How to overclock... 4790k aiming 4.7/4.8ghz

Pablix360

Honorable
Jun 21, 2015
85
0
10,640
I'm finally upgrading my CPU cooler from stock one to NZXT Kraken x62 with a mission to overclock my i7 4790k to 4.7 ghz (or higher if possible). First of all I need know if I can even reach those number with my current setup which is:

Asus Z97-Pro Gamer
Corsair Vengance 2x8GB 1600mhz
Corsair RM650x
GTX1080 Ti FE
Crucial SSD 250GB (Windows)
Segate HDD 1TB
NZXT H440 Razer Edition

I'm completely new to overclocking as I have never done it, never read about it etc....

So I'm here asking how to basically do it from start to end.

Thanks!
 

burtman88

Distinguished
Jun 17, 2011
411
0
18,860
Well first off Asus makes Overclocking much more simple. You can use asus Rog program in windows that will automatically do it for you. Or you can do it in bios again very straight forward it will do it for you. Or you can set the speed and voltages yourself. Why i love Asus board very nice bios set up. user friendly, However looking your cpu up, it seems like to achieve 4.7 ghz you will need cpu voltage of 1.3v
 

Pablix360

Honorable
Jun 21, 2015
85
0
10,640


Yes the BIOS does gave a nice and friendly GUI which makes it easy to look for options when people tell me to check them. I've got installed the Ai Suite software from the CD I got with the motherboard - is that pretty much the same as the Asus Rog?

Also what is the difference with the CPU voltages? I know different speeds will need different voltages and the temp the CPU will run at is also dependent on that but is there anything else to it?
 
Don't bother with built in oc programs, they generally add way too much voltage and rarely achieve the best possible oc.
What you need to do is adjust your core speed multiplier, in case of your 4790k it will be x40 (x44 on boost) with the bus speed of about 100MHz (100MHz x 40 = 4000MHz = 4GHz which your cpus speed is. You can set it to the clock speed you want but it's recommended to go up 100MHz at a time. Your cpu should pretty easily reach 4.5GHz on stock voltage but going 4.6GHz and higher you should test if it can run prime95 or some other cpu stressing program without crashing, if it crashes you need to add more voltage (cpu vcore) add voltage by small increments 0.01-0.03v at a time. Adding voltage increases the cpus stability but also increases heat and stress on your cpu. I run my own i5 4690k at 1.350v which is still a pretty safe voltage for haswell though i wouldn't recommend more than 1.4v for daily use. See how far you can push your cpu with it still being stable under stress. Once you think you've found a config where it's stable run tests for few hours and see if it crashes, if it crashes add more voltage/lower clock speed until you have a stable oc.
 

burtman88

Distinguished
Jun 17, 2011
411
0
18,860
Yah actually the software is called AI suite sorry lol, The stuff you got from the cd. However go to the asus website to see if there's updates. So yes you can use the Software to overclock, with the voltages not much to it. All you do is increase it, this a certain amount you dont want to go over. so lower clocks like 4.3 ghz i saw ppl say 1.2 volts work or maybe little less voltage. You just put that in the bios area where it says cpu voltage. Erase whatever it may say and do 1.30 for your 4.7 ghz. You may even get lucky and have gotten a better cpu and need less voltage like 1.27. Hard to say not every cpu overclocks the same.
 

Pablix360

Honorable
Jun 21, 2015
85
0
10,640


Yeah I did think overclocking will be better using BIOS as it seemed like it gives a lot more customization.

If I run this prime95 to test the cpu should I just leave it on and not do anything on the PC or am I okay to do run a game or something.

Also, does it mean that the settings are not stable when I make a change in BIOS but the PC keeps on restarting itself and doesn't come up until I hold the power button on it and then revert the change?
 
It's probably worth mentioning that if your PC locks and fails to boot into BIOS, it doesn't mean you've fried your cpu, it just means that the settings are too high and the PC can't start itself to reset the bios. In this case you need to manually reset your bios from the motherboard. There's usually either a button to reset it or a jumper you need to connect to reset it. If there's neither of them you need to disconnect the power to your PC, remove the CMOS battery and wait few mins, pressing the power button too is good idea since it clears any left current from the capacitors.
 

Pablix360

Honorable
Jun 21, 2015
85
0
10,640


Thanks for the tips and answers, I'll be doing this next week as now I'm quite busy with work...

What I've done in the past after messing with BIOS settings is hold the power button if the PC kept rebooting itself and not showing anything on the screen and wait couple seconds and turn it back on and then it allowed me to go back into BIOS and revert the changes I made - is that a good thing to do? or should I as you say reset the BIOS from the actual motherboard?
 


As long as it boots to bios on it's own it's better to not reset it from the board.
 

Pablix360

Honorable
Jun 21, 2015
85
0
10,640
So i've just finished running prime95 for about 1 hour and this is what I've got. It hasnt crashed compared to 2 tries I had earlier so I guess this seems promising:

http://imgur.com/a/dpKJE

Although, I have a question about the CPU min/max cache as I overclocked it using a guide where a guy overclocks to 4.5Ghz but I did 4.7Ghz so what should my CPU min/max cache setting be? For now I've set it the same as he has which is 40.
 

TRENDING THREADS