_₌= The Q9550 Club =₌_ [Please read first post] - Page 226

Yeah I agree temps are getting a little higher than I'd like... hitting low 80s in IBT maximum but my chip seems to be perfectly stable. I think Intel's tcase for these chips is 72C so what you're saying makes sense. Tonight I'm going to try dropping the voltage a bit and maybe increase the zalman's fan speed so it's about the same as my case fans. 3.4 at the stock voltage is nice but above that it goes up fast... I need 1.3 for 3.7 stable and 1.4 for 4 and that still isn't stable. It's a shame I only have a 3 pin so I can't vary the fan speed via the motherboard.It would keep it quiet at idle and cool at max (I pretty much only hit those temps running stress tests so it would be quiet almost all the time). It seems weird to me that you'd see such high temps gaming when mine always stays cool, your 5850 has about the same power as my 4870x2. Maybe the difference is because I'm at 2560x1600 vs. your 1920x1080. I'm thinking I will order an RX240 kit, should make 4 ghz easy but I'll have to drop my RAM speed again. I like 3.4 since I can run the ram at the right speed for a 400 fsb. My ram kind of sucks it's high voltage and can barely overclock... in retrospect I should have went with ddr2-1066.

If I may chime in here... That seems awfully hot for that voltage. Those are stock heat sink temps. You might want to try reseating your 9700, or upgrade your cooling. I'm not sure how far you are willing to go with that system though. I run at about the same with the genesis @ 3.825... Which is close to the limit for every day use with this stepping unfortunately...

Good luck!

Mattb2e - What is your SPP(NB) voltage at?

It's currently running @ 1.44V.

Hydro: I just purchased an Antec Kuhler H2O 920 cpu cooler and I'm really impressed with the performance. I used to have a Noctua NH-D14 and could never overvolt to 1.36250V, now it's a breeze. Literally!

If you have a large enough case with plenty of good airflow get one now!!!

UK - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-006-AN

US - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835209054

I'm never looking back and looking forward to buying a custom loop water cooler one day.

Water is definitely the way forward.

I can't believe I put it off for so long............

It's because I turned the fan down from 2800 rpm to 800 rpm. A bit extreme but I wanted to see what I could get away with. The zalman at 2000+ is very loud. At full speed I only hit about 60C full load.


That antec 920 is pretty nice, I'm surprised it outperformed your Noctua. I'm thinking about an XSPC rasa 750 kit, the rs240 starts at $130 and is supposed to kill the H100 plus it's more versatile. I'm leaning towards the rx240 at $170 since it will give me some overhead if I upgrade to X79. (eventually... first thing that needs replacing is my vacuum cleaner 4870x2).
Edited by Hydroplane - 4/16/12 at 1:06pm

Im not running my Asus Rampage Formula anymore as my sig, I used to use that with my Q9550 before I upgraded. I ran my NB at 1.4v if I remember correctly, much less than auto voltage, but thats with an X48 chipset motherboard.

Wow people are still messing around with OC'ing these Q9550's eh? Good to see but man some crazy Temp/Voltage use still.

If anyone needs a little guidance I believe I still have all my settings I have used in my profile which should give an ok staging point. I have been running 3.84Ghz for over 3 years now 24/7. The main thing that would hinder OC use though was the NB. As you can tell in my rig, I have almost everything that can be used on my X48, used and it makes the NB mad if it doesn't have proper cooling. Even with my new 500R case, the NB would hit upward of 80C and cause something to fail (USB input would die first, sometimes a GPU would loose sync and cause a driver reset and sometimes drop off disabling SLI, weird stuff like that). Once I got my Spotcool replaced and aimed back at the NB, 53C max NB temps = Zero crashes and lower Voltage needed to keep everything in line. I can even rock a fully stable 4.0Ghz OC with a reasonable Vcore bump, but I just don't see the benefit from pushing her that hard anymore. For me I am an inch away from pulling the trigger on a 3930K and finding this beast a good home.

*Damn my settings are burried somewhere in the forum in either this thread or another. If anyone reallly needs them, I can see about digging everything up once again.

IM0001 - Damn my settings are burried somewhere in the forum in either this thread or another. If anyone reallly needs them, I can see about digging everything up once again.

Yeah, we still be clockin' 'em!!
Dig 'em up if it's not too much hassle, it'll probably help me or even someone else...

