Bad luck or Inexperiance?

[Cyberstatic1013]

So ive had my new computer for 5 months now, and im looking at trying to OC it a little more but not sure if I should try and risk breaking a great computer.

This is my system:
C2D E6600 2.4ghz @ 2.93ghz (Watercooled)
Asus P5W DH Deluxe
OCZ Platinum 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 1000mhz (PC2 8000)
OCZ GameXStream 700 watt PSU
BFG 8800GTS 640mb (Watercooled)

I pulled the metal covers off the north and south bridges on the mobo and added a 40mm fan on each of their heat sinks as well. I also have the optional fan installed on the CPU's voltage regulator heat sink. The case is an extremely well ventelated full tower with 3 80mm 74 cfm Thermal take fans sucking air in at the front, and 3 of the same fans on the back for exaust.

I obviously built the system with the intention of OC'ing it, but I was only able to get to about 3.06 ghz before it became unstable and I was no longer able to boot correctly. Ive read many guides to OC'ing on this board/cpu combo, and I turned off all the unnecissary stuff in the bios. I adjusted the FSB/Ram ratio as I went to keep the ram at or under it's rated 1000mhz but it seemed no matter what I did I couldent get past around the 3ghz mark.

I know alot of other people, the majority in fact can get past 3.0ghz with cheaper components running on stock air cooling and it's hard to believe I cant get past 3ghz with the setup I have. So my question is this do you think I was just unlucky and got a chip that doesnt want to OC past 3ghz or that im doing something wrong? Im at work right now so I cant post my exact bios settings but I will do that when I get home.

Thanks for any info or input anyone can provide.

 

[little_scrapper]

what settings have you tried so far?

 

[Cyberstatic1013]

Well im back at home tinkering, and I actually discovered something thanks to the story of one of the other newbies here that was having trouble. There are certain frequencies that for some reason my processor doesnt like, but other higher frequencies work just fine. Here is the OC'ing ive done so far this morning listed by the base clock speed.

333 - GOOD
338 - GOOD
348 - GOOD
358 - BAD
378 - GOOD
388 - BAD
400 - GOOD

For clarification by good I mean booted fine and ran through 15 min of stress testing on the CPU and memory with good voltages, temps, and without crashing. I know my frequency graduations are a bit strange but when I get a crash im just jumping it up a bit and it seems to be working.
As you can see I was unstable at 348 and 388 but perfectly stable at 400.

Edit: well 3.6ghz(400) was the highest I could get it to go and still be stable without jacking the voltages up higher which I dont want to do. Still a 1.2ghz OC isnt to shabby at all, I think I can live with it