i7 4790K Question

[nubbsauce]

Hello!

I was wondering how I could push my CPU further than 4.6ghz. Currently, it's stable at 4.6ghz with 1.350v going to the CPU. The Intel HD 4600 Graphics is Enabled as well as HT. Right now, I have a stable benchmark of 16,435 on 3DMARK. Also, if you couldn't tell, I mainly use this build for Gaming and eventually Streaming. I don't use this for Editing, Rendering, or anything of that nature.

I have read that if you disable both of those, you can get a higher clock at the same voltage with little temperature change.

I really haven't messed with turning things on and off, but would disabling HT make that much of a difference if the CPU was at a higher clock such as 4.8-5.0ghz?

Looking forward to your response!


Here are my specs:

CPU: Intel i7 4790k @ 4.6
CPU Cooler: Corsair H105 Liquid Cooler
GPU: Evga GTX 980 Ti SC ACX 2.0+ w/BP (+250 Core Clock / +500 Mem Clock)
MOBO: ASUS Maximus VII Hero
RAM: Corsair Dominator @ 2133 (16GB)
PSU: Antec 850 HPC Platinum Modular PSU
SSD#1: Samsung EVO PRO 512GB (Games)
SSD#2: OCZ Agility 3 240GB (System)
HDD: WD 1TB 7200RPM (Storage)
KB: Razer Black Widow Chroma
MOUSE: Razer Deathadder (original)
Speakers/Headset: Astro A50 Gen2 (wht/grn)
MONITOR: ASUS 24" 1080p @144hz
Windows 10 Pro 64-Bit

 

[Gallarian]

Just wondering, why do you want to?

With your specs, an extra 0.1 or so on top of your 4.6 will have virtually 0 impact on anything you do..

 

[Shneiky]

You will not reach 5 GHz on a Haswell without custom water cooling and delidding.

Even so, a 5 GHz I7 without Hyperthreading will be slower than 4.6 GHz with Hyperthreading when gaming and streaming at the same time.

 

[nubbsauce]

Thanks for the quick response!

Well people are hitting 5.0ghz with HT enabled, but I cant get close to that. It's super unstable when I try to push 4.8ghz with HT on and pushing 1.400v to the CPU. But that can be because they hit the Silicon Jackpot haha. What I want to do is hit at least 5.0-5.2 ghz on my CPU. Now I have seen people set their base clock to 4.0ghz and somehow raise their boost to 5.0 Boost clock (unless the overclock to 5.0ghz is read as the boost clock). But will disabling HT to get a higher clock be worth it for gaming?

Also, stock boost is 4.4ghz for my processor.

 

[Shneiky]

As I said - they use way better cooling than a H105 and delid the CPU to swap the thermal paste for better heat transfer. There are no 5.2 GHz 4790Ks using All in one liquid coolers such as the H105. 99.9% of Haswell caps out at around 4.7-4.9 with conventional cooling means. Haswell is not Sandy. You can't do 5.1 GHz on air as Sandy does.

Also, running Haswell on 1.4 vCore will degrade the life of the CPU. A lot of people who had burned Haswells do not recommend over 1.35 for long term use.

The last 200 MHz that you are trying to squeeze out are completely not worth it. Even if you manage to get it to 5.2 GHz, still a 4.6 GHz with Hyperthreading ON will be more productive when streaming and gaming at the same time.

 

[nubbsauce]

You will not reach 5 GHz on a Haswell without custom water cooling and delidding.

Even so, a 5 GHz I7 without Hyperthreading will be slower than 4.6 GHz with Hyperthreading when gaming and streaming at the same time.

But I don't understand how people are hitting 4.8 - 5.0 ghz with HT on with a corsair H110. Am I doing something wrong?

And i would never overclock anything on air cooling regardless if it's stable or not. But those Sandys were amazing.

 

[Shneiky]

Deliding sometimes drops temps down with over 10C.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erbhskSHRPc

And your bias against air is not based on any true facts - top-of-the-the line air coolers for 70-90 bucks beat AIO water coolers up to 130-150$ in price / performance / noise department.

