What happened? Overclocking fail

RedFalconHayabusa

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Jul 18, 2013
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Well I'm a noob at overclocking so I attempted to overclock for the first time on my A4-3300 locked multiplier 2.5ghz APU.

I got it to 2.6ghz and it was fairly stable and temps were around 50-55 on full load.
I wanted to go higher so I changed the frequency to 2.65 and slightly increased the voltage in both the ram and cpu.
I selected save and reboot but the PC wouldn't boot up properly.
It said on my monitor that my pc was in power saving mode; move mouse, press a key on the keyboard or power button.
The pc sounded like it was booting up as normal, it made 1 beeping sound when it booted up as normal.

So I couldn't do anything. I was going to reset the bios from the motherboard but I decided to plug in my dedicated graphics card in and hook my monitor into that instead.
And now my pc works.

What happened?
 
Solution
I believe I understand what you're saying, but you aren't grasping what I'm trying to say, so I'm gonna try to explain what I'm speculating even further.

On the APU, there is a CPU and a GPU. Now, when there is no dedicated graphics card being used, the CPU and GPU both use the voltage given to it. Say, 1.3V, for example, is what the CPU needs to run 2.6 GHz and the GPU needs to work. When you up the frequency to 2.65 GHz, the CPU may get enough voltage, but the GPU does not, and thus it doesn't work (even if you upped the voltage a little). Then, when you plug in the graphics card, the GPU on the APU is shut off, so it doesn't need any voltage, so all of the set voltage is going straight to the CPU. Thus, the CPU overclock becomes...

ihog

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Let me explain. It's doubtful that you destroyed the APU's graphics, but the APU's graphics aren't being used when you plug in the dedicated graphics card, and thus, the APU's graphics don't need any voltage. Now, the only CPU part of the APU is being used and is getting all of the voltage. So, it needs less voltage to keep the clocks you set.

This is speculation, though.
 

RedFalconHayabusa

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Jul 18, 2013
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I think you've misunderstood me, I'm not asking why the graphics in the APU isn't being used when my dedicated gpu is plugged in and how, I'm asking why my computer wasn't booting properly (screen said pc was in power saving mode) after I increased the cpu frequency from 2.6ghz to 2.65ghz. I did slightly increase the voltage in the cpu.

Now the way I fixed this was by plugging in my dedicated GPU (which wasn't in whilst I was overclocking) then connecting my monitor to that instead of the port in my motherboard.
 

ihog

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I believe I understand what you're saying, but you aren't grasping what I'm trying to say, so I'm gonna try to explain what I'm speculating even further.

On the APU, there is a CPU and a GPU. Now, when there is no dedicated graphics card being used, the CPU and GPU both use the voltage given to it. Say, 1.3V, for example, is what the CPU needs to run 2.6 GHz and the GPU needs to work. When you up the frequency to 2.65 GHz, the CPU may get enough voltage, but the GPU does not, and thus it doesn't work (even if you upped the voltage a little). Then, when you plug in the graphics card, the GPU on the APU is shut off, so it doesn't need any voltage, so all of the set voltage is going straight to the CPU. Thus, the CPU overclock becomes stable, or at least stable enough to boot. (This is all speculation.)

Now, does the APU's GPU not work anymore (without the dedicated card plugged in), even if you dial back the overclock to where you had it?
 
Solution

RedFalconHayabusa

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Jul 18, 2013
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Oh thanks I understand now. I will unplug my dedicated GPU later and test if my computer still boots at the default frequency and volts, bit busy atm.