AMD phenom II x4 965 BE

[shaggy2k7]

Atm I am using the Zalman 9700 heatsink with arctic silver5 on my AMD phenom II x4 965 BE. I have gone over the 200hours and several thermal cycles the company recommends and ran prime 95. This is all stock settings, haven't overclocked yet.

Idle: 29c
Prime95 Small FFT's: 45c for 2hours of load. Got up to 28k-34k FFT's.

My question is are those good temps pre-oc?

 

[JofaMang]

Those are similar temps to what I see on my 710x3 at stock speeds, stock cooler, just a few degrees lower at idle, which could amount to you having higher ambient temps (my computer room is usually around 21c). All things considered (An xtra core, 600mhz higher frequency) I would think those are pretty good temps.

 

[unclefester]

You look like your all set to start OCing. Go up slowly and keep an eye on temps as you go. AMD recommends not going over 62c as the thermal limit. Personally I would try to stay in the mid 50s at load.

 

[xbonez]

those are pretty good temps. start OC'ing now, carefully though

 

[shaggy2k7]

ok well I have been researching for awhile now and alot of people are saying to preferably not to go over CPU 1.5v, well with the 965 BE stock settings are at 1.4250v. I was able to raise the multiplier to 19x and only raised the volts by .05v's. It ran stable for about a 30min prime95 load. Anything higher and pc just restarts. Any suggestions? This is my first time oc'ing so any help/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Like I said, I have done alot of reading, but nothing so far pertaining to a phenom II x4 965 BE.

*edit* the 30min prime95 load never crashed, I never got an error while playing a game either at those settings. Also, at what point in oc'ing will my cpu's life duration start to decline? I have read mixed reviews saying the cpu's life duration is not effected as long as stock volts are kept and heat is maintained. So what would be a safe oc for my cpu?

 

[unclefester]

What did your temps look like at those settings?

At that voltage it seems you found the max for your multiplier. Now try raising the FSB 2 points at a time (ie... 202, 204, 206, etc...). Run prime for 15 or 20 minutes at each setting. When you get to where you have errors or a crash, drop back down 2 points and run prime for an hour or 2, then try gaming for a couple of hours to see if it is still stable.

As far as longevity of your processor at the voltage. It should run for a few years as long as heat is never an issue.

PS: What does your memory run at?

 

[redgarl]

I am using coretemp and I got 25C at idle with a 720 X3 BE and a OCZ Vendetta 2. Seems ok to me.

 

[unclefester]

I am using coretemp and I got 25C at idle with a 720 X3 BE and a OCZ Vendetta 2. Seems ok to me.

I'd say 25c is pretty dang good! Room temp for most people is 20-22c

 

[shaggy2k7]

my temps at 19x multiplier 200fsb 1.4750v's were raised about 2c idle and 1c load.

 

[unclefester]

Did you try upping the FSB yet?

 

[shaggy2k7]

no not yet, just trying to be a good college student and research everything so I dont have to fork out another $250 .

I will say this, AMD's overdrive utility just does not work. Tried the novice cpu level up and just went up 1 point on it and......crash.

 

[shaggy2k7]

woot, only at 1.4625v's and have my mulitplier up to 19x and fsb 210, so far up to 4.003.72ghz per core and running smoothly, dare I go higher?

So if my stock voltage is 1.4250v's and I upped it to 1.4625v's, how much is that going to hurt my processor? Basically what I am asking, besides the heat issue(which I am not having), will my processors life start to be in question?

*edit* above postings actually were very unstable, once I restarted it would just crash everytime getting to the vista flash loading screen. Reset everything back to default. So what could be the problem? Not enough juice to the cpu with the current multi/fsb settings?

*edit #2* Finished reading the artical on tomshardware
"How to: Overclocking AMD processors"
A very good read, wish I would have found that artical first. Pretty much from what I am getting from it, is that if I can get my multiplier up and make it stable with out changing any other settings, that would be considered a very safe overclock correct?

Example: If my default multiplier is 17x(which it is), and I safely get it up to x19 with leaving voltage at 1.4250 default, and fsb 200 default, get through prime 95 for a few hours with no errors, that is a safe overclock for a beginner like me.

 

[unclefester]

Even at 1.4625 the CPU should last a few years ( they are warrantied to 1.5v).

Looks like 19x210 will not be a stable OC. But that is part of OCing trying to find the sweet-spot that "your" computer will run at.

Now try dropping down to 19x208 and run a stability test and see if it will hold up. If not drop to 19x206, and so on to find "that sweat-spot"

 

[shaggy2k7]

ok so can you tell me if my thinking is correct?

Atm all stock except for the multiplier which is at 18x putting each core to 3.6ghz. I'm watching the voltage readings on the cpu and stock settings are at 1.4250v's, but running prime95 atm the cpu is only pulling 1.37-1.38v's. So if my thinking is correct, I can keep slowley raising multipliers and fsb's until my volt reader program tells me its getting extremely close the the 1.4250 *limit*. Then I start upping voltage to continue oc'ing?

 

[unclefester]

Let me see if I understanding you correctly. You set everything back to the default settings in the BIOS except the multiplier? So you didn't hard-set /lock-down the CPU voltage and the default voltage is 1.425v? But it's only drawing 1.38v?
Sounds like the CPU voltage is set to AUTO. And if that's the case you need to go in and set it manually again. The reason for this is that when set to AUTO the MoBo will keep pushing more voltage then is needed and you will build heat really fast. If your not sitting there monitoring it during a stress test and all of the sudden it decides to spike. Well you know what I'm saying, Not Good!!!

 

[shaggy2k7]

your kinda getting what I'm saying, but in bios I set the cpu voltage to 1.4250, so it wont go over that I believe. 3.7ghz at 200fsb 18.5x multiplier and 1.4250v's is stable for over an hour in prime95 small FFT's. I know I'm kinda back tracking a little but I believe when I first did it I was going way to fast. Bumped my multi to 19x and prime95 ran for about 5mins then crashed the pc. So I think its time to start slowly upping my voltage or should I slowely up my fsb first?

 

[unclefester]

Not sure why your getting a voltage fluctuation? Try upping it to 1.45v or lowering it to 1.4v and see if it stabilizes on your next stress test.

You can do it either way. I prefer to up the multiplier then push the FSB. Others have stated they had better results by using a lower multiplier and running up the FSB.
PS: Keep in mind that when you OC with the FSB, you are also OCing other components in your system (ie... hardrives, CD/DVD, memory...ect.)

 

[jbguillo]

I too am running an oc'd 965 on a Zalman 9700 w/ as5. I've only ran this setup for less than 24 hours though; so not really any heat cycles on it yet.

I'm currently idling at 33c at 3.8ghz w/ 19x, 200mhz and 1.425w. I upped all of these setting through bios, and at max I really only see around 53-54c.

Yesterday I was playing around with Gigabyte's Easy Boost that came with my mobo. It does it's own stress tests for AMD BE chips, and watched mine reach x19.5 206mhz stably. My computer BSOD'd once I hit x20 200mhz; keep in mind my temps never went above 56c.

I'm going to keep playing around a little more, but I believe that x19 and 200mhz at stock voltage is one of the best settings for this cpu.

 

[xbonez]

i have the same procy...965BE. x19 multiplier (3.8 ghz) is rock solid for me, but anything higher than this and my comp crashes instantly. I think that for the most part, the 965BE is unstable at anything beyond the 3.8ghz mark.