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Q9550 overclocking woes

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I am at my wits end. I just purchased a Gigabyte EP45-UD3P and a Q9550 to replace my Q6600 that just died on me. I am trying what seems to be a very mild overclock for this chip, 3.4ghz (400x8.5). I can't seem to get this stable to save my life. I have used bios F6 and F8 and have the same results. The Q9550 is a E0 chip, and I have upped to voltage all the way to 1.34 in the bios, about 1.29-1.3 in windows according to CPU-Z.

I use OCCT for testing, and it never gets past 18 mins without rebooting. I never get a error in OCCT, the computer just reboots. I am using 4gb of GSkill (2x2gb sticks), and I am running them at 1066 spec, 2.1 volts. After one of the reboots, I ran Memtest with these settings, and the ram did not produce any errors. I have tried leaving the voltages to auto, turned VTT up from 1.2 to 1.26, MCH from 1.1 to 1.3, but none of these helped. I tried turning on loadline calibration, but this causes the motherboard to reset when posting, and it tells me that my overclocking or voltage settings fails.

My power supply never drops under 12.3 volts when loaded, it is a OCZ GameXstream 700watt.
I am running Vista64, and the OS seems fine. no data corruption from what I can tell.

Also, the hottest any core got was 52, according to realtemp, so heat is not a issue.

What could be wrong, I have seen plenty of post in other forums about guys hitting 4.0ghz stable with less voltage, I am only trying 3.4:shadedshu
 
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Have you tried bumping the voltage on the NB?
 
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I tried up to 1.3, according to the board stock is 1.1. It is a P45, I am not sure how you can go safely on the NB.
 

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The thing you have to worry about when ocing the nb, is not the volts, but the temps.. you should be fine putting 1.4 volts onto the nb. Just as long as the NB is cool enough..
 

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I don't have that mobo, but with my 9550, you'll need about 1.3 VTT (fsb) at least to go past 3.2 or so. Over 3.6, you'll need higher, probably close to 1.4. My 780i only lets you go from 1.3-1.4, no steps in between.
 

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I've hit a wall as well.

:(

I wasn't even able to OC until I discharged my motherboard, weird I know. Maybe if you try that you'll be able to attain the OC you want.
 
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I don't have that mobo, but with my 9550, you'll need about 1.3 VTT (fsb) at least to go past 3.2 or so. Over 3.6, you'll need higher, probably close to 1.4. My 780i only lets you go from 1.3-1.4, no steps in between.

What speed is yours running at, and what voltages are you using?
 
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I have no P45 experience but doesn't the NB work with relatively low voltage?
 
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I have no P45 experience but doesn't the NB work with relatively low voltage?

I believe it does, that is what surprises me. I am only running 2 sticks of ram at it's rated speed. I can't believe it is stressing the northbridge that much.

I also find it odd that it justs reboots, it doesn't give me a error in the program. I have never had a overclock fail like this before.
 
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I have no P45 experience but doesn't the NB work with relatively low voltage?

I have a P43, which is similar, and I'm running my NB at 1.41 volts; it appears to be taking it fine, but it was getting hot so I put a little 60mm fan on it to keep it nice and cool. ;)
 
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Well, unless you are using your 4pin mobo connector instead of the 8pin, I would say it's a dud chip.:ohwell:
 

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What speed is yours running at, and what voltages are you using?

They won't translate to your board, but here they are. Vcore 1.3625, FSB 1.4, SPP 1.45, MCP 1.575, HT 1.40. That's 4.0GHz. link
 
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Well, unless you are using your 4pin mobo connector instead of the 8pin, I would say it's a dud chip.:ohwell:

I am using a 8 pin.
 

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I believe it does, that is what surprises me. I am only running 2 sticks of ram at it's rated speed. I can't believe it is stressing the northbridge that much.

I also find it odd that it justs reboots, it doesn't give me a error in the program. I have never had a overclock fail like this before.

One more point I wanted to make: it's stressing the NB that much because it uses that to communicate between the cores, not just the memory. The faster the CPU is going, the harder the NB has to work. Hope this helps. :pimp:
 
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Thanks for all the replies. Does anyone else find it strange that it just reboots, never gives me a error in the program?
 

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Thanks for all the replies. Does anyone else find it strange that it just reboots, never gives me a error in the program?

Did it blue screen? Do you have your system set to restart automatically when it BSOD? Even if you don't, it's not that uncommon if hardware just gives up. There are no system errors because it's not software related.
 
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It just blue screened at 15 mins in, vcore at 1.3, nb at 1.3, vtt at 1.3. It is a memory BSOD, but I have run memtest at these settings, and it passed without error. I am running the ram at 1066, which is it's rated speed.
 

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I ran in to a similar issue as the OP. OCCT would crash the system. CPUZ would crash the system. It makes sense, OCCT uses the CPUZ SDK.

I stopped using OCCT to stress the system and edited the CPUZ .ini file to turn off the sensors and the crashing stopped. I keep meaning to go back and narrow down which exact sensor causes the problem, but have yet to. Now I use IBT and the 64 bit version of Prime95 to stress the system.

This was on an ABIT IP35-Pro. I recently switched over to the same mobo as the OP. I'm still learning, but I'm hoping for another couple of hundred mhz over the ABIT.

Hope this helps. Best of luck.

Oh and hey, I'm new here.
 

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Welcome to the forums dude!

:rockout:
 
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I have no P45 experience but doesn't the NB work with relatively low voltage?

And you shouldn't need any extra voltage on it unless you are pushing ram beyond the boards limits.

Try bumping more voltage into the chip, maybe you just got a bad chip, did you turn off speedstep, thermal management, c1e?

Also note the Q9550- 0.85V – 1.3625V

Might want to bump that voltage a bit higher, try 1.375-1.4 and see what happens.

Also kick the ram down to 1:1 400mhz fsb = 800mhz ram, just for testing purposes, limit your failure chances here down to your processor and see where it lands.
 
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Vista can cause lower overclocks for some people. Have you tried bumping the cpu vcore up to like 1.45 just to test if it makes a difference ?
 
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Vista can cause lower overclocks for some people. Have you tried bumping the cpu vcore up to like 1.45 just to test if it makes a difference ?

Erm, No....

Vista cannot cause lower overclocks for some people...
If you are getting a lower clock in Vista than XP, it's because you were not 100% stable, maybe 99.9% but not 100%.

Software and hardware are two layers here.
 
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I did just try running the ram at 800 instead of 1066, reinstalled OCCT just in case, it still reboots about 15 mins in. I turned all the voltages to normal instead of auto, used loadline calibration, the chip never went under 1.32 under load. If you had to guess, is the chip or the motherboard the dud here?
 
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I ran in to a similar issue as the OP. OCCT would crash the system. CPUZ would crash the system. It makes sense, OCCT uses the CPUZ SDK.

I stopped using OCCT to stress the system and edited the CPUZ .ini file to turn off the sensors and the crashing stopped. I keep meaning to go back and narrow down which exact sensor causes the problem, but have yet to. Now I use IBT and the 64 bit version of Prime95 to stress the system.

This was on an ABIT IP35-Pro. I recently switched over to the same mobo as the OP. I'm still learning, but I'm hoping for another couple of hundred mhz over the ABIT.

Hope this helps. Best of luck.

Oh and hey, I'm new here.

I am trying IBT. lets see what happens.
 
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Update; It passed IBT, I did 5 rounds at maximum stress testing?

So what now?
 
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