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EzioAs
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Joined: Tue May 14, 2013 9:50 am

Overclocking CPU (Ivy Bridge) and RAM

Sat Feb 25, 2017 1:06 am

Hi guys,

I'm looking into further overclocking my system. I've been wanting to do this for awhile now and I've gotten more interested in doing it ever since I've seen the performance of recent released and soon to be released CPUs.

What I've got:

CPU : Intel Core i5-3570K
MOBO : MSI Z77A-GD65
RAM : 16GB Corsair Vengeance LP DDR3 1600MHz (4x4GB though different dual kits)
Cooler :Cooler Master Hyper 212+
PSU :Corsair HX750i
GPU : Palit GTX 1060 Jetstream 6GB
Case :Corsair Obsidian 750D

What I want to do:

1. Overclock the CPU further (priority: medium)
I've already overclocked the 3570K to 4.5 GHz (1.21v CPU Vcore). It's been stress tested and I've ran Prime95 Blend Test (I believe) for 12 hours and found no errors with the hottest core reaching 84c. If possible, I'd like to push things a little bit more onto 4.7 GHz. Now I know it's not a lot, and I'm sure some of you will tell me it's not worth it but if I still want to push it, what other settings should I look into? I've only touched the CPU Vcore voltage and the multiplier.

2. Overclock the RAM (priority: high)
I've been wanting to do some RAM overclocking since it's something I've never even try. Right now, the modules are running at 1600 MHz using XMP but I'd like to try and push it further to 2000 MHz or at least 1866 MHz. I'm not looking into adjusting the timings by the way but if you think it's worth it to tighten it, I'll give it a shot.

Current speed
Image

Modules in channel 1 and 3
Image

Modules in channel 2 and 4
Image

3. Overclock the GPU (priority: low)
I'm not sure it's worth it but if I were to overclock the GPU, how would I do it with Pascal? In the Fermi days, if I wanted to overclock the GPU all I've ever set was the Core clock, Memory clock and set the GPU voltage in MSI Afterburner. Now, with the boost and everything I'm not so sure. Can you guys help me on this too?

If you guys need anything else (screenshots, etc) in order to help me, let me know. Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks.
Ryzen 5 3600 | MSI B450 Tomahawk Max | 16GB Crucial Ballistix Sport AT 3200MHz | Palit Jetstream GTX 1060 6GB | Corsair HX750i | Corsair Obsidian 750D | 250GB Crucial MX500 | 320GB WD Blue | 1TB Samsung F3 | 2TB WD Black
 
Kougar
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Re: Overclocking CPU (Ivy Bridge) and RAM

Sat Feb 25, 2017 6:01 am

Quick tip, many memory modules have way more profiles than CPU-Z shows. You can find them by selecting tools and exporting to HTML, then opening in your browser. For example my current DDR3 kit has 22 different profiles, 11 for 1.65v and 11 for 1.60v. Which is weird since my board only shows the two main XMP profiles if I view from the UEFI.

Personally I'm not a fan of memory overclocking given the hassle/performance ratio is pretty awful. Expect to be doing CMOS resets if you start messing with the timings. I'd recommend starting with just the frequency first and play with timings later. Don't go over 1.65v.

For your CPU you're already at the edge of the sweet spot, given what you said it will probably hit 100c before you get to 4.7ghz. Have you tested how far you can push it at the current vcore?
 
EzioAs
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Re: Overclocking CPU (Ivy Bridge) and RAM

Sat Feb 25, 2017 7:23 am

Kougar wrote:
Quick tip, many memory modules have way more profiles than CPU-Z shows. You can find them by selecting tools and exporting to HTML, then opening in your browser. For example my current DDR3 kit has 22 different profiles, 11 for 1.65v and 11 for 1.60v. Which is weird since my board only shows the two main XMP profiles if I view from the UEFI.


Thanks for the tip. There are only two profiles for my RAMs. One for 533Mhz and another for 800Mhz.

Kougar wrote:
Personally I'm not a fan of memory overclocking given the hassle/performance ratio is pretty awful. Expect to be doing CMOS resets if you start messing with the timings. I'd recommend starting with just the frequency first and play with timings later. Don't go over 1.65v.


I'm really only looking to increase the frequency, without adjusting the timings. Should I increase any voltage though and afterwards, any tools you can recommend for me to ofr test stability?

This is a video overview of the BIOS my motherboard has https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UE2BUrQTxaE

Kougar wrote:
For your CPU you're already at the edge of the sweet spot, given what you said it will probably hit 100c before you get to 4.7ghz. Have you tested how far you can push it at the current vcore?


This is actually as far as it goes with the current vcore. To get higher clock speeds, I'm guessing I'll have to increase the vcore or some other voltage right?
Ryzen 5 3600 | MSI B450 Tomahawk Max | 16GB Crucial Ballistix Sport AT 3200MHz | Palit Jetstream GTX 1060 6GB | Corsair HX750i | Corsair Obsidian 750D | 250GB Crucial MX500 | 320GB WD Blue | 1TB Samsung F3 | 2TB WD Black
 
synthtel2
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Re: Overclocking CPU (Ivy Bridge) and RAM

Sat Feb 25, 2017 2:15 pm

Vcore and frequency are probably the only things to bother adjusting for the CPU OC. Other tweaking might be worth 100 MHz or something (if that), but if you're only at 1.21V right now, you should be able to get to 4.7 pretty comfortably. The issue you'll run into is throttling if you test with P95 blend. That generates a lot more heat than anything else you're likely to do with the system, and it'll probably tell you your thermals are garbage when in normal use they would be perfectly fine. To get around this, I stress test with P95 restricted to large FFT sizes - 2M to 8M in-place, usually. IME, this is as good as blend at finding problems. I run that for ~15 mins in the quick iteration phase of the process, boosting by 25mV and 100 MHz if a run passes and just the 25mV if it doesn't, until the voltage and temperature combo is as tough on the chip as I'm comfortable with. Then at the desired frequency, reduce by 10-20mV per pass to find the minimum workable voltage, run a 24 hour pass to confirm it really is solid, then either add 30mV back or drop 100 MHz to give a safety margin (or drop 200 MHz if you're like me and want a really big safety margin). With P95 2M resulting in 90C on Ivy Bridge, I'd be comfortable with 1.3 or 1.32V (others might say 1.35V), so you've still got plenty of headroom.

