FX-8350 + ASUS M5A99X Overclocking

Hey, I wouldn't mind some screens or details of what you have changed in the UEFI Bios. I have just bought the FX-8350 - although am running on the M5A97 Pro..

So far I'm not having much fun trying in the overclocking department in terms of stability - I'm sort of learning about it on the fly - but I am yet to find a guide that translates well to the UEFI Bios

Sure adz, I will try to get some screenshots for you tonight. By the way, I'm stable @ 5.0GHz at the moment.  

Wowsers! That's pretty good going! What are your temps like?

Well, I have two 250CFM fans coming tonight for my radiator (setting them up push/pull style)... They are 120mm x 38mm, so I got longer 6-32 screws from the hardware store. Fans I've got on there now each move 120CFM, and I generally see idle temps around 38-40 deg C (it's incredibly warm in my downstairs, 80+ degrees). Then under a full load I'm seeing around 58 deg C with a 1.51v core voltage. FWIW, in most games the CPU doesn't get over 52 deg C. Again though, this is with 120CFM fans. I anticipate the temps will drop 5-7 deg C with these crazy new jet turbine like fans.   Haha

Not as High as I thought it would be! And yeah, I've noticed Temperatures soar during Prime95 tests for example, but don't quite get as high during gameplay. I'm almost at my wits end with my system at the moment!

I just can't get it running anywhere near where I expected it to when I bought the bits.

I'm pretty sure I'm not setting up the overclock right, because I would expect higher benchmark scores than I'm getting mainly seem to be falling over on physics and combined scores on 3dmark 11 (compared to searches for similar hardware setups on 3dmark website)

specs are in my profile if curious!

Trust me, I totally understand where you're coming from. I was in that same boat when I was trying to get my initial overclock stable. :\ It was beyond frustrating, and with this new UEFI BIOS it can be a bit intimidating. There are FAR more settings than I was ever used to dealing with when I had my ASUS P6X58D. Lastly, it's worth noting that I switched from the TT Water 2.0 Performer to the Water 2.0 Pro. The Pro has a radiator which is roughly twice as thick as the Performer's. I also threw the two 120mm fans it came with right in the garbage, and switched them out for higher flow fans.

First off, what are your goals as far as your overclock is concerned? How far are you looking to take the system? Secondly, what have you changed thus far in the BIOS?

Vcore - ???
CPU clock and multi - ???
NB/CPU voltage - ???
NB freq - ???
HT freq - ???
LLC - ???
APM and CPU - ??? (Hopefully 'Disabled')
RAM voltage - ???
RAM timing -???
Phase power - ???

That's just grazing the tip of the iceberg, but it'd help to know what your goals are and what your current settings are.   You'll get there. Just be persistent and be determined. Remember, correct overclocking is incredibly time consuming, and can consist of a lot of trial and error at times. Just be very cautious, go up in small increments, and watch those temps.

I don't know why the hell it won't let me edit that last message... No reason I shouldn't be able to. Anyway, it's supposed to read "APM and EPU", not "APM and CPU". The EPU is an energy saving feature, and should be disabled.

At the moment, with the exception of the power saving etc, everything is set to Auto. I did fiddle about with the multiplier and the voltages a little last night But have gone back down to stock as high temps and the old BSOD were becoming an issue on full load.

Basically my goal is to squeeze as much out of my system as possible, I'm not overly concerned with energy efficiency, but this rig is mainly only on to game. To be honest, the only game that even got me thinking about upgrading the sodding thing was ARMA II, which as I'm sure you are aware is insanely processor intensive! On paper it all looked great, but something, somewhere is going wrong as i'm pulling pretty low frame rates (15-20fps average. and that's offline!) And I'm pretty sure with what I have I should be getting more.

As for overclocking - where I'm hitting a wall is understanding what everything in the UEFI bios means, I've found plenty of tutorials for overclocking etc, but most of them don't use the same terminology as what is in my Bios, and there don't seem to be many people that use it! So you can imagine my excitement when I saw you and your fairly similar set up!


Operating System : Windows 8 64bit
Processor:AMD FX-8350 stock @ 4ghz
Motherboard and RAM: ASUS M5A97 Pro
RAM: AMD /Patriot 2x4GB 1600mhz
Graphics Card: Asus ATI Radeon 7950 HD 900MHz 3GB PCI-Express 3.0 HDMI TOP OC
Hard Drive: OCZ Agility 3
Case: Can\'t remember - picked up from PC world
Power Supply: As above 750W though
Cooling: Corsair Hydro H80i

I totally get where you're coming from. For example, people may ask "do you have Load Line Calibration (LLC) enabled?", while in the UEFI BIOS it's not simply "Enabled" or "Disabled". It's something like "Disabled, low, medium, high, extreme". Same with Full Phase power, if I recall correctly. In any case, I know what you mean, and it did take a bit of fiddling around with these values before I gained stability.   It was absolutely NOT happy with everything left on "Auto", so that's most likely at least part of your problem.

