Hello Alec5442,
I was apprehensive when I first started but after you gain the right knowledge and experience you can actually have your cpu running cooler than stock most of the time or even at load with an OC vs default settings depending on a number of factors. So in my case for example I have a 24/7 OC on my i7 3770k at 4.4GHz. Before I left everything at stock settings and when I simply did some video conversions my load temps shot through the roof hitting 80-90c! I was pissed! I started playing around with overclocking and got to a point where under the most stressful testing my cpu barely gets over 60c now with the overclock! So I'm running both faster and cooler! It's so much better. As added pre-caution I purchased the intel warranty:
http://click.intel.com/tuningplan/purchase-a-plan
For only $25.00 I was covered. Keep in mind you aren't covered till 30 days after purchase. This helps intel prevent people who've already burnt their chips from retroactively abusing such a program.
Anyhow, again I have a Intel i7 3770K 4.4GHz 1.145 Vcore + .085 manual offset. I recommend learning how to OC yourself btw. It's attractive to try the quick oc programs out there but you'll find you tend to overvolt and thus overheat more with those OC settings. It takes some repetition but is completely worth the effort! Remember you want stability with your OC as well as low temps and with the right tweaks and some patience you'll get there! Now I am speaking in generalities and there are definite success stories out there outside of what I'm sharing here but you will probably find in the long run that with your cooler properly mounted and overclocked you can have better performance with your oc and perhaps better temps like I'm getting. It all depends on how good of a chip you got too. Just be methodical and you should be fine! Best of luck! So, yeah it can be not only safe but better! Obviously it can be very dangerous if you are hasty, so just take your time and learn. It's very rewarding! Again, good luck!
On another note though, with your components, the GTX 780 should be more than adequate to keep you at well over 60fps most of the time, according to guru3d (
http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/geforce_gtx_780_ti_review,16.html ) on a ti version there are some dips to no less than 50fps but that's less than 20% of the time. Overclocking both the card and the gpu will help overcome this to a greater extent. Gains can be substantial while keeping heat to a minimum. You just have to know what you are doing. Make sure your cpu OC is absolutely stable first (ie runs prime95 for a few hours without blue screening etc.) or you will find yourself running in mad circles trying to figure out how to get your gpu right. If you're too iffy on all this then try first without any OC and you'll probably be just fine and happy but if you can put the right time in and get it right, you'll be even happier! If you're not a very patient person that's when you'll run into problems. Some say you can push to 80 or 95c; I hit that when I was running at 4.8 to 5.0GHz but I don't recommend it. I'm just not comfortable running near the throttle point. I'd say an OC that stays below 80c is much safer. In most games with current cards you should hover around 60-70c max if you have a pretty solid OC. When testing and finding your limits you'll probably run past that often and will just have to tweak and adjust as needed till you get all the details to your liking (highest OC with lowest temp that doesn't crash or hang). So, I hope this all helps! Have fun!
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