And those special people have won the silicon loterry. If their chip can do it - it does not mean that yours can. My 2700k can run at 4 GHz at 1.09 vCore. That is one of the 1% lowest I have seen around the internet. But I cant reach 4.5 GHz at stock voltage like one of my colleges does. Some chips perform better at lower, some perform better at higher and, well, some are just lemons. You got a pretty descent chip. You should be able to run 4.6 at 1.3 vCore. Just try it at that and if it runs stable - then just leave it at that and forget about it. You will never notice any difference.

 

[nubbsauce]

Deliding sometimes drops temps down with over 10C.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erbhskSHRPc

And your bias against air is not based on any true facts - top-of-the-the line air coolers for 70-90 bucks beat AIO water coolers up to 130-150$ in price / performance / noise department.

And those special people have won the silicon loterry. If their chip can do it - it does not mean that yours can. My 2700k can run at 4 GHz at 1.09 vCore. That is one of the 1% lowest I have seen around the internet. But I cant reach 4.5 GHz at stock voltage like one of my colleges does. Some chips perform better at lower, some perform better at higher and, well, some are just lemons. You got a pretty descent chip. You should be able to run 4.6 at 1.3 vCore. Just try it at that and if it runs stable - then just leave it at that and forget about it. You will never notice any difference.

Okay. So if I drop it to 1.3v and It's stable ill leave it there. I would assume my temp would be even lower than it already is. One more thing, that doesn't have to do with the CPU, for some reason, in my benchmarks and system monitors, my RAM reads out to 667mhz. But when i go to my bios, its at 2133mhz. Is it just the program misreading the RAM or is it actually running at that speed?

 

[Shneiky]

Depends on which software application you are using. Some applications do not read the actual rate, but they read the first profile they encounter.

Also - 667 MHz (double data rate) is 1333 MHz - which is the lowest profile. Go to your profile and Enable the proper XMP profile to get it at 1067 - which is 2133

 

[nubbsauce]

Depends on which software application you are using. Some applications do not read the actual rate, but they read the first profile they encounter.

Also - 667 MHz (double data rate) is 1333 MHz - which is the lowest profile. Go to your profile and Enable the proper XMP profile to get it at 1067 - which is 2133

Well I use CPU-Z and 3DMARK. They both report the 667mhz. And my bios profile is already set to XMP 1.3 1066mhz. The bios reports 2133mhz total.

 

[nubbsauce]

Ok, so 1.300v gave a WHEA error bluescreen right at windows login. I bumped it up to 1.310v and it got to desktop fine. I will keep you updated if it is stable when I Benchmark it. The RAM is still reading 667mhz on the monitors but 1066 in the bios. So idk if it's the Monitors or what.

EDIT: Benchmarking and 2 hours of BF4 on MAX was stable.

 

[nubbsauce]

Update: Managed to push the CPU to 4.7ghz at 1.375v. It currently is stable at that. No matter how much I tried, I couldn't push it to 4.8 and get past Windows Login.

 

[Shneiky]

Well that is just as much as your chip can do. 4.7 is a descent result.

1.375 is too high for long term usage. I do not advise more than 1.3 and personally I won't go over 1.2 on a Haswell for long term usage (I do tons of rendering, so CPU is at 100% for 40-50 or up hours at a time). But in the end it is your hardware and your choice.

 

[nubbsauce]

Well that is just as much as your chip can do. 4.7 is a descent result.

1.375 is too high for long term usage. I do not advise more than 1.3 and personally I won't go over 1.2 on a Haswell for long term usage (I do tons of rendering, so CPU is at 100% for 40-50 or up hours at a time). But in the end it is your hardware and your choice.

Yeah it is, which is why I will only use that for benchmarking and not constant use. (The voltage boosts to 1.392v for some reason even when I have it set to 1.375v)

I just updated my bios yesterday and reset everything to default, and when I noticed my CPU voltage at 4.4ghz, I noticed the voltage was at 1.232v. Now I'm wondering if I can redo the 4.7 at a lower voltage with the new bios update. When the CPU sits at its 4.0ghz base clock, the voltage is 1.104v which seems pretty damn low.

So I'm wondering if my BIOS update further improved the overall stability of the voltages.