Why is my i7 950 running at 1.6 ghz

[tigolbitties]

Hi,

I recently tried to o/c my computer from 3.06 to 3.6 and CPUID says my computer is running at the 3.06ghz without the o/c and 3.6 ghz with the o/c, yet after 5 minutes or so it changes to 1.6 ghz without the o/c and 1.8 ghz with the o/c

I recently built a computer, here's my list of parts:

Cooler Master 932
Asus Sabertooth x58 Mother board
i7 950 3.06ghz
OCZ 60gb SSD (for boot)
1TB velociraptor at 7,200 RPM
AZZA 900w psu
Nvidia Geforce GTX 560 Ti
Corsair Dominator 3x 2gb DDR3 1600

With my o/c my BCLK is at 150 and my CPU ratio is at 24 making my computer run at 3600Mz or 3.6GHz
This is the only thing i changed and everything else in bios is standard

I don't know whether it is a voltage issue or a heat issue can someone please help? it would be much appreciated

 

[saint19]

Hi and welcome to Tom's forum.

Did you disable the power save options?

 

[HEXiT]

yep c1 halt state needs to be dissabled in bios along with any other powersaving features...
you will also want to adjust the power managment in windows.

 

[bwrlane]

Hi,

I recently tried to o/c my computer from 3.06 to 3.6 and CPUID says my computer is running at the 3.06ghz without the o/c and 3.6 ghz with the o/c, yet after 5 minutes or so it changes to 1.6 ghz without the o/c and 1.8 ghz with the o/c

I recently built a computer, here's my list of parts:

Cooler Master 932
Asus Sabertooth x58 Mother board
i7 950 3.06ghz
OCZ 60gb SSD (for boot)
1TB velociraptor at 7,200 RPM
AZZA 900w psu
Nvidia Geforce GTX 560 Ti
Corsair Dominator 3x 2gb DDR3 1600

With my o/c my BCLK is at 150 and my CPU ratio is at 24 making my computer run at 3600Mz or 3.6GHz
This is the only thing i changed and everything else in bios is standard

I don't know whether it is a voltage issue or a heat issue can someone please help? it would be much appreciated

Simple. Your CPU is underclocking itself when not needed. If you load it up, it will revert to nominal values. My system is somewhat similar to yours (i7 920 o/c to 4GHz) and it idles at around 2.2 GHz if I remember correctly. If you are really bothered about this, you can change the power saving settings in the bios but the only effect will be to increase your power consumption. The frequency adjusts so quickly when you increase load that any speed improvements from disabling powersaving will almost certainly not be noticed.

 

[ern88]

Yup, If you have your power setting set to balance. Windows will throttle down your CPU when max power isn't need. That's what I have mine set to!!! My i5 2500K throttles down to 1.6 GHZ. And under load, such as gaming. It goes to my O/C state which is 4.2 GHZ!!!

 

[clairvoux]

Dont worry. Its just the CPU throtling itself down to save power. My Q9400 does the exact same thing and underclocks itself to 1,7 GHZ when on idle (or almost) state. But as soon as the extra power is needed, the CPU clocks itself up in 333 mhz increments (that varies from CPU to CPU) up to its max asigned frequency.

 

[IntelEnthusiast]

The technology is called Intel® Speedstep® it is designed to keep heat and power usage down when you are not actively doing something with processor. As soon as you start up an application you will see the processors speed zip right up.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team

 

[FinneousPJ]

Yep, it's a great feature as long as your system is stable with it (you may run into problems with extreme OCs, yours should be fine). I use it too on my i7-920 since I run it pretty much 24/7.