Overclocking Need Help!

im not a pro either and am having my own issues, but I have heard people say lower the CPU PLL a little and it can help stabalize an overclock. I think stock is like 1.8 and lower it to 1.791? Just 1 or 2 clicks down on that board, i have the same board, my issues are that i keep getting random power outtages, i hope my board isnt bad =[

i had my pll down to like 1.71 or whatever was the one closest to 1.7. I heard some people were having issues with this board and I hope mine isn't a bad one. I don't know if not having a graphic card effects it or anything since it will arrive tomorrow. I put in quite a bit of time trying to figure it all out but I just don't know what to do, even at 1.285 volts a cored instantly errors in prime95. Sometimes on my cpuz it doesn't show my multiplier correctly. I don't know if thats normal or not.

Mine crashes a lot too, im almost wondering if these boards arent bad, and i have not been able to run it stable with anything below 1.3vs, i get blue screens if i have it below that. Same cpu too btw, our rigs are almost identical other than ram and heatsink. my ram is g.skill ripjaws x 1600, and im on a hyper 212 air heatsink

its a shame too, its a beautiful looking board

I know, thats what I thought aswell. Nothing seems to be wrong, I mean if its a bad board, I'll gladly send it back and upgrade to something better, but I heard so many good reviews, people even reach 5ghz on it. Iuno what to do.

A friend of mine also had trouble getting 4.5ghz stable on his 2500k. He eventually got it though. He told me that it was one setting in the bios that was stopping him. His motherboard is an ASus z68 gen3, which should be VERY similar to your asrock board. Maximum recommended vcore on air cooling is ~1.4 so don't be afraid to test 1.3, especially since you are water cooled. I wouldn't go too far though, since 4.5 should be pretty easy. I will ask him for you, and post exact settings here soon.

a starting point for a 4.5 ghz overclock is 1.325 and your not even close to it. you guys are fine keep putting voltage to it.

I got it to run prime95 for 30 minutes at 4.5 with a volt of 1.35. Is that good? Would I get better performance from a higher quality board. My temps weren't getting high at all, one core going to max 61 celcius with my h60 in just a pull set up atm

I think after about an hour of prime95 you can assume that your vcore is stable because you arent getting any blue screens, so now you can run prime95 overnight and start the 24 hour test to see if its fully stable

It seems you got it all right. Found out that he had changed default settings on accident, so it would not have helped you anyway. He also has a vcore of 1.35 though, and his is very stable.

Your temps are good. I think for longevity, most say to keep temps below 70'c and vcore at or below 1.35v. Anything higher will reduce lifespan, but it's not known by how long. 4.5Ghz seems to be the norm, and anything higher is more for bragging rights.

It looks like most 2500k cpus will be able to hit 4.5 pretty easily. But it's the luck of the draw. Unfortunately, there will be a very few unlucky ones (like myself) that will hit the wall and can't OC that much. I can only go as high as 4.3Ghz stable. Anything higher crashes or BSODs. Not able to get past the wall no matter what I do and I've tried for months.

I don't think a better mobo will change anything. It's going to be dependent on how lucky you got with the cpu. The cpu will have certain tolerances and none of us can tell what that will be as each cpu will be different. There are some that can acheive 4.7-5.0 Ghz on very low voltage (below the average) for example. Don't expect you can do the same.

Edit: You can also do IBT ~20 standard passes and ~10 maximum passes to see if you are stable (on top of P95). Sometimes it can detect instability that P95 can't pick up. But it will really stress the system and result in higher temps than that shown in P95.

hes right. my chip can go all the way to 5.0 all the way with what i believe a little above average temps but none the less it can go to 5.0 but as soon as the multi goes to 51 it will not boot. no matter what i try. disappointing cause i really wanted to get a 10 in cinebench.

ok some one solve my issue now O.O

whats your issue? all i see you say is that your cant get it stable under 1.3v which doesnt mean much.

I now have another question for my own computer. I just got the same h60 cooler using an msi p67-gd65A with an i5-2500k. I am trying to overclock it as well but my temps seem crazy high already. I am only running a 4.5 overclock as well so far on this system and a voltage of 1.3 in bios, but showing 1.375 in cpuz. Just like my girlfriends system I have the h60 only in a pull system and after only 20min of prim my temps are hitting 70-79 which seems a bit high for this cooler, especially since I have another system to compare it too. Even the idle temps before starting the oc seemed higher ranging from 30-40 vs my other one which was sitting right at 28-21.

your voltage is too high

what should it be at. any lower and its not working.

4.5 at 1.375 volts is really high. what did you set in the nios

adjust cpu ratio OS disabled
internal pll overvoltage enabled
eist enabled
intel turbo boost disabled dram is at auto 1333hz
spread spectrum disabled
vdroop set to low vdroop
core volt 1.33
imit cpuid max disabled
intel c state enabled
package c state limit set to no limit

you said 1.375 and now its 1.33? what is it?

if those are really your settings then it must be your cooler or your case flow. check you have good case flow by taking off the side panel and check temps again.

i said it was set to 1.3 in the bios in my original post but the core voltage in cpuz shows higher. The side panel is already off and I am using a haf 922 so my case flow has always been good. some people have said with the h60 if its mount badly it won't work, but I just mounted one without issue so i don't think it could be that.

My issue is on the front general overclocking page with all the details if you wouldnt mind looking at it for me, thanks!