My first Q6600 OC, but a few questions first

[Silverdusk]

Alright, I've done my fair share of reading (Including that very informative HL OC Guide) and I've delved deeply into my BIOS to familiarize myself with all of it's features. So, I have a few questions, before I give it a go.

1). Ok, so I know I'll start by lowering the multiplier on my CPU and RAM first and then focus on raising my FSB. Do I lower these multipliers as low as they can go or just down a few notches?

2). When do I use Memtest? After I've adjusted my RAM timings and voltage?

And I think after this I'll give it a try :)

[Quakindude]

Originally Posted by Silverdusk

Alright, I've done my fair share of reading (Including that very informative HL OC Guide) and I've delved deeply into my BIOS to familiarize myself with all of it's features. So, I have a few questions, before I give it a go.

1). Ok, so I know I'll start by lowering the multiplier on my CPU and RAM first and then focus on raising my FSB. Do I lower these multipliers as low as they can go or just down a few notches?

2). When do I use Memtest? After I've adjusted my RAM timings and voltage?

And I think after this I'll give it a try :)

Don't lower your CPU multiplier. Just the memory divider. As you change the divider, you should see right there in the BIOS what the effective ram speed will be. As you increase your FSB to overclock your CPU, the effective MHz of the Ram will go up as well.

You use memtest to see if your ram overclock is stable after you've finished overclocking and things are running stable through booting up and various regular programs. Alternatively, you can use Prime95 v25.5 and small TFT's to test CPU and RAM overclocks at the same time. Keep a close eye on CPU temps. While overclocking RAM, you run the very real risk of corrupting your OS install, so don't be too upset if you end up reformatting and loading your OS. For first time overclockers, I strongly recommend using the memory divider to keep the ram @ 850MHz or below while finding your CPU limits.

[Silverdusk]

Thanks ... also any ideas how to go about booting from my usb key? I have memtest86+ 201. loaded on there, but I can't seem to find where the selection for booting from it is. I see my hdd and dvd roms.

[screwballl]

usually it should be USB hard drive or USB floppy drive and it should work... then set that to boot from first

[RAID]

i have memtest on a cd and boot from the dvd burner....

if you are trying to overclock your CPU, my advice would be to drop your ram speed (ex: if you're running 1066 mem, drop it to 800) and keep your timings loose. then i would concentrate on raising the front side bus and cpu overclock.

this way, you'll know that if you have any system hangs or blue screens, its due to your cpu and not your memory

[Silverdusk]

Thank you Raid. Yep, I said screw the USB Key and made myself a CD to boot from.

Right now I'm getting all my ducks in a row and familiarizing myself with the software I'll test with. Pretty ingenious stuff.

Am I correct in my thinking: Lowering the multiplier on the cpu to 6 or 7 and then slowly raise the fsb. Then lower the FSB and raise the cpu. Then lower cpu and raise mem. Then test all together? For a 24/7 I'd like to see 3.6 out of this setup <- my goal at least.

[screwballl]

there are several ways of doing it but many times you can overcome a memory limitation by lowering the multiplier...
for example, with my E6600 (stock is 2.4GHz):
2.61GHz = 9x290 with memory at 1160 (290x4.0)
2.8GHz = 8x350 with memory at 1120 (3.2)
2.89GHz = 8x362 with memory at 1158 (3.2)
This 1066 memory was topping out for me around 1160-1180MHz but I got my CPU to 3GHz which was 8x375 with memory at 1125 = 375x3.0... I tried 375x3.2 = 1200 which would not post...
Changing the memory multiplier helps lower the memory speed an increase the cpu speed. I myself prefer to find out the top end of the memory first and then work from there. It is tough just increasing CPU fsb when it wont boot at +400MHz CPU speed... only to find out it is the memory that is maxing out.

[Silverdusk]

Thank you .. I'm gonna give it a try soon. Trying to read all I can before tackling it.

[Silverdusk]

Alright I've taken the plunge. Right now I'm running Prime 95 w small FFT's. Seems to be running fine, however when I opened up MemSet, two instances of CPU-Z, Everest and Prime 95 it rebooted w/ a recovery window. So I'll hold off on taking screenshots till I've run small FFT's, Large FFT's and a blend test.

Right now I'm looking at

CPU Multiplier 8.0
FSB of 420

To give me my first overclock of 3.360 GHZ.

Temps on my system thus far are:

IDLE

CPU 21
CORE 1 36
CORE 2 33
CORE 3 30
CORE 4 27

LOAD

CPU 34
CORE 1 48
CORE 2 49
CORE 3 46
CORE 4 46


CPU Voltage

1.408v