Q6600 overclock help needed

[wonder44]

Hi.

Im trying to overclock my Q6600 to 3.8GHz or even 4GHz.

The problem is when i get past 3.5Ghz it becoms unstable. Itl eitha freeze at the welcom screen or freeze when running a stress test. anything past 3.8ghz it will load windows to the point where the boot animation starts then just crashes, with a split second view of the blue screen. i have had voltage upto 1.52v which is as high as i will go for voltage.

my mobo is a Nvidia 780i 3-way sli version.

Also i have 800mhz ddr2 ram, could this be causing problems? Do i need to change ram timings to a certain settings to get the oc stable?

Thanks for any help. Also i have a 650w PSU with a gtx 285, i say this because i heard you need a good psu for good oc headroom. Thanks

 

[rubix_1011]

800mhz DDR2 would be one issue. Are you running unlinked RAM/FSB? In reference to your timings, looser timings often help when initially trying to reach a target speed and then tighten them as you narrow it down.

Also note that depending on what chip revision (B3/G0) and VID, your chip might not make it past 3.4 or 3.5.

There isn't a single 'list of settings' to overclocking, so most of it is trial and error...but also knowing where to start and where to stop.

 

[wonder44]

800mhz DDR2 would be one issue. Are you running unlinked RAM/FSB? In reference to your timings, looser timings often help when initially trying to reach a target speed and then tighten them as you narrow it down.

Also note that depending on what chip revision (B3/G0) and VID, your chip might not make it past 3.4 or 3.5.

There isn't a single 'list of settings' to overclocking, so most of it is trial and error...but also knowing where to start and where to stop.

Hi thank you for your reply.

I have the G0 revision. Is there anyway of finding out the VID as i dont have the box. Will cpu-z help? So you ar saying that ddr2 is my main problem here? I also canot change the ram ration. ex: 1:1. the option in my bios is greyd out.

Thanks

 

[rubix_1011]

CPU-z should tell you the vid, yes.

I had a 780i and 790i EVGA board and the unlink option was for sure available on the DDR3 790i, but I thought it also was on the 780i DDR2 board...but possible it might not have been. A 1.0ghz overclock on this chip was pretty substantial, so 3.4 isn't anything to scoff about. Very, very, VERY few Q6600 chips were stable beyond 3.6ghz and a minuscule number were able to hit 4.0 (although this required near-perfect hardware and cooling).

Is there a reason that 3.4 isn't good enough? Why are you trying to reach 3.8? The Q6600 at 3.2 or 3.4 is still a very viable processor today for almost any task you'd use an i5 for.

 

[wonder44]

Im coming back to thread people. Ok, my VID is 1.2500. this is what real temp 3.70 tells me as CPU does not show me :/ so my question is, what voltage would you think i would need at 3.5ghz? thanks

 

[rubix_1011]

My VID was 1.2250 which is lower than yours but still needed 1.47500 in order to remain stable over 3.4ghz.

The only way you are going to know is for you to test it and see what is stable under the highest load possible- I used 10 passes of Intel Burn Test.

 

[wonder44]

also, does it matter if voltage is slightly over the recommended value? as long as temps are under conrtol? i just had 3.5ghz wich was stable for a little while but crysis then had froze, the second time was a graphics issue. il try raising the voltage everytime it freezes, but if i need to go above 1.55v to keep it stable il just stick to 3.2ghz

 

[wonder44]

Ok im at 3.60ghz with a voltage of 1.47 on the core. Is this a good overclock? is it too much or too less voltage? Thanks again

 

[rubix_1011]

That isn't something I can tell you; what are your temps? I think you don't want to go over 1.5v on vcore for those chips, so under that is fine as long as it's stable and your voltage isn't higher than it needs to be to remain stable.

 

[wonder44]

That isn't something I can tell you; what are your temps? I think you don't want to go over 1.5v on vcore for those chips, so under that is fine as long as it's stable and your voltage isn't higher than it needs to be to remain stable.

Hi thanks for the reply. It hangs around 37-38c idle and is 61c max temp on load. I am using watercooling so that helps

 

[wonder44]

my mistake, i am getting 51c load. typo :/