[SOLVED] Ryzen 5 2600 Voltage differences between load and idle

slavi_asenov2002

Honorable
Apr 11, 2018
117
6
10,695
I have overclocked my ryzen 2600 to 4.0Ghz using 1.2375v in the BIOS.
However, recently I saw that in CPU-z, HWInfo, HWMonitor that the Core voltage is shown as 1.232.
The strange thing is that on idle in those programs say the core voltage is 1.232 when the cpu is idle or its usage is less than 30-40%.
But when I play games,render some videos or run a stress test the voltage lowers to 1.216v. There are also cases when it drops to even 1.136v, 0.608v, 0.7v... etc. on idle.
What is going on?

My PC Specs:
-Ryzen 5 2600
-Asrock AB350M Pro4
-2x8gb Corsair Vengeance RGB
-bequiet System Power 9 600W PSU
 
Solution
I didn't know about vdroop. Now that I have looked about it many people were suggesting turning the LLC to extreme, but my mothrrboard does not have that.
Also strange thing is that I saw 2 different opinions on vdroop - one says it can damage the transistors severely and the cpu will degrade, the other says it is no big deal.
Asrock forums is full of this vdroop articles, so it is probably safe to say it is fine with it
You'll only be drawing a lot of current if you're at high load, and with vdroop your voltage drops as you draw more current. Vdroop is safer than cranking up the LLC and getting overshoot where you end up with higher voltage than you asked for. As long as your OC is stable it doesn't matter if you're getting...

slavi_asenov2002

Honorable
Apr 11, 2018
117
6
10,695
I didn't know about vdroop. Now that I have looked about it many people were suggesting turning the LLC to extreme, but my mothrrboard does not have that.
Also strange thing is that I saw 2 different opinions on vdroop - one says it can damage the transistors severely and the cpu will degrade, the other says it is no big deal.
Asrock forums is full of this vdroop articles, so it is probably safe to say it is fine with it
 

junglist724

Honorable
Apr 10, 2017
126
38
10,640
I didn't know about vdroop. Now that I have looked about it many people were suggesting turning the LLC to extreme, but my mothrrboard does not have that.
Also strange thing is that I saw 2 different opinions on vdroop - one says it can damage the transistors severely and the cpu will degrade, the other says it is no big deal.
Asrock forums is full of this vdroop articles, so it is probably safe to say it is fine with it
You'll only be drawing a lot of current if you're at high load, and with vdroop your voltage drops as you draw more current. Vdroop is safer than cranking up the LLC and getting overshoot where you end up with higher voltage than you asked for. As long as your OC is stable it doesn't matter if you're getting a ton of vdroop. Higher temperature and higher voltage/current will cause CPU degradation, though how much it degrades depends on the CPU and how much load you put on it for how long. Ryzen 2nd gen and its 12nm process actually degrades so easily that I'd say there is no safe voltage, only safe voltage @ a given temperature, but at less than 1.3v I wouldn't worry about it at all. You left C-States(idle states) on so it drops voltages at idle, which is absolutely not a bad thing unless it's unstable. You always want to use as little voltage as you possibly can.

On the X versions of the CPUs precision boost overdrive will allow up to 1.375v for a 100% all core load, but as soon as temperatures start to go over 70C it starts to throttle back voltage, which is pretty much exactly in line with what people have tested as safe.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: slavi_asenov2002
Solution
Since your board has NO LLC settings, there's nothing you can do about it anyhow. And the reason it does NOT have those settings, is because it is not a board intended for even moderate manual overclocking. IMO, any board that lacks LLC settings is a board that should not be overclocked on more than just very little. I'd simply set things back to the stock configuration and let the system handle the boost settings or get a better board.
 
  • Like
Reactions: slavi_asenov2002