Where might my bottleneck lie?

[legolas0008]

Here's the build I made a week or so ago. I was wondering if there's any way to tweak out a bit more performance, or if there's not really much else I can do with what I have.

i5-2500K clocked at 4.2Ghz
EVGA GTX 560 Ti at 950 core, 1900 shader, 2150 memory
8GB unmodified G.Skill DDR3 at 1333
ASRock Z68 Extreme3 Gen3 motherboard
2x Caviar Black HDDs, one 1.5TB, one 1TB

What might be the "low" point of my setup, and can that be changed?

 

[kelthic]

Could add an SSD.

 

[aqe040466]

Here's the build I made a week or so ago. I was wondering if there's any way to tweak out a bit more performance, or if there's not really much else I can do with what I have.

i5-2500K clocked at 4.2Ghz
EVGA GTX 560 Ti at 950 core, 1900 shader, 2150 memory
8GB unmodified G.Skill DDR3 at 1333
ASRock Z68 Extreme3 Gen3 motherboard
2x Caviar Black HDDs, one 1.5TB, one 1TB

What might be the "low" point of my setup, and can that be changed?

Overclock the CPU to a stable performance

 

[legolas0008]

Overclock the CPU to a stable performance

Stable performance? How far should I push it? Right now temps are perfectly manageable, mid-60s in Prime95, mid-40s in all but the biggest games.

 

[aqe040466]

Stable performance? How far should I push it? Right now temps are perfectly manageable, mid-60s in Prime95, mid-40s in all but the biggest games.

4.7 GHZ 1.35V Vcore

 

[legolas0008]

4.7 GHZ 1.35V Vcore

I can't seem to get settings like that working properly. I've tried various combinations of 4.6, 4.7, and 4.8 with voltages of 1.35, 1.36, etc. Most of the time it won't even load the post, but one single time I got it to Windows, where it immediately bluescreened. Should I be doing anything with the other settings, like spread spectrum or internal pll voltage?

 

[aqe040466]

I can't seem to get settings like that working properly. I've tried various combinations of 4.6, 4.7, and 4.8 with voltages of 1.35, 1.36, etc. Most of the time it won't even load the post, but one single time I got it to Windows, where it immediately bluescreened. Should I be doing anything with the other settings, like spread spectrum or internal pll voltage?

Are you using an aftermarket CPU cooler(air or liquid)?

 

[lowjack989]

@ legolas0008---> 4.2 GHz on that chip is extremely fast, like some of the others have posted just add a SATA III SSD with at least a 120 GB capacity...That will increase your whole computer experience, and if you run a SSD RAID Array...Lightning quick..So the only weak spot I see is .....Get an SSD with SATA III interface.

 

[legolas0008]

Are you using an aftermarket CPU cooler(air or liquid)?

I'm using the Cooler Master V6GT air cooler. The temps on the CPU are great, but when I try to push it past 4.2 it won't even boot/POST.

And for the other responses, thanks a bunch. I can already do pretty much everything I need to, but I was just wondering if I could push out any further performance from my current hardware. I do plan on getting at least a couple SSDs in the future, so I imagine once that happens it'll be perfect enough for my tastes.

 

[legolas0008]

Best answer selected by legolas0008.