It certainly seems that with that graphics card you'd be hitting higher frame rates. I'd absolutely take a second to peruse the BIOS and make sure any/all "APM" and "EPU" settings are disabled. Also, if present, disable "C1E" on your processor, along with the "6 core" mode (can't remember exactly what it's called, will check tonight). There are several CPU options that should be turned off, because they'll cause the CPU to throttle up and down based on load. I've found that this can cause instability/lock ups, and sometimes low frame rates.

Also, please clarify what you mean by your description of the PSU. "As above 750W though". Is it rated for 750W max? If so, depending on how many other fans you're running (and how much they draw), hard drives, CD/DVD drives, etc, that may not be sufficient for what that system needs with an overclock. Remember, even though your CPU is only running at 1.4xxx volts, it's going to draw SIGNIFICANT power under a load, especially at higher clock speeds/voltages. If that PSU isn't up to the task of satisfying it, you'll absolutely get lock ups.

Anywho, hope that info helps for now!   I have those fans to replace in my system tonight, but as soon as that's done I'll sort through the BIOS and see if I can get some more information for you.

Oh, another thing... All of your drivers (especially chipset) are up to date, correct? That's huge. The only other delta I see right off the bat is that you're on Windows 8, while I'm on 7.

You'll likely need to run your memory faster than that as well, for a significant OC. I'm running mine at 1866, with 1.65v.

Right, I've just gone through and uninstalled and re-installed all my drivers. Interestingly that appears to have sped up my graphics bench a little, but not by much. I was on the Catalyst 12.11 beta drivers before, but have dropped down to 12.10. Yeah, I've wondered the same things about windows 8 vs 7 - but have not had the time yet to do a fresh install of 7 to compare it, I'd be annoyed if I installed it and it made no difference!

I'm going to dive into the Bios now and have a check on power saving settings and as for memory, i've kind of left that alone before because i've really no idea what i'm doing there! (Although on the plus side, RAM is pretty cheap these days)

THanks for helping out man! Looking forward to your BIOS Screenies for guidance!

Ok as far as I can see, I all the power saving settings are off. I have bitten the bullet and changed some of the settings and am up to 4.6 but very unstable, managed to run a 3d mark bench then locked up(norestart just frozen screen) the I think temp was about 65!!

im giving up and going to bed now, but I will look into psu tomorrow and some bios fine tuning.

From what I can remember putting in thebios:
Cpu multi - 21.5, clock 216, vcore 1.4, nb/Cpu 1.3, no freq ~2600, ht freq ~2400. Llc extreme.

Yeah, I remember having issues with those 12.11 Beta drivers as well. As a general rule of thumb, I avoid Beta drivers.   I believe I'm on the 12.10's as well.

Regarding your Vcore voltage, if my math is correct your CPU clock frequency will be around 4.64GHz with the specs you listed... Right? If that's true, (at least for my chip), a 1.4v Vcore would certainly be WAY too low. If I recall correctly, my chip needed ~1.48v @ 4.7GHz to be stable.

Furthermore, here are the screenshots, as promised. This is what I'm currently running on my system to date, and thus far it has been 100% stable. I did back my clock down to 4.98GHz as an experiment, although I should be in the clear to go back up to 5.01GHz if I choose. The only thing I'll point out that's not 100% accurate in these screenshots is the manual Vcore voltage I have specified. I've found that on my board I need to specify a slightly higher voltage than the board will deliver. You'll see I've specified 1.54v for Vcore, but the board is actually delivering 1.52v.

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll302/TRWeiss1/IMG_2...

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll302/TRWeiss1/IMG_2...

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll302/TRWeiss1/IMG_2...

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll302/TRWeiss1/IMG_2...

http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll302/TRWeiss1/IMG_2...

Hope that helps! Let me know if you have questions.

Oh, and one other thing. I didn't mean to uninstall and reinstall your original drivers. I meant to go to the manufacturer's website to verify that the drivers you have installed match their latest and greatest. If not, download and install the most up-to-date ones.  

Thanks for these! I plugged them into my BIOS this morning before work with the exception of the memory frequency as my PC would not POST with your value (I blame the RAM, I don't think it is very good)

Yeah, I realised you didn't mean to completely remove them, but I wanted to be sure I had the correct drivers so uninstalled and re-downloaded - Also I wanted to downgrade to 12.10 instead of the beta anyway so..  

Below is an initial screen showing idle temps and clock speed etc plus a Novabench result (which is already 500 more than I was getting before I co-erced you into helping me  )

http://i.imgur.com/FredL.png?1

What is interesting is that the bump of 300Mhz to the CPU has not made a massive difference from the settings I showed you last night. For example the following link is the 3dmark score I got before it crashed out on my settings

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/5208543

and this is the result from your settings (which I'd like to add I think I still need to tweak a lot because I can no longer get to it from teamviewer so I imagine it has frozen just after the 3dmark test again.)

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/5211107

The difference is very small - which I think I can put down to the HT/NB frequencies perhaps (I think I'm getting the hang of this!?) The big issue though at the moment is it's crashing out after a bench mark - so still a way to go before I'm stable.

Incidentally I've just found my 3DMark results from before I got your advice (http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/5198015) And, although the CPU parts of the score (Physics, and combined) are lower, the overall is higher due to my graphics score being 2000 points higher. So now I need to work out what I've done with the graphics card!

