AMD FX 8350 overclocking causes pc to freeze

[jakey1995abc]

I have recently been having issues with my PC when I try editing my bios for better performance. The problem is that my PC will freeze within half an hour of being on, regardless of it being under heavy load or not, and it does not seem to be overheating according to the many temperature monitoring softwares I have used. This issue occurs when I either overclock my cpu to 4.4ghz or disable power saving modes in the bios. I've tried updating bios for both motherboard and graphics card, updating graphics drivers to latest version, reinstalling windows 10 from scratch after wiping both drives, uninstalling and reinstalling PC components and cleaning them (cpu, gpu, ram, drives). My full specs can be found here: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/jakey1995abc/saved/yCfbjX

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: AMD - FX-8350 4GHz 8-Core Processor (Purchased For £0.00)
CPU Cooler: Noctua - NH-D14 65.0 CFM CPU Cooler (Purchased For £0.00)
Motherboard: Asus - M5A97 R2.0 ATX AM3+ Motherboard (Purchased For £0.00)
Memory: Corsair - Vengeance Pro 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory (Purchased For £0.00)
Storage: SanDisk - SSD PLUS 480GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (Purchased For £0.00)
Storage: Western Digital - BLACK SERIES 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For £0.00)
Video Card: Asus - GeForce GTX 770 2GB DirectCU II Video Card (Purchased For £0.00)
Power Supply: EVGA - 750W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply (Purchased For £0.00)
Operating System: Microsoft - Windows 10 Pro OEM 64-bit (Purchased For £0.00)
Case Fan: BitFenix - Spectre Pro 148.7 CFM 200mm Fan (Purchased For £0.00)
Case Fan: BitFenix - Spectre Pro 148.7 CFM 200mm Fan (Purchased For £0.00)
Case Fan: ARCTIC - Arctic F14 77.3 CFM 140mm Fan (Purchased For £0.00)
Case Fan: ARCTIC - Arctic F14 77.3 CFM 140mm Fan (Purchased For £0.00)
Monitor: BenQ - RL2455HM 24.0" 1920x1080 60Hz Monitor (Purchased For £0.00)
Keyboard: Perixx - PX-1100 Wired Gaming Keyboard (Purchased For £0.00)
Mouse: Razer - DeathAdder Wired Optical Mouse (Purchased For £0.00)
Speakers: Creative Labs - GigaWorks T40 Series II 32W 2ch Speakers (Purchased For £0.00)
Total: £0.00
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-04-09 15:34 BST+0100

Any help will be greatly appreciated and will provide more information if I have missed anything out

 

[Lutfij]

You might want to aim a fan at the VRM/NB area since it's possible you've set something amiss with your numbers in BIOS. You should always have the power saving features on at all times. Overheating can and will be your limiter here.

What sort of voltages are you working with? How are you going to that 4.4GHz number?

 

[geofelt]

What kind of editing are you doing in the bios?
If you simply mean overclocking settings of a standard bios, then fine.
If you mean some sort of hacked bios, that is another matter.

Regardless, how well you can OC any chip is determined by your luck in getting a good bin.
4.4 may well be the limit of your particular chip.

What kind of temperature readings do you get?
FX max temperatures are much lower than the Intel standards.
I think 61c. might be the number for FX-8.

 

[robert_bramble]

Hi Jakey,

Your problem sounds like one I resolved recently with the same processor. The computer would freeze at various points, usually with the graphics still displayed on-screen. I tried the usual things you might think of, including updating the graphics card drivers, updating the BIOS, testing the RAM, updating Windows, monitored temperatures of components.

And if you haven't, you should probably try all of the above before my solution below.

It turns out that after a while (in my case, about three years) the thermal paste that separates your CPU from the CPU fan dries up and no longer conducts the heat away from the CPU to the fan. The stock fan that comes with this CPU doesn't seem to me to have had enough paste on it from the outset. It turns out that it doesn't take much in terms of a temperature rise for the CPU to freeze, causing whatever it was doing to freeze. With the CPU freeze, there would have been no clue at all registered in the computer logs.

The solution? Replace the heatsink compound between the CPU and the fan. But go carefully! The lever and hooks to the fan were released from the motherboard successfully. But in trying to remove the fan, the CPU seemed welded to it. The motherboard eventually gave in to my pressure (I swear I didn't pull that hard) and released the CPU still stuck to the underneath of the fan. Some CPU pins were bent. And in trying to straighten the pins, I broke one, breaking the CPU.

You might be lucky with pulling your fan. But if it won't come off easily, consider taking the motherboard out completely. You should then be able to get something flat between the CPU and the fan to gently wiggle it apart. Once separated, scrape away the old paste from both the CPU and fan. Replace with new thermal paste - and you should be good!

 

[Axhell]

Hi, I have the same issue with my fx8350 the M5A97 R2.0. Followed a guide and overcklocked the CPU to 4.5ghz, everything runs smooth for about 10 minutes of gaming. Then it freezes with grafics on the screen. Luckily I had 2 screens connected with CoreTemp on the other, so all the stats from the freeze moment was saved. I dont think heat seem to be the issue for me atleast as it should be fine up to 62c. Provided an image of the stats at the freeze moment.

https://imgshare.io/image/ae7e3622-5864-4f4d-a918-90da787fea78.ZJsFo

Anyone have any clue what the issue might be and how to fix it?


Thanks in advance,
Axel