Overclocking Intel i5 650 & 661 Safely

[jsphdickens]

I recently convinced a friend of mine to let me build her a respectable system for under $500.

Similar to my system (see my signature), here are the specs:
■Intel i5-650 @3.2GHz
■Asus P7H55-M/CSM Motherboard
■4GB Kingston ValuRam @1333
■Sony Optiarc DVD-R/W
■Thermaltake V3 450W PSU
■Thermaltake V3 Black Mid-Tower
■Radeon HD5770 (She will get this from me hand me down when my 6870 comes in)


I have convinced her that she should let me overclock her chip to 3.6GHz. My reasoning being that all these 3GHz+ i5 processors are probably the same exact thing, and that they are just clocked to different speeds for marketing. For my 3.33GHz 661, I am able to increase my clock speed all the way up to 4.00GHz with stability and not even have to mess with voltages. I keep my computer clocked at 3.6GHz all the time, and have no problems.

Now that somebody else's expensive hardware is at stake, I'd like to know for sure that my assumptions aren't wrong and that what I am suggesting isn't a bad idea.

Is this a good idea? Are the i5 650-680 the same chip at different clock speeds, or is there something important I am missing?

 

[asven1]

how well did you get the stock intel cooler to seat? the fan assembly attachment is wimpy and its easy for the prongs to pop out. i would be afraid to overclock on a stock intel fan assembly unless i was absolutely sure it was seated properly and was not going to pop off at a later date.

with turbo boost enabled i do not think you would need to overclock the cpu unless she is going to use her machine for something more than email, surfing, and watching movies.

as to your question about the difference between 650 and 680... i believe you are right that the 680 is the 650 with a faster speed not sure if its done through different multipliers or not.

I have been running my 650 at 4.1 ghz on air since i have bought it in may of this year. All i really did was bump the bclk.

If you are sure the machine temperatures are stable then i would not be afraid to overclock it to 3.6

 

[jsphdickens]

Best answer selected by jsphdickens.