Question Constant crashes after overclocking ?

[hard2break]

Hello all! I know I have a very old CPU and it bottlenecks my setup, but still wanted to ask why do I get constant crashes after I overclock even a bit, while my temperatures are very good. Also, I'm pretty noob at OC.

My setup is the following:
i7 4790k
AMD RX 6700 XT
4x8GB Corsair Vengeance 1333MHz (rated 2400MHz)
MoBo ASUS Maximus Ranger VII
PSU Corsair CX750 Bronze
I use Arctic MX 4 for thermal compound
CPU Cooler Coolermaster 212 EVO

I tried a LOT of different setups, but can't manage to reach 4.5GHz without the occasional crash. The most "stable" I achieved to run it is like this:
Core Multiplier at 45 (to achieve 4.5GHz)
RAM speed at 2666MHz
Voltage set to adaptive with + symbol
Cache voltage set to adaptive with + symbol

With these settings, and running HeavyLoad stressing bot CPU and GPU, I reach a top 72C temp, which in theory is really good. The stress test passes (left it for around 30 min), but occasionally will crash as well. Games with high requirements will also make my computer crash eventually.

When trying to set my voltage to manual, I tried different setups, but no matter what I try it always crashes on the stress test.

Can anyone help me? What am I doing wrong?

 

[Dark Lord of Tech]

OC will not help the bottleneck , you need a new platform.

 

[hard2break]

OC will not help the bottleneck , you need a new platform.

Thanks for your reply! I bought this PC with a very low price, since my friend decided to upgrade everything and sold this one to me, so buying more parts is not feasible for me for now, I don't have a budget for it.

With what I have, I'm just trying to squeeze as much performance as I can, but the constant crashes, even with low temps are preventing me to do so. Whenever I OC it to 4.5 or 4.6 GHz I feel the overall difference, and gain around 10FPS on very modern games, which is a big deal to me since I only plan to play on 1080p. I heard this CPU was a monster on its time for overclocking, but not being able to get past its factory turbo speed is very sad. With 4.5 I don't see problems with temps, and supposedly the voltage I apply is good enough (1.28v) but still it will crash...

 

[Phaaze88]

Leave Vcore and cache voltage on auto, only set the multiplier to 45. If it still crashes in tests, you've other problems, that I wouldn't know where to start.

 

[zx128k]

If you have just got an old system from someone else, the first thing you should do is load bios defaults. Load the correct default setting for the RAM. Then test the system to see if its stable at stock. Also overclocking requires a good PSU with the right watts and better than stock cooling. If the system has not been cleaned, you should clean all the dust out of the cooling system before you do anything. Do a full service. If there is a custom water loop, you need to clean it out and check for leaks or corrosion.

Once you are 100% sure that everything is working, that there is enough cooling and power for the overclock. Accept that overclocking an old system can kill it and thus understand the risk. Then research how to overclock the system correctly. Ask things like, can the motherboard VRMs handle an overclock? or is this a board not conducive to overclocking. Having 110c vrm, can create a blast furnace inside your case this might not affect your overclock or vrms but other components won't like that kind of heat and could fail.

Ask should you overclock? If you find an issue then fix it or don't overclock. 4790k for example if you put 1.3 volts for everything, vcore, cache etc. This will kill the cpu dead. Make sure you understand what is safe and what is a reasonable overclock for the setup you have. The following information will help.

Historical Binning Statistics

Devil's Canyon	All Core SSE Frequency	All Core AVX2 Frequency	BIOS Vcore	% Capable
4790K	4.60GHz	Not Tested	1.296V	100%
4790K	4.70GHz	Not Tested	1.312V	Top 96%
4790K	4.80GHz	Not Tested	1.328V	Top 68%
4790K	4.90GHz	Not Tested	1.344V	Top 22%
4790K	5.00GHz	Not Tested	1.360V	Top 3%

We can see that when you tried 4.5 or 4.6 GHz and vcore of 1.28v. This could be a little too low but all cpus binned here were able to do 4.5-4.6GHz. The BIOS vcore voltage was 1.296V. Its a good sign temps were fine as well with your first attempt. Remember to check the VRM temps as well.

