Overclocking AMD Phenom ii x4 955 Deneb (NOT B.E.)

Overclock via bios only! Read some guides, don't be afraid to use google there are tons of excellent guides available for OCing a 955.

All 955's are black edition chips, anything below a 955 in the phenom II x4 line is not a black edition.

Right. Well I've been in the BIOS several times, and when I get to core multiplyer after enabling custom p-states, the highest value is x16 (3200mhz). So what am I dealing with here?

Again, mobo is A870U3.

Here's an ss of CPU Z:

http://i.imgur.com/xKIKmXS.jpg

Seems like it is a board limitation and not a chip limitation you're running into. The board was not intended for overclocking (it uses a 3+1 vrm with no cooling on it).

Buying a different motherboard would solve your problem, in the meantime I wouldn't push your overclock too far unless you want to fry the motherboard and possibly other components as well.

Here are a couple of threads dealing with the particular board in question:
http://www.overclock.net/t/1050385/biostar-a870u3
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1650724