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[scottiemedic]

I'm rather new to overclocking. I used to OC Celeron 300 Slot 1's back in the day, that's how long it's been. My setup: ASUS P5Q3 S775 with a Q8200. I have 4 sticks of DDR3 (yes, DDR3) RAM. I have 2x2GB OCZ Platinum 1333 and 2x2GB OCZ Platinum 1600, both are 1.65V (hey, they were a steal of a price). I also have an Arctic Cooling Freezer XTreme HSF.

I've gone into the BIOS and made the following adjustments:
Changed CAS to OCZ recommended 7-7-7-16.
CPU FSB to 450 (locked 7x multiplier)

Numbers reported by HWMonitor:
CPU Vcore 1.36
SYSTIN 37C
CPUTIN 28C
AUXTIN 34C
Core 0 40C (always higher, could my thermal paste be thin or weak in that area?)
Core 1 30C
Core 2 35C
Core 3 35C

GPU Core 42C

Timings @533 7-7-7-16 @451 6-6-6-14 @380 5-5-5-12
DRAM:FSB 1:1

NB 1.1V
SB 1.1V

That's it, and I'm loving this board for OCing...
So, when I go to 475FSB (3.3ish GHz), it boots into windows and runs for awhile, then locks up, no BSOD, just freezes. At anything higher, I cant get my machine to POST. Where should I go next for increasing speed? Should I mess with CPU Volts? White papers from Intel state this proc runs .85-1.3625V so I'm at the upper limit of that now. The volts are AUTO in the BIOS, could that be why it reads so high? I read that the proc tends to supply too many volts even when not needed.


FYI, ALL TEMPS ARE IDLE TEMPS!!!

 

[saaiello]

The Q8200 is THE worst overclocker quad CPU ever you should consider yourself lucky you got to 3.1ghz. Core 0 will always be warmer has nothing to do with thermal paste 1 core will always be favored over another. As for your voltage i would not go much over 1.36 now have you stressed tested this at 3.1 yet?

 

[scottiemedic]

No stress testing yet, just wanted to play with the numbers first...

 

[saaiello]

Check out this article on the Q8200

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/overclock-phenom-pentium,2366-12.html?xtmc=q8200&xtcr=1

Also i have experience with that chip i have one in a computer i use for video rendering the most i could get stable was 2.9ghz at around 1.35 volts anything more then that was very unstable but at 2.9 ghz runs very well. For my gameing rig i use a E8200 which i have running 3.8 daily but can go higher easily.

To help overclock on that ASUS board enable load line calibration

 

[scottiemedic]

Found the happy medium for now, 430 FSB is stable in Prime. at 3.2Ghz it would fail everytime. I'm happy with my little 2.33 running at 3.01.

 

[saaiello]

Thats a solid overclock for a Q8200 good job man.

 

[scottiemedic]

Thanks!! I was wondering if everyone would look at my BIOS settings, make sure I didn't forget anything... I've opened a new thread in the Overclocking/Motherboard section...

 

[steadfast1984]

with a Q8200, i wouldn't O/C that baby any faster then 3.0GHz at the most. your really running your Vcore at the point where it just deteriorates the CPU very quickly. take her down a few notches, or invest in a better Socket 775 chip. I know you can pump up the q9400 up to 3.2 maybe 3.4 with lower voltages around 1.26 and on load 1.30. and the q9550 can go up to 3.4 no problem. If you wanna go faster then that, id suggest going to i5 or i7cpu, but that means buying a new mobo. you DONT wanna have to much VCORE it seriously just wrecks your chip.

 

[scottiemedic]

Best answer selected by scottiemedic.