Question PC will not boot if "CPU Clock Ratio" is set to "Auto", everything runs fine if this setting is lowered

[Kirsch05]

Hey guys!

So a couple days ago I came home from work and my PC was off. I tried to turn it back on and was getting non-stop bluescreens, with the error codes seemingly random and not consistent.

I updated my bios via USB flash, did some digging online, tried repairing windows using a Win10 recovery boot disk, etc, all to no avail.

When trying to repair the windows installation using a USB flash drive I would get a BSOD that had an error code "Unsupported Processor". I then decided to mess around with the frequency settings and that is how I am at the spot I am now.

If I have these settings:

with "CPU Clock Ratio" set to "Auto", I immediately get a BSOD:

(The error code seems to change every time).

However, if I have these settings:

with "CPU Clock Ratio" set to, say 25 for example, my PC boots up just fine (albeit with slower CPU performance):

Since I can still get in to Windows I have ran CHKDSK and SFC SCANNOW, all windows and driver updates. They all install successfully and reboots are clean with this BIOS setting in place. I've ran cinebench to stress test the CPU to see if I could purposefully cause a BSOD to get logs but it ran flawlessly.

Are these just signs of my CPU dying? I am definitely due for an upgrade anyways but just wanted to see if anyone here has dealt with something similar. I also pretty much stick to CS on my PC so the hardware handles that just fine still hah

Thank you!

Specs:

MB : Gigabyte GA-Z170X-Gaming 3

Processor : Intel Core i7 6700K 4.00 GHz Unlocked Quad Core Skylake Desktop Processor, Socket LGA 1151

 

[punkncat]

Lol, by your title alone my first thought was "This is a Gigabyte motherboard"....and it is.

I had an Aorus board that did something very similar in regard to voltage.

I would suspect things such as CPU damage, motherboard power delivery issue, bad PSU.

Might test part of that equation by taking out GPU and then turning the ratio back up just to see if anything changes.
Have you been running a long term OC on this machine?

I will say this: I would not spend any significant amount of money towards fixing this machine unless the part can be used on a new build. So, basically, if it turns out to be pointing towards CPU or mobo I would just use this as an opportunity to update.

 

[Kirsch05]

Lol, by your title alone my first thought was "This is a Gigabyte motherboard"....and it is.

I had an Aorus board that did something very similar in regard to voltage.

I would suspect things such as CPU damage, motherboard power delivery issue, bad PSU.

Might test part of that equation by taking out GPU and then turning the ratio back up just to see if anything changes.
Have you been running a long term OC on this machine?

I will say this: I would not spend any significant amount of money towards fixing this machine unless the part can be used on a new build. So, basically, if it turns out to be pointing towards CPU or mobo I would just use this as an opportunity to update.

Thank you punkncat!

Yea I know its running on 7 years now and probably due for an upgrade anyways. I will do ask you suggested and remove the GPU to see if it can boot set at Auto.

I don't play any new gen games on this PC. I've had a fantastic habit the last 20 years of building a state of the art gaming machine just to install Steam and play counter-strike at 1280x720 🙄

Thinking maybe I can just replace the MB/CPU and keep everything else the same. Thank you for your input! I'll let this thread settle for the day before I get home tonight and see if anyone else has anything to try.

Again, I appreciate you taking the time to respond!

 

[punkncat]

As little overall power as the motherboard uses in relation to the graphics card, it would be unlikely to be causing this issue without you seeing other symptoms such as crashing under load and so forth. I was also going to suggest turning off XMP, but see that you don't have it enabled.

Is the clock ratio @25 as high as it will go without crashing?

Might consider trying something like download HW Info or the monitor of your preference and see what core voltage is. Try to set that manually and slowly creep it and ratio up. I do not know what safe voltages are for that CPU and this isn't really an "overclock" but just might want to do a quick search on that to see where the upper limit is to avoid (further) issue.

If you can eliminate the other components as being a part of the issue, even a humble upgrade to a modern i3 would be significant in relation to that 6th gen CPU.

 

[Kirsch05]

Is the clock ratio @25 as high as it will go without crashing?

Might consider trying something like download HW Info or the monitor of your preference and see what core voltage is. Try to set that manually and slowly creep it and ratio up. I do not know what safe voltages are for that CPU and this isn't really an "overclock" but just might want to do a quick search on that to see where the upper limit is to avoid (further) issue.

If you can eliminate the other components as being a part of the issue, even a humble upgrade to a modern i3 would be significant in relation to that 6th gen CPU.

I will download HW info tonight and do some testing. I have not overclocked this machine at all since its inception. Will post back, thank you!