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New to overclocking need help: Q6600 & P5k Premium

HexagonalBolts

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Hello everyone,

My old graphics card died and I was able to get my new one for a good price, however I was advised on here to overclock my CPU to reduce the bottleneck it would have on the system. I only want a fairly minor overclock of the CPU to about 3.0GHz. My cooler is only a Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro.

I am completely new to overclocking and have absolutely no idea where to start. I have looked at several guides (including the one on this forum) but I am still left quite bewildered, and the guides are frequently out of date. If anyone could offer me a nice clear guide to overclocking, any advice that is relevant to my system in particular, or even an exact guide on how to overclock my system I would be extremely grateful. Thank you very much for any help in advance.

System
Mobo: Asus P5K Premium
CPU: Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" @ 2.40GHz
The rest: HD 6950 2gb Frozr II | Corsair 4GB DDR2 XMS2 Dominator PC2-8500C5 | CM690 case + 5 case fans | Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro | Corsair HX Series 520W Modular PSU | 1TB HDD | Windows 7 x64 | Blu-ray drive | 1920x1080 27" LG monitor
 

JrRacinFan

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Bring up bus speeds to 333(1333) from default 266(1066), add about .075 to vcore, leave cpu multi at 9x, and adjust memory ratios so you don't overclock your ram in the process. Good luck. :)
 

HexagonalBolts

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Bring up bus speeds to 333(1333) from default 266(1066), add about .075 to vcore, leave cpu multi at 9x, and adjust memory ratios so you don't overclock your ram in the process. Good luck. :)

Thank you, what sort of memory ratio should I put in? Should I then just leave a long test of prime95 running?
 

JrRacinFan

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Thank you, what sort of memory ratio should I put in? Should I then just leave a long test of prime95 running?

Well I will admit it has been a long while since I have ran anything on s775. I think you may want 5:6 for 800mhz. With that, unsure if you have a 333 memory strap to run a 1066 ram divider. Prime95, just as long as you can get an hour of that along with an hour of max LinPack then call it stable.
 

HexagonalBolts

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Well I will admit it has been a long while since I have ran anything on s775. I think you may want 5:6 for 800mhz. With that, unsure if you have a 333 memory strap to run a 1066 ram divider. Prime95, just as long as you can get an hour of that along with an hour of max LinPack then call it stable.

Those first three sentences went a bit over my head I'm afraid, is there any way I can find out if I have a '333 memory strap to run a 1066 ram divider'?
 

JrRacinFan

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JrRacinFan

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Should automatically adjust. Sorry for using technical terms. You might even need to run the ram at 800mhz.
 
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yeah I remember when I had this board I had to run the ram at 800MHz... it did not like going above that
 
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i used to have p5kr and i had my 1066mhz ram running @ 1066 no problem, i changed the board because of few cpu power phases, also check if u have huge voltage drop on load in cpuz u may need to do vdrop mod to run it @3.2 without much voltage IE 1.325
 
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maybe it was just picky with the ram, cause I installed some cheap Corsair value 800 and ran all 4 slots 2 x 2GB and 2 x 1GB and it ran great, OC'ed better too
 

HexagonalBolts

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This all still sounds a bit alien and intimidating to me. Why would I need to do a voltage drop on the CPU...? I think my RAM is 1066mhz
 
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This all still sounds a bit alien and intimidating to me. Why would I need to do a voltage drop on the CPU...? I think my RAM is 1066mhz

He was saying the voltage will drop when the CPU is under load. Look up "VDroop"/"VDrop". Sometimes you need to add a little core voltage to counter this and stabilize the overclocked CPU.

Just set your memory to the manufactures specs and don't let it go over 1066. After you get the CPU overclock stable you can mess with the memory speeds and timings. You don't want memory problems interfering with your CPU overclocking efforts.
 
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HexagonalBolts

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He was saying the voltage will drop when the CPU is under load. Look up "VDroop"/"VDrop". Sometimes you need to add a little core voltage to counter this and stabilize the overclocked CPU.

Just set your memory to the manufactures specs and don't let it go over 1066. After you get the CPU overclock stable you can mess with the memory speeds and timings. You don't want memory problems interfering with your CPU overclocking efforts.

Thank you very much, so should I just set the RAM fairly low to begin with?
 

HexagonalBolts

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Bring up bus speeds to 333(1333) from default 266(1066), add about .075 to vcore, leave cpu multi at 9x, and adjust memory ratios so you don't overclock your ram in the process. Good luck. :)

Ok I've reduced my RAM to 800mhz, then set the FSB to 333, which changed the ram to ~1002mhz. Because I couldn't work out how to use linpack I'm currently running two copies of Prime95 64-bit (Only because I saw other people saying they were running multiple copies of stress test programs, I presume it doesn't actually make any difference...?). All core loads are at 100%. I've been running it for 25 minutes for the first twenty minutes temperatures were around 59-63C according to CoreTemp and 48-51C according to SpeedFan (I heard speedfan reports too low?). On Coretemp temperatures are now approaching 69C which is a bit hot for my liking. But then I have read that these temperature programs are very unreliable. I took the side off and felt the top of the heatsink (Arctic Cooling Freezer Pro 7) and it felt just slightly warm.

However, I have some queries:

1) I have not increased my voltage: I followed the first part of a guide I found on the internet for overclocking the p5k (http://forums.hexus.net/hexus-hardware/110267-c2d-overclocking-guide-beginners-p5k-add.html), it did not mention adding the .075 to vcore, and my vcore was set to 'auto' so I did not know what to change it to. Is it ok left on 'auto'?

2) Is it ok to now put my RAM up to its intended 1066mhz?

3) What I hadn't appreciated was that my computer seems to automatically raise and lower some of the settings, like multiplier (when not under load it lowers to 6), CPU frequency (when not under load it lowers, I think), and DRAM frequency (although actually this one only seems to change a tiny bit). Is this ok?

4) In CPU-Z it says 'FSB : DRAM' is '2 : 3' is this ok?
 
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JrRacinFan

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Can raise dram to 1066, if you have the option. Only reason I say this obviously you stress tested and cpu clocks are not an issue.

Regarding clock speed increasing under load, it's a power saving feature. You can keep it on it won't hurt anything, just may have to tweak a few things a little if you notice instabilities.

2:3 sounds right for that speed. What I had meant by dropping to 800 was while you were running 333/1333. Sounds like you're on the right track now. Good luck! :)

As far as temp goes, those are actually fine on an AC Freezer 7, pretty good for a Freezer 7 tbh.
 

HexagonalBolts

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Can raise dram to 1066, if you have the option. Only reason I say this obviously you stress tested and cpu clocks are not an issue.

Regarding clock speed increasing under load, it's a power saving feature. You can keep it on it won't hurt anything, just may have to tweak a few things a little if you notice instabilities.

2:3 sounds right for that speed. What I had meant by dropping to 800 was while you were running 333/1333. Sounds like you're on the right track now. Good luck! :)

As far as temp goes, those are actually fine on an AC Freezer 7, pretty good for a Freezer 7 tbh.

Thanks! I might just leave the RAM as it is - it all works and 1002 isn't far from 1066. I have five case fans turned on full blast, so that might be something to do with it, although my wire management is dreadful.
 
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