Question about AMD Black Edition Overclocking Guide‏

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Yoshinat0r

Yoshinat0r

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Nov 22, 2010
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I've read through the guide on overclocking black edition processors, and it is excellent, but there is something I don't understand. In the guide it said:

"First,you need to manually set your memory speed, timings, and the required memory slot voltage, to your memory manufacturers exact requirements"

but I'm not sure exactly how to find my memory manufacturer's exact requirements for those settings. Same thing with this line as well:

"All your specification speeds like Memory, Hyper Transport, or North Bridge need to all be set to their default settings"

How do I figure out the default settings for those specification speeds? Does it just mean to set them to auto?

I know these are probably really simple questions but I just want to make sure I'm doing everything right before I start overclocking.
 
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Ok, well actually I'm glad I may have found a solid answer as to why this is happening. Thanks for posting that green300.

If it's true that this memory is only guaranteed to run at its rated speeds on an x6 cpu, then maybe it's not an issue with the mobo at all. I haven't got the chance to contact ASRock yet, was going to today, but maybe this solves my issue.

If I really can't get the memory to run at its rated speeds, then what should I set it to before overclocking? Should I just play around with it until I get the highest stable settings I can get?
 
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😉

I guess personally I would try 8-8-8-24-2T @1.65,possibly 1.66,1.67 if needed

Couple ppl said the best they could get was 8-9-8-24-2T, may need to go there..just don't go too loose.

It's recommended that you boot to Memtest and test memory before entering your os so as to help prevent corrupting os.

http://www.memtest.org/

g/l



 
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7-7-7-16@1333 will perform very well if it is stable. I would want to run 1600 or there abouts if I could..

Is it stable under stress testing ? (couple hours of prime95 on "blend" or an hour or so of linux set to "all" memory)

You would want to make sure it is stable before you start oc'ing..

Real world feel or system snap, no. Benchmarks, yes.
 
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I haven't done any serious stress testing yet, I just booted into memtest and let it run until it successfully passed all of the tests, which took a good 40 minutes. I usually don't like running prime95 for extended periods of time because my cpu temp climbs pretty high, about 68'C max during the test, and I know it can't be good for the cpu to stay that hot for such a long time. Unless that's not such a bad temp to run stress tests at.

I also managed to get it at 8-8-8-18@1600, seems stable, ran memtest like halfway through and no errors so far. Would it be more beneficial if I could run it at 8-8-8-18@1600 as opposed to 7-7-7-16@1333?
 
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Max safe operating temp is 62c. 68c is too hot ! You will need a good aftermarket cooler if your going to oc or stress test. You don't want your cpu to get up over 55c as they are known to become unstable above.

8-8-8-18-2T@1600 is very good, where 7-8-7-18-1T@1600 would be a smidgen better.

Think cooler now...too hot.
 
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Well finally new cpu heatsink/fan arrived and I installed it. Wow what a difference! CPU idles at about 28'C. I ran prime95 for about 18 minutes and the CPU mostly stayed at 43'C under max load, occasionally hitting 44'C 😀 Man I never thought replacing the stock heatsink would make so much of a difference!

Now I just wish I could get the memory to run at 7-8-7-18@1600, but it seems my computer does not accept any CAS value less than 8 for 1600 :sarcastic: Should I try also slightly increasing the voltage? I'm also curious as to what the 2T/1T means? Never manually set that so not sure what it's set to right now, I think 2T.
 
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I suppose it's best to just leave it at 2T then, for stability's sake. Thanks for the thread link, that article made it quite a bit clearer to me.

Ok well it seems that no matter what I do, my motherboard will not accept a CAS Latency of 7 @ 1600. I've tried as loose timings as 7-9-7-24 along with upping the voltage to 1.68 (don't really want to go beyond that), and it still will just change the MHz down to 1333 upon booting into memtest. Whatever though, so far I've been able to get 8-8-8-15@1600 stable (Passed memtest and ran prime for about 35 minutes). I'll have to find a certain time a day when I won't mind leaving my computer to stress test for a few hours, but it seems solid enough right now.

So I have another question regarding timings. The last number (I forget what the last 3 timing values are called) cannot go below 15, the motherboard won't let me set it any lower, so it's basically at its lowest I guess. I'm wondering, however, if I should try just lowering the two middle numbers? I'm not sure if there's some kind of pattern you must follow when lowering timings, so I don't know if it's a good idea to try lowering the two middle numbers without lowering the CAS latency along with them.
 
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^ Try 9-9-9-24 at 2T discover your highest multiplier O/C potential, then tweak and tighten the memory timings later.