I don't know much about RAM overclocking, but if I were trying it, I'd try to separate BW and latency as much as possible. The trouble is that when you boost the speed, you also cut the absolute latency, as the units in that 9-9-9-24 are all based on the 1600. That means when testing out 1866, I'd start latency at 11-11-11-28. As Kougar said, it's likely to be a bit messier than the more commonly done OCs.

How much trouble it is to OC Pascal mainly depends what kind of gains you're trying for. Small gains are easy - just boost the core clock in small increments (20 MHz?) until it artifacts or crashes in <insert test of your choice here> (Unigine Heaven or Valley are fine), then back off enough to give a safety margin you're comfortable with, then repeat for the VRAM clock (maybe with 100 MHz increments). That may or may not give significant gains, but it's worth a shot. On my 960, it gave basically nothing on the core clock, but my VRAM clock went all the way to 8200, which was definitely worthwhile.
 
Kougar
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Re: Overclocking CPU (Ivy Bridge) and RAM

Sun Feb 26, 2017 9:43 am

EzioAs wrote:
I'm really only looking to increase the frequency, without adjusting the timings. Should I increase any voltage though and afterwards, any tools you can recommend for me to ofr test stability?


I use Prime95 blend runs and Memtest86+ v5. Blend runs are generally a good catch-all so I'll let it run for a few hours. After you have finalized RAM settings Memtest can provide some extra assurance though it will take awhile to do a full pass with 16GB+ kits. So I only suggest it when you're done OCing and just want to verify stability.

As Synth said vcore is probably the only thing you'll want to adjust on the CPU for frequency, I wouldn't mess with other voltages for just CPU clocks. You might try locking the uncore frequency before raising the clockspeed as well, I recall Haswell didn't like ultra high uncore/cache clocks so Ivy is probably the same way.
 
johnbro11
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Re: Overclocking CPU (Ivy Bridge) and RAM

Fri Sep 22, 2017 7:55 am

I like this techniques as overclocking RAM is one of the cheapest and most effortless ways to squeeze performance out of a system. It usually doesn’t require additional cooling, especially if you're only shooting for a modest boost, and you won't be forced to shop for a beefier PSU since RAM accounts for a very small part of your power budget..
 
DPete27
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Re: Overclocking CPU (Ivy Bridge) and RAM

Fri Sep 22, 2017 9:01 am

CPU: Like others said, you can probably hit 4.7 with a bit more vcore. If instability hits before you get there, LLC adjustments can help.

RAM: You might get 1866 out of a 1600 kit, but 2000 is probably a stretch. When OCing RAM, make sure you're considering the effect that loosening timings to get higher frequency has on overall performance. All your efforts could be a net zero performance gain if you have to loosen timings too much.

GPU: Pascal already OCs itself automatically. Increasing the power limit via OC software can open up higher clocks though. This may be the lowest priority on your list, but it might be the easiest component to extract some extra performance from at this point. Have you fired up GPUz to see what frequency it's actually hitting?

As it sounds like you're already aware, you're splitting hairs at this point. You've got a nice OC on your CPU and it probably wont go much higher without risking longevity and/or needing better cooling. RAM OCing is going to be limited to low single-digit performance gains, and as stated, your GPU is already OCing itself. Of course, if you want to push everything to the ragged edge, nobody's going to stop you. But ask yourself why you want this. Are you scratching for more performance out of a system that isn't satisfying your needs, or is it just "because I can"? When OCing, make sure you're keeping things in perspective. Don't get too hung up on the numbers. For example, +200MHz might seem like a lot for a CPU 20 years ago, but when you're talking about a CPU that's already running at 4500MHz.....you get the idea. Are you raising temps and noise and risking component damage for just a couple % performance gain?
Main: i5-3570K, ASRock Z77 Pro4-M, MSI RX480 8G, 500GB Crucial BX100, 2 TB Samsung EcoGreen F4, 16GB 1600MHz G.Skill @1.25V, EVGA 550-G2, Silverstone PS07B
HTPC: A8-5600K, MSI FM2-A75IA-E53, 4TB Seagate SSHD, 8GB 1866MHz G.Skill, Crosley D-25 Case Mod
 
Chrispy_
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Re: Overclocking CPU (Ivy Bridge) and RAM

Fri Sep 22, 2017 11:36 am

CPU:
Moar voltage!! (1.4V with high-end liquid cooling, so 280mm radiator or bigger).
Also, running four DRAM sticks is counterproductive to overclocking further - each stick of RAM adds power draw to the memory controller, heating up your CPU even further.

RAM:
Buy faster RAM, you can't really overclock much more than the XMP profiles usually, because if they could have sold it as 1866 in the first place, they would done so to get more money from you. If you want that extra 10-15% then you should shove the voltage to 1.65V and try 1866. If that fails you'll need to loosen the timings, which kind of negates the benefits of the overclock anyway, it's basically not worth it IMO.

GPU:
Download MSI afterburner, max out the power limit and see if you can hit 9GHz on