Question on Overclocking P5N-E SLI

[vanka]

I want to put together a budget Core 2 Duo system (thinking of using the E4400 and overclocking it to 2.6) and have almost settled on the Asus P5N-E SLI board. I was wondering of anyone out there has any experience with this board.

As I said I want to take an E4400 to 2.6GHz, so that means a FSB of 266. I would also like to use DDR2-1066 RAM with this board for the added performance of a 1:1 RAM/FSB ratio; but the specs say it supports DDR2-800 and no word of DDR2-1066 support.

I would appreciate any comments, insights, or advice you can give.

 

[lmimmfn]

oops thought you meant the p5n32-e sli, my bad 8O

 

[dragonsprayer]

first set your pci-x to 100, turn off all auto controls for cpu

remember to check your cpu temps in the bios and physically feel the memory and nb. You need to add a 40mm fan to nb if you are over 1200fsb, if your system crashes in heavy gaming and nb is hot add this fan mod. The 40mm fan will screw into the aluminum slots with 3/4" sheet metal screws.

Set your fsb to 1500 375x9 = for 3.4ghz you may have to settle for a little as 1200fsb. set your cpu voltage to 1.45 (1.4 to 1.5max) - you can lower it later 1.38-1.42v

if you can not boot into 1500-1400 fsb try lowing your multiplier to 8

set your ddr speed below its rating - i.e. ddr 800 set it 720 or so
set your latencys and your ram voltage. set one at a time if you have 4-4-4-12 ddr 800, if it locks up try 4-4-5-12, set the 1 or 2 last or leave it at auto

set your ram freq to its normal setting and voltage - if it works set the voltage higher try to oc the ram. must ram runs at 2.1v good ram runs at 2.2.v over 2.3v you may have problems with ram degrading as with the 680i chipset.



set your nb/memory contoller if you use fsb 1500 use the second or third setting- i think its 1.55v. p5b-e likes auto setting so set it last.


you should end up with

4-4-4-12-1 Vmem= 2.1-2.2v or 4-4-4-12-auto
2.8-3.4ghz with mutliplier of 8 or 9 with fsb of 1400-1500
Vcore = 1.42 or so


you want a fast clean boot into windows after you get it tuned - if you system is haning up or crashing loading windows - your memory is too fast or too low of voltage in almost all cases.



I built and shipped 3, 3.4ghz systems last 2 weeks with e6600's and these settings! The e4300 has the potential to run the same speed with its 9x multiplier. The bottom is antec 900 and the top NXZT! Note: the memory cooler and 40mm fan on the p5n-e.

Also note both systems run with a stock intel cooler! no need for any expensive cooler at 3.4ghz.

iHint: if you get hung up at certain cpu speed try a lower multiplier and and higher fsb see which has a lower temp in the bios that is the right multiplier in many cases!

2nd - remember to load windows ad default settings and if you crash its the memory!

 

[vanka]

Well thanks for your reply; but I am already familiar with overclocking. I was wondering if anyone had any experience with the P5N-E SLI and could share their impressions of the board and its overclocking potential.

 

[pmr]

Well thanks for your reply; but I am already familiar with overclocking. I was wondering if anyone had any experience with the P5N-E SLI and could share their impressions of the board and its overclocking potential.

mine went to 3.2Ghz on stock vcore, vdimm, vchipset. Raised vcore to 1.45 or so and did post at near 3.6 (stock cooling!!!) but i went down again, I just wanted to check how far it would go.

Great OC mobo with great bios features (bios 0505 ftw) that allows you to run the ram at any speed independently from the cpu fsb.

WARNING: as DragonSprayer said, a 40mm fan on the NB is needed when going high speeds, but beware: put the fan on the left side of the NB HS, because when on the right side it blows air to the PWM sensor, and it won't allow the CPU fan to rotate at the normal speeds

 

[vanka]

So you were able to get a FSB of 400MHz? How about the RAM? You say that the board allows to run the RAM FSB independant of the CPU FSB; but does it go up to 1066?

 

[pmr]

I saw in a forum (I don't know which one) of guys running 1000+mhz. Mine is 533 and it wont go past 700, so, I didn't experienced that.

As for the fsb, I think it was 390ish x 9, around 1580fsb. But I believe it wasn't near stable. I don't believe you can stay stable past 3.4ghz. I'll try next week with a new cooler

Check this review

http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2894&p=1

 

[vanka]

Thanks for the info.

 

[pmr]

tested again and I have some news.
3.5Ghz (1556fsb) stable (ORTHOS, MEMTEST), ram 600Mhz 4-4-4-12 1T only with bumped vcore to 1.45.

AC Freezer 7 Pro @ 2100rpm Q-Fan enabled:
Full load ORTHOS - 64ºc

Either way, forget 1066 ram. 800Mhz is more than enough running a 9 multiplier

 

[13thmonkey]

I want to put together a budget Core 2 Duo system (thinking of using the E4400 and overclocking it to 2.6) and have almost settled on the Asus P5N-E SLI board. I was wondering of anyone out there has any experience with this board.

As I said I want to take an E4400 to 2.6GHz, so that means a FSB of 266. I would also like to use DDR2-1066 RAM with this board for the added performance of a 1:1 RAM/FSB ratio; but the specs say it supports DDR2-800 and no word of DDR2-1066 support.

I would appreciate any comments, insights, or advice you can give.

266 FSB means 533 memory, not 1066, I think.

so you'd end up with your RAM running at 2x the speed of the FSB, i.e. 2:1 not 1:1. Not sure if that is needed.

 

[sgtdisturbed47sgtd]

*snip* sorry for thread invasion. I'll make my own.

 

[vanka]

266 FSB means 533 memory, not 1066, I think.

Well yes and no. DDR2 has a chip clock and a bus clock with the chip clock being half the speed of the bus clock. So if you consider bus clock speed then yes DDR2-533 would provide the 1:1 ratio. I wanted to go with DDR2-1066 for the higher bandwidth; but has any one done a performance comparison of low-latency DDR2-533 with DDR2-1066?