Your memory OCZ > OCZ3P1600C6LV4GK is compatible with Intel Core i3 & i5.

It is guaranteed to run 6-8-6-24 timing on Intel, there is no guarantee it will do the same on AMD, the only solid figure you have is the voltage is 1.65v so set that voltage manually and set your timing at the cas 9 suggestion above, and find your highest stable overclock.
 
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Ok, that makes sense as far as the issue I'm having with getting the rated speeds.

Well I'm having a slight problem here with manually upping the vcore voltage. I managed to get the multiplier to x20.0 / 4.0GHz without manually adjusting the voltage at all. So I shot for 4.1 GHz and manually set the vcore voltage one step higher, 1.42V, but the motherboard is reporting a voltage way higher than that, like 1.44/1.45. I know I have it manually set to 1.42, but if the voltage is really as high as the motherboard says, I don't want to go any higher. Could the motherboard be reporting the wrong voltage or something? CPU-Z is reporting the same voltage as well, much higher than what I have set.

EDIT: Ok I found out that CoreTemp is showing the correct Vcore voltage that I manually set. Should I just ignore what CPU-Z and my motherboard is showing?
 
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Well I've managed to get 4.0 GHz @ 1.46v stable, which I'm super happy about :) 4.1 GHz just will not work, no matter how much I increase the voltage (tried as high as 1.50v). The CPU can't pass 3dmark and occassionally it'll crash upon booting into windows. I would like to try and shoot a bit higher if I could though 😀 are there any other voltages that I should try increasing along with the cpu voltage to attain speeds higher than 4 GHz?
 
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Win7 Ultimate 64bit OP/SYS you're running will be an affecting factor, after experimenting with the various operating systems the 64bit versions will limit your O/C top end.

I dual boot WinXP Pro 32bit and WinVista 64bit, I can clock my 965BE to 4.3G in WinXP 32bit stable, but cannot get that high in Vista 64bit, I'm pretty sure your Win7 64bit will act similar to Vista.

Why don't you just run at 4.0G for a while and allow your CPU some burn in time at that speed, because experimenting with voltages up to (tried as high as 1.50v), is not a good idea.

4.0G is better than some others have gotten the 965BE on Win7 64bit, so you kinda need to be happy with where you are, or risk negative results.
 
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Thought I should just throw this out there:

I can't run prime95 for more than like 20 seconds and then it's bsod. I tried upping the voltage to no avail. I can pass 3dmark06 fine, however. I know you said in your guide that passing prime95 wasn't absolutely necessary, but it has me concerned, since I've ran things like video converting programs which use all 4 cores at almost 100%. I'm not sure if I should try and get it stable under prime95, or just leave it.
 
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yoshinat0r, Its probably memory related.

Email OCZ's product support team, you can get the contact info from OCZ's website, tell them the model# of the memory you purchased and the details of the AMD platform you're running that memory in, and ask them what timings they recommend for you to use, on an AMD setup, for the most stable performance.
 
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Just got a response. They recommended 6-9-6-30, so I tried it, system just hung on a black screen, I knew it wasn't going to work. My motherboard seems to follow a strict pattern.

It won't accept CAS Latency of 6 at any speed higher than 535 MHz
It won't accept CAS Latency of 7 at any speed higher than 666 MHz
It will accept CAS Latency of 8 at all speeds up to 800 MHz

If I try to set the speed of the RAM any higher than the speeds I listed above for the 6 and 7 CAS Latencys, my motherboard will follow another strict pattern.

After the settings are saved in the BIOS, the system will restart and hang on a black screen. After I manually switch the power off and switch it back on, the system will hang on a black screen again. After manually switching the power off and switching it back on again, the system will finally post, but the settings will be changed to 6-6-6-15 @ 400 MHz. It will always hang two times, and successfully post on the third try.

Could it be the BIOS version I have? I upgraded to the latest version for my motherboard, 1.90, I'm wondering if I should revert back to an older one.
 
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It would definitely be something to try. I just hope I can do some kind of exchange with the RAM I already have. Really don't want to pay another $80 for something I'm not even sure will fix the problem.
 
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I contacted ASRock about the problem with certain speeds not liking certain timings and got a response, but I can't for the life of me make out what the guy is trying to say. I don't think English is his native tongue lol Here's the response:

"The ASRock model support the kind of CL (timing ) you mentioned ,but if you are installing with Phenon CPU version , witha regular version does not clock properly."
 
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:heink: :heink: :heink: :heink:

I don't get the idea :lol:
 
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