AVADirect Does Overclocking
AVADirect doesn’t specify an overclocking option in its Web-based configuration tool, but the company's techs will overclock your system if you ask them to. In light of the custom cooling and drive configuration only available via phone call, this configuration necessitates talking to a representative anyway. Might as well request a tune-up at the same time.
The company didn’t force a manual voltage increase, but instead set a fixed 42x multiplier and let the motherboard manage voltage levels. The result is a mild speed-up that persists under multi-core loads rather than clocking down—as specified by Intel—with a core voltage ranging from 1.15 to 1.25 volts.
We’ve found that 1.25 V is roughly the voltage limit for the Core i7-4770K (at least in our motherboard reviews). Additional voltage leads to increasingly quicker thermal throttling. Then again, when we're evaluating platforms, we aren't using a closed system with an internally-venting graphics card either. Although AVADirect’s overclock is consistent through most of our benchmarks, eight threads of Prime95, compiled with AVX support, quickly cause it to throttle back.
There aren’t any special settings tied to the mild overclock, but AVADirect does save a copy of its changes to one of the motherboard’s overclocking profile registers.
GPU overclocking is often more difficult to manage, so the company leaves Asus’s original GeForce GTX 780 frequencies alone. Though it contributes to CPU heat and occasional thermal throttling, the internally-vented graphics card also is largely responsible for a sub-32 dB full-load noise level and 22 dB of idle noise, both calculated to one meter.