Umm, glad I waited really with LGA775, cos 1155 seems a lot cooler and faster than 1366. I get 3.83GHz from a Q9550 E0 so can't complain. 1800MHz FSB with Sync Mode and 900MHz RAM. 1:1

Just wish I could run my RAM stable at 4-4-4-12 @ 2.2V instead of 5-5-5-15 @ 2.2V, does anyone know how to do this? I am currently stable in Prime95 20.11, Hyper-Pi, IBT and OCCT. As soon as I send my RAM to faster timings it crashes.

Do I need to bump NB core? Which houses the memory controller? Will I introduce another problem by changing settings when I am stable...

Are overclockers naturally never happy???
Edited by cortec - 4/17/12 at 9:19am

Knew I had this crap burried somewhere recently. Using my ram in a 5:6 setup netted me a nice performance gain a while back I remember. Try it before you think 4-4-4 timings are all that. I always did 1:1 to find a stable CPU OC, then played with the ram later and this is what I ended up with. Going to 4.0 is possible for sure, but really not worth the extra heat/voltage/time it takes to really get it dialed in. With this overclock even on my old Q9550 (wasn't even a newer stepping) I still feel this chip has a ton of life left in it. Also unlike a friend of mines, it doesn't have any stuck temp sensors (that get stuck at a certain temp and only rises but can't go below a certain value)

AI Overclock Tuner [Manual]
OC From CPU Level Up [Auto]
CPU Ratio Setting [Auto]
FSB Strap to North Bridge [333MHz]
FSB Frequency [450]
PCIE Frequency [101]

DRAM Frequency [DDR2-1081MHz]
DRAM Command Rate [2N]
Grey
Grey
DRAM CLK Skew on Channel A [Advance 300ps]
DRAM CLK Skew on Channel B [Advance 300ps]
DRAM Timing Control [Manual]

(Now the RAM Timing settings may be different based on your rams vs mine if they are not the exact same kit)

1st Information : (Numbers your Ram states)
CAS# Latency [5 DRAM Clocks]
RAS# to CAS# Delay [5 DRAM Clocks]
RAS# PRE Time [5 DRAM Clocks]
RAS# ACT Time [15 DRAM Clocks]
RAS# to RAS# Delay [3 DRAM Clocks]
REF Cycle Time [50 DRAM Clocks]
WRITE Recovery Time [6 DRAM Clocks]
READ to PRE Time [3 DRAM Clocks]

2nd and 3rd Information, just match the grey numbers shown by your ram.

DRAM Static Read Control [Disabled]
Ai Clock Twister [Stronger]
Ai Transaction Booster [Manual]

Common Performance Level [07] *Important* Look up info on this in the forums to help understand if you plan to go higher overclock. This will have to be Risen to loosen it up to hit 4.0Ghz then find the DRAM speed you can use before bringing this down. There was a math formula for this but I am not going to try and look that up right now You may be able to use the 1081Mhz memory speed with a 1:1 4.0Ghz setting.
*Edit* Found the writeup that explains a lot of what I am going on about. Great for tuning ram for max performance. I Picked the 1080 shown in the chart on the 2nd to last page since it was the best I could do at 450FSB though I can't pull this down to 6, it is damn close otherwise.

Pull-In [All Disabled]

CPU Voltage [1.31875V]
CPU PLL Voltage [1.500V]
North Bridge Voltage [1.47V] (Think I have it at 1.5+V now since I got SLI. With so much demand on that NB it needs it. If you don't have an Antec Spotcool yet, get one and point it at the NB. It will help temps a ton! 80+C down to 50+C)
DRAM Voltage [2.16V]
FSB Termination Voltage [1.20V]
South Bridge Voltage [1.075V]
SB 1.5V Voltage [1.50V]
Loadline Calibration [Enabled]
CPU GTL Voltage Reference [0.67x]
NB GTL Voltage Reference [0.63x]
DRAM Controller Voltage REF [Auto]
DRAM Channel A Voltage REF [Auto]
DRAM Channel B Voltage REF [Auto]
Edited by IM0001 - 4/18/12 at 4:07pm

I'm working on my overclock tonight. Ambient of 71F instead of 78F the other night so my average small FFT temp is now 66C. I'm going to drop the voltage, increase the fan speed a touch and run IBT maximum.

At 3.4 you're hitting 66C? That's too much.

I still don't understand why people use IBT. It's less sensitive than P95 or OCCT and nothing real-world makes that kind of heat. Is it because intel makes it so everyone thinks that's what you should use? Honestly that test is worthless IMO.