OC'd AMD Phenom II X4 945 is slower than stock speed

Rafael Mestdag · Nov 2, 2015

Whenever I OC my CPU, at first it seems faster, then I start to notice it's actually slower, the games become laggy and the loading times are a lot longer. Why is it?

My Rig:

Phenom II X4 945
nVidia GT630
Seagate 500GB 7200 Rpm SATA II
Asus M2N68-AM
4GB RAM DDR2
PSU: Generic 500 Watts

unksol · Nov 2, 2015

Possibly because it's not stable or the PSU is unstable.

GPU is extremely low end as well.

photonboy · Nov 2, 2015

You can monitor your CPU frequency in the Task Manager-> Performance-> CPU (CTRL-ALT-DEL).

If the overclock is NOT dropping then I don't see how your overclock is affecting anything. If it IS dropping then it may be THERMAL throttling due to insufficient cooling.

I also recommend running MEMTEST www.memtest.org (full pass), and a CPU diagnostic. Prime95 might not be the best one but I use Intel so use the Intel CPU diagnostic utility. Not sure if AMD has one of their own.

Other:
I'm not sure what CPU COOLER you have. The Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO is a lot better than the stock cooler and fairly cheap. If interested verify it's compatible with your case and motherboard.

Other:
As said your GPU is pretty low-end. I did a comparison and I think it was something like 4X slower than a GTX750Ti. It has 8X less cores than the comparable architecture GTX680 and a lower frequency to boot so might be closer to 10X less performance than that.

Passmark GT630: http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=GeForce+GT+630

Passmark GTX750Ti: http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=GeForce+GTX+750+Ti

*I'm not trying to make fun, but rather recommending you investigate getting a GTX750Ti, or go as high as a GTX950. The amount of CPU bottleneck will vary by the game but some modern games with your CPU and one of these GPU's will be quite playable.

Tomb Raider for example would probably play quite well.

*Note that AMD GPU's are not recommended with that CPU as their poor DX11 drivers are very prone to cause CPU bottlenecking and performance loss when pairing a relatively weak CPU with AMD GPU's.

GPU performance
(CPU bottleneck will affect this, and vary a lot by the game but you can still compare the GPU order.)
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/EVGA/GTX_950_SSC/30.html

*The GTX950 is over 5X faster than the GT630 (again with better CPU) for reference.

Prices (USA):

$95 (after rebate) for Asus GTX750Ti 2GB:
http://pcpartpicker.com/part/asus-video-card-gtx750tioc2gd5

GTX950... Cheapest is $140 (after $10 MIR and $10 code) so I'm not sure if the value is there for your system. Investigate more if interested.

Cheers.

photonboy · Nov 2, 2015

Update:
If you have Windows 7 or 8, then you may wish to consider upgrading to Windows 10.

It's pretty stable now. More importantly in some cases it seems to have better CPU support. I'm not quite sure of the details but I've tested a lot of systems that got upgraded. I don't know how much is just due to having a CLEAN INSTALL, or how much is due to better CPU and/or System memory support.

A lot of people see no difference.

Anyway, my advice if interested for gaming is again:
1) upgrade to GTX750Ti, and
2) upgrade to Windows 10

*Make sure you have 64-bit Windows not 32-bit or you can't access much of your System Memory.

**Upgrading to Windows 10 will be easier with an upcoming release this month (date unsure). They are making it so you can burn a DVD or USB stick from the ISO image (downloaded from Media Creation Tool) but rather than Upgrade from W7/W8 to Windows 10 before then doing a Clean Install, they are allowing a Clean Install right away. I think it will go like THIS:

a) download media creation tool and run
b) choose option to download ISO image
c) Burn ISO to DVD (imgburn) or thumb drive (Rufus)... older motherboard may not support USB boot (not sure)
d) Boot to Install Media and enter Windows 7/8 serial during install
e) finish install, upgrade drivers, add programs etc.

The above may not be exact, and of course you want to PLAN your path. If in doubt then just first upgrade directly from Windows and keep your programs and see if that's stable.

gamerk316 · Nov 2, 2015

Could be temperature related. Either that, or the OC isn't stable.

RobCrezz · Nov 2, 2015

Are you using the stock CPU cooler? Getting too hot and throttling?

Rafael Mestdag · Nov 2, 2015

RobCrezz :

I'm using an aftermarket cooler with two fans and my stock average temperature simply using Windows is 42°C.

RobCrezz · Nov 2, 2015

Do you have heatsink on your VRMS? perhaps they are overheating and throttling.

Rafael Mestdag · Nov 2, 2015

RobCrezz :

What's a VRMS?

RobCrezz · Nov 2, 2015

Voltage Regulator modules

Can you see these things circled, or are they under a heatsink?

Rafael Mestdag · Nov 2, 2015

RobCrezz :

I can see them, there are 3 on my motherboard, they're not under the heatsink.

RobCrezz · Nov 2, 2015

Rafael Mestdag :

Its very possible they are overheating when overclocking causing the throttling you are experiencing. Fairly common on the lower end AMD motherboards.

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