How did your fan install go? Are you noticing lower temps?

Thanks again for holding my hand through this by the way! It is making it a little less terrifying..  

Hey, I'm glad my settings were able to help you a bit!   Looks like your CPU temps are pretty good too. One thing I will note that I saw from your CPU-Z is that you're up around a 1.54v Vcore. That's fine so long as you're staying within the heat range tolerance of the CPU, but keep in mind that even though I'm specifying a 1.54v Vcore for my chip the board is only delivering 1.52v. So, if your board is delivering exactly what you're setting for Vcore, you can probably drop that down to 1.52v to decrease power consumption and temps slightly.   If you find instability, you may need to bump it back up a little higher. This is what makes overclocking especially difficult, and not cut and dry... EVERY chip is a little bit different.

Regarding your RAM, have you thought about running memtest86 at the increased speeds to see if it fails? Might help isolate a gremlin if you have bad memory.  

As far as my fan install, it went great! I'm seeing exactly what I thought I'd see, which is a pretty consistent 5-6 deg C drop under a load. I was seeing a max of 51/52 in TDU2, when before my max was right around 57/58. It does keep the chip about 3-4 deg C cooler at idle if I don't let it heat soak, but after a game it's idling a bit higher (still lower than with the other fans). The last thing I did as an experiment this morning was install my old two 120CFM fans at the top of my case blowing in, so it's force feeding the fans cooling my radiator. I'm curious to see what results that delivers. I did read that the H70 recommends inducting cold air from the rear of the case and blowing inward, as to force the coldest air possible through the radiator. I tried this and it resulted in little to no change in CPU temp, and an INCREASE in motherboard temp. Needless to say, I reversed them the way I had them.   I found that the mobo stays cooler when drafting heat AWAY from the chipset, rather than forcing airflow towards it. Lastly, I'm sure the air was quite a bit warmer after passing through the radiator.

Generally, I'd have my top case fans sucking air OUT, since heat naturally rises... But in this case I'm trying something a bit different to note the results. Moreover, I didn't want to have those fans sucking air out the top and starving the CPU fans, so to speak. I may be wrong, but the way I see it if 2 sets of fans are competing for air from the same airspace, each set of fans is going to get a lower volume of air. That was my reasoning for blowing air DOWN from the top fans, which will also feed the CPU fans at a higher rate than if they ingested air naturally (similar to a turbo setup on a car). Anywho, we'll see how it works after I get some game time with it!  

Hello!

I spent the majority of last night tinkering and experimenting with different things, and am really starting to see improved results! Which is fun. I've found that setting the multi lower and the clock higher I can set my RAM to run faster - which in turn seems to get ARMAII making more use of my GPU. I'm slowly coming to the conclusion that my RAM is just *** and I should save up and get some decent G.Skill sticks!

I think I'm going to need to take a look at cooling too. If I run Prime 95 for 15 mins the CPU temp in HWmon gets to about 65 then the computer either hangs up or reboots. I have my H80i set up in push/pull and, incidentally, I have had the top fan facing in for some months now (makes sense to me!)
I'm thinking of getting a couple of these :
http://www.dabs.com/products/akasa-14-12cm-viper-r-high...
to go either side of my radiator, More CFM and lower noise too, I can then probably replace the shitty front fan with one of corsair ones off of the H80.


Fortunately when I am playing games the temps aren't getting to high, So I'm sort-of happy with it at the moment - but it is by no means stable. I just can't seem to get it to run at the speeds I want with a lower voltage. I will keep persisting!

Glad to hear you're making progress! Unfortunately, in most cases, in order to achieve stability you must increase voltage (or slow down clock speeds). I hear you on temps when running an overclock test... 65 is definitely getting hot for that chip. I believe AMD recommends staying under 62.

And while we're on a cooling note, my new cooling setup is working wonders! Drafting air in from the top and force feeding the CPU fans was definitely the way to go. Before, I was seeing max temps of around 52 deg C in TDU2, and now my max temp is 44 deg C (if I run the fans at 100%). Since the fans are obnoxious running at full speed, I backed them down to halfway which keeps the system pretty silent. In that case I was seeing max temps of 47 deg C, with it staying pretty consistent at 46.  

I am buying the same motherboard an cpu combo it will be here tomorrow will the board recognize my cpu without a bios update??

Absolutely. A BIOS update is not required for your mobo to recognize the CPU.  

Can i get some clarification on exactly what mobo you are using?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B008RPZUZK/ref=s9_si...

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0089GN9KU/ref=s9_si...

And neither of these would require flashing right?

I would like to know this also as a friend wants to just slot in a 8350 in one of the same motherboards, but isn't sure if he would have to flash beforehand. What a coincidence.

Are there any settings in particular you have questions about?

I've been running a sabertooth 990fx since it was released (sometime before bulldozer came out). The UEFI bios on my board should be nearly identical to yours and I have quite a bit of overclocking experience with this board. Currently I'm working to get 4.4Ghz running fully stable on my phenom II 955 which stock is 3.2Ghz.