Take things slow if you overclock. Research everything. Try each frequency one at a time and record the vcore needed. There will be a point were you need massive vcore increases or cannot get the cpu stable. This will help you find the best frequency to aim for as a maximum overclock. Any issues at that frequency, temps, too high voltages. Then reduce the overclock target frequency and retest. This will be a proccess that will take as long as required.

Also if the cpu has been overclocked for many years it could well degrade and not overclock as well as this table implies. Just be careful, research everything so you know what you are doing and treat it as a project that will take time to complete correctly. I would start at 4.80GHz if everything is good with the system. That you have started at 4.5GHz is good but if you cannot get it stable yourself you need to research overclocking your system more. 4.5GHz should be a matter of setting the multiplier.

 

[Etrius vanRandr]

Hello all! I know I have a very old CPU and it bottlenecks my setup, but still wanted to ask why do I get constant crashes after I overclock even a bit, while my temperatures are very good. Also, I'm pretty noob at OC.

My setup is the following:
i7 4790k
When trying to set my voltage to manual, I tried different setups, but no matter what I try it always crashes on the stress test.

Can anyone help me? What am I doing wrong?

4790k needs quite a bit of voltage to achieve stable, I ran mine at 4.6 to 4.8 at about 1.35 to 1.4 volts on a 360 mm liquid cooler and still got pretty spicy temperatures.

My laptop is still haswell if you take a look at my signature. Mine's overclock to 4.2 GHz and still has crashes sometimes even on regular adaptive/automatic voltage. You're going to want to try 1.215 volts to maybe 1.25 and see if that's any more stable. If that gets too hot for you try also playing with the VCC voltage. Depending on your motherboard core voltage and core input voltage might be labeled with different terms

I would also enable XMP for more stable ram timings

People in this thread are right though you do need a new platform. Quad-core CPUs don't really perform well anymore. the only reason why my laptop gets away with anything is because the CPU is overclocked but even then at 1080p it's still the bottleneck in a new game like cyberpunk

 

[hard2break]

Okay everyone, thanks a lot for your suggestions! Turns out the culprit is not what I would've thought... A friend of mine told me Win11 has been giving him performance issues with a very new build (i9 12th gen, amd 6800) and then he reverted back to win10 and it solved his issues

I installed win10 and tested a lot of games with my previous OC profile (4.4GHz) and noticed a huge improvement! Like 10fps overall in every game I tried ( some like dota were like 60fps more!!!).

Then I imagined maybe win11 was messing with my OC? I tried 4.5GHz with 1.33v and ran another torture test with prime, and it was rock solid. Then I went even further with 4.6GHz and 1.38v, and it took it like a champ! Something odd with Win11 not performing well with OC (and even without it), but so far I am more than happy with the results, even running Witcher 3 next gen (dx11) with everything on ultra at 90fps!

 

[zx128k]

Windows 11 has security features enabled that will reduce performance. Also turn off bitdefender as it will reduce performance as well in windows 11. Otherwise Windows 10 and 11 are close performance wise for a 10900k.

 

[jerry'sSOFTWARE]

Okay everyone, thanks a lot for your suggestions! Turns out the culprit is not what I would've thought... A friend of mine told me Win11 has been giving him performance issues with a very new build (i9 12th gen, amd 6800) and then he reverted back to win10 and it solved his issues

I installed win10 and tested a lot of games with my previous OC profile (4.4GHz) and noticed a huge improvement! Like 10fps overall in every game I tried ( some like dota were like 60fps more!!!).

Then I imagined maybe win11 was messing with my OC? I tried 4.5GHz with 1.33v and ran another torture test with prime, and it was rock solid. Then I went even further with 4.6GHz and 1.38v, and it took it like a champ! Something odd with Win11 not performing well with OC (and even without it), but so far I am more than happy with the results, even running Witcher 3 next gen (dx11) with everything on ultra at 90fps!

have you tried Windows 10 LTSC? it's the fastest version of Windows 10 ever. from booting-shutdown process, to open program, no bloatware, etc.