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Strix Z370E OC woes: Vdroop and vanishing SSD?

10K views 127 replies 18 participants last post by  Techhog 
#1 ·
Hi. I'm trying to overclock my 8700K, but I'm starting to suspect that either my CPU is a dud, my board is a dud, or my SSD is dying. The SSD part might sound odd, but here's the deal: all of my instability has been the result of my SSD seemingly disconnecting, which ends up requiring a few reboots to fix. This reminds me of a similar issue I'm having with my laptop with the same SSD model (Crucial MX100 256GB) so I'm not sure if the overclock is causing the issue or not. On top of that, it seems like Vdroop might be an issue for me as well; I was running 4.9GHz at 1.36V, but I was observing the Vcore and it was falling as low as ~1.26V with a max of 1.344V at LLC level 4 before crashing. My SSD then went poof for a while. I tried setting LLC to auto, at which point it booted but everything was frozen. I forced it off and my SSD was gone again for a bit. Now I've reset everything to stock. I'm, not really sure where to go from here. Should I just give up on overclocking and leave it at stock? Is there a bug with LLC that I need to wait for a fix for? Should I buy a new SSD? Here are some images after a stock RealBench run, in case they help a bit:







Also, my cooler is an NH-D15S. And I'm sorry if this is the wrong forum.

Edit: In Cinebench R15 I saw the Vcore drop as low as 1.184V
 
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#2 ·
Okay, now I get it.

So, I took the lazy route and switched motherboards without reinstalling Windows, but I did so with the idea in mind that something might go wrong so my system can actually deal with a reinstall without really losing anything. Anyway, it seems that some rouge driver was causing issues with reading files, which lead to instability in Windows and handbrake, which was somehow made worse by the overclock. I'm not entirely sure how something like that works, especially with it causing the drive to vanish in the UEFI, but now it seems like I might be stable at 4.9GHz with 1.34V and LLC 5. Lower voltage or higher frequency might even be possible. It'll need more testing though. Pretty crazy either way.
 
#4 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by AlphaC View Post

Wrong chipset drivers?
Yeah, I'm guessing that the old chipset drivers were still there even though it looked like I had removed them. That helps, but the amount of Vdroop that I seem to be getting in HWiNFO64 when running RealBench still seems ridiculous. Why am I seeing Vcore under load that's more than 0.1V under the Vcore I set in my BIOS? Since this is happening in the Handbrake part of the test, should I perhaps add an AVX offset to balance it?

The best part of all of this being the fact that I use Premier for encoding, not Handbrake.
 
#5 ·
Well, it happened again while watching a YouTube video. So, either my chip is a total dud (which I guess makes it a good thing that I didn't get the M10H like I originally planned), or my boot SSD is having serious issues. This behavior is identical to my laptop, which has the same issue with the SSD vanishing and the same SSD, so it's really hard to say if the problem is the drive or the overclock. The drive has 88% of its life left, but maybe I should replace it anyway? Any suggestions?

Edit: Welp. I ran Realbench at stock settings and still see the issue where my screen completely freezes momentarily. In fact, it happened sooner than it did in any overclocked testing I did. I do have XMP enabled so it could be that, but that makes it seem even less likely that it would affect my SSD in such a way. On top of that, I only set 8GB for that stress test (I have 16GB). I'm really quite sure at this point that I need a new SSD.
 
#7 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Exilon View Post

According to a redditor on /r/intel, the excessive vdroop reading on Asus boards is a firmware issue and support has said that they will have an update for it next week.

Though don't bet your life on it, it could just be some creative fiction.
Thanks. I'm not sure if I should wait for that before getting a new SSD or just get one now before I lose data.
 
#8 ·
Okay, so there are now two possibilities:

My 8700K is unstable at stock, or

I need a new SSD.

So, I guess I'm ordering a new SSD. ***. I mean, I guess a full reformat is also an option but what are the odds of something like that fixing an error where the drive just vanishes from the BIOS?
 
#9 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Techhog View Post

Okay, so there are now two possibilities:

My 8700K is unstable at stock, or

I need a new SSD.

So, I guess I'm ordering a new SSD. ***. I mean, I guess a full reformat is also an option but what are the odds of something like that fixing an error where the drive just vanishes from the BIOS?
If your SSD shows the same behaviour on both machines then the only common denominator is the SSD, logically the SSD is the issue
smile.gif
 
#10 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by scracy View Post

If your SSD shows the same behaviour on both machines then the only common denominator is the SSD, logically the SSD is the issue
smile.gif
I guess the moral is to not buy a cheap SSD as a boot drive. I expected better from Crucial though, but now I have two systems with the same model SSD and both have issues with the drive not being found? I don't know what else to think. If I have to do this, I might as well go NVMe too I suppose. :/
 
#11 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Techhog View Post

I guess the moral is to not buy a cheap SSD as a boot drive. I expected better from Crucial though, but now I have two systems with the same model SSD and both have issues with the drive not being found? I don't know what else to think. If I have to do this, I might as well go NVMe too I suppose. :/
Given you have the option of NVME then why not look at something like a Samsung 960 Pro/Evo?
 
#12 ·
I've had all sorts of fun with Crucial SSDs and Asus motherboards over the years. I really don't know what the problem is.

One Asus board flat out refused to see any Crucial SSD newer than a C300 (was an old board, though; the last AM3 nVidia chipset, I forget the model number). My Rampage V Extreme liked to "lose" any Crucial SSD attached to it randomly (I always knew when because I had a Crucial MX100 as a linux drive and a Samsung 850 Pro as a Windows drive - whenever the Crucial drive disappeared, I'd go straight through to Windows without seeing GRUB...) some BIOS revisions were better than others. Eventually I gave up and stuffed that drive into a system with a Gigabyte mobo; never had a problem with the drive since. The RVE issue was particularly annoying as I had to completely disconnect the SSD before the computer would see it again.

If I'm reading your post correctly, you have two of these SSDs, one in a laptop and one in your desktop? Both of which exhibit the random disappearing, but you've not actually tried one in place of the other?
 
#13 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Paradigm Shifter View Post

I've had all sorts of fun with Crucial SSDs and Asus motherboards over the years. I really don't know what the problem is.

One Asus board flat out refused to see any Crucial SSD newer than a C300 (was an old board, though; the last AM3 nVidia chipset, I forget the model number). My Rampage V Extreme liked to "lose" any Crucial SSD attached to it randomly (I always knew when because I had a Crucial MX100 as a linux drive and a Samsung 850 Pro as a Windows drive - whenever the Crucial drive disappeared, I'd go straight through to Windows without seeing GRUB...) some BIOS revisions were better than others. Eventually I gave up and stuffed that drive into a system with a Gigabyte mobo; never had a problem with the drive since. The RVE issue was particularly annoying as I had to completely disconnect the SSD before the computer would see it again.

If I'm reading your post correctly, you have two of these SSDs, one in a laptop and one in your desktop? Both of which exhibit the random disappearing, but you've not actually tried one in place of the other?
Your experience is interesting... And yes, your understanding is spot-on.
Quote:
Originally Posted by scracy View Post

Given you have the option of NVME then why not look at something like a Samsung 960 Pro/Evo?
Just bought the 512GB Evo. Should be useful for Premier I suppose. I guess I'll have an update tomorrow.
 
#14 ·
Nevermind. I just need to accept that I lost the silicon lottery yet again. I'll see if it can at least squeeze out 4.8GHz but I doubt it. I'll just stick to locked or binned CPUs going forward. Thanks guys... Ugh, what a waste of money! And before you say otherwise, VID with MCE was already exceeding 1.4V. This CPU can't go beyond stock, so I paid $60 extra for an 8700 non-K.
 
#15 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Techhog View Post

Nevermind. I just need to accept that I lost the silicon lottery yet again. I'll see if it can at least squeeze out 4.8GHz but I doubt it. I'll just stick to locked or binned CPUs going forward. Thanks guys... Ugh, what a waste of money! And before you say otherwise, VID with MCE was already exceeding 1.4V. This CPU can't go beyond stock, so I paid $60 extra for an 8700 non-K.
960 EVO is an excellent drive, the thing about Samsung SSD is that the controller and flash are all designed and manufactured in house meaning better quality control, also dont give up on your CPU you might find things will improve once the UEFI has been refined after all it is only an early UEFI
thumb.gif
 
#16 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by scracy View Post

850 EVO is an excellent drive, the thing about Samsung SSD is that the controller and flash are all designed and manufactured in house meaning better quality control, also dont give up on your CPU you might find things will improve once the UEFI has been refined after all it is only an early UEFI
thumb.gif
I guess, but it's so disappointing. I still don't understand how Windows instability is causing the SSD to not work in BIOS though, and I'm deeply confused by that one time I lost the drive just from rebooting when I was at stock with everything except the RAM. Maybe I should still get the drive anyway, just on case it is some sort of weird issue which the overclock is just making more prominent, rather than directly causing?
 
#17 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Techhog View Post

I guess, but it's so disappointing. I still don't understand how Windows instability is causing the SSD to not work in BIOS though, and I'm deeply confused by that one time I lost the drive just from rebooting when I was at stock with everything except the RAM. Maybe I should still get the drive anyway, just on case it is some sort of weird issue which the overclock is just making more prominent, rather than directly causing?
Have you flashed your UEFI to a newer version than what the board came with? If so maybe a bad flash could have caused this? Tried using a different SATA port, perhaps the SATA port you are using has a dry solder joint?
 
#18 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by scracy View Post

Have you flashed your UEFI to a newer version than what the board came with? If so maybe a bad flash could have caused this? Tried using a different SATA port, perhaps the SATA port you are using has a dry solder joint?
I did flash to a new version, but after more testing I realized that this only happens with an overclock. I've tried changing the SATA cable and the SATA port. The only other possibility would be to reformat and clean install Windows. I don't know what could possibly be interfering after the in-place upgrade though since that removed all of the old drivers. Granted, it did get stuck loading apps during the first log-in.
 
#19 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Techhog View Post

I did flash to a new version, but after more testing I realized that this only happens with an overclock. I've tried changing the SATA cable and the SATA port. The only other possibility would be to reformat and clean install Windows. I don't know what could possibly be interfering after the in-place upgrade though since that removed all of the old drivers. Granted, it did get stuck loading apps during the first log-in.
It isn't unheard of Crucial drives causing issues with various brands of motherboards not just Asus, but its odd that its always Crucial drives, perhaps clear your cmos and do a complete fresh install of windows?
 
#20 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by scracy View Post

It isn't unheard of Crucial drives causing issues with various brands of motherboards not just Asus, but its odd that its always Crucial drives, perhaps clear your cmos and do a complete fresh install of windows?
I see... Okay, I'll just keep the order in and I'll see what happens when I migrate over. I was planning on getting a 960 Evo at some point anyway, though I wanted to wait until next year. And if it doesn't work I'll try the clean install. It's such an odd issue though.

Edit: Okay, now the Vcore just does whatever it wants and doesn't care what I set it at... What the hell is going on?
 
#23 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by Exilon View Post

According to a redditor on /r/intel, the excessive vdroop reading on Asus boards is a firmware issue and support has said that they will have an update for it next week.

Though don't bet your life on it, it could just be some creative fiction.
I checked that thread and all it shows me is they don't know about measuring from the socket.

If you recall , chew* proved that Buildzoid's measuring from the capacitors / chokes is wrong for X370 Taichi.

I think you mean https://www.io-tech.fi/uutinen/paivitys-testilabrasta-coffee-laken-kayttojannite-asuksen-strix-z370-emolevyilla/ right?
Quote:
Set Operating Voltage (Manual): 1.385 V
Measured operating voltage (Prime95): 1.363 V
CPU-Z: 1.312V
Intel Extreme Tuning Utility: 1.395 V
HWiNFO 64: 1,395V & 1,312V
 
#24 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by AlphaC View Post

I checked that thread and all it shows me is they don't know about measuring from the socket.

If you recall , chew* proved that Buildzoid's measuring from the capacitors / chokes is wrong for X370 Taichi.

I think you mean https://www.io-tech.fi/uutinen/paivitys-testilabrasta-coffee-laken-kayttojannite-asuksen-strix-z370-emolevyilla/ right?
I am going to wait to see if there's a UEFI update before jumping to conclusions, but after oh so much testing I've come to the conclusion that the only options to have voltage work properly are to either configure both LLC and IA Load Lines, or to run manual voltage 24/7 with LLC at a comfortable level.
 
#25 ·
Wait you were using offsets this whole time? I thought you were running manual volts with C states on.

If manual volts just use that for now.

The reason is you want to overclock with manual volts to figure out what is stable THEN use offsets to try to reach those voltages with the CPU on offset mode.

For example , hypothetically:
4.7GHz 1.2V
4.8GHz 1.25V
4.9Ghz 1.3V
5GHz 1.35V
5.1GHz 1.4V
5.2GHz fail

edit: see http://www.overclock.net/t/1621347/kaby-lake-overclocking-guide-with-statistics
 
#26 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by AlphaC View Post

Wait you were using offsets this whole time? I thought you were running manual volts with C states on.

If manual volts just use that for now.
No, I was using adaptive since I thought that was what was considered best to use 24/7. Maybe manual with c-states actually works better though. I recall that still resulting in spikes so I'm iffy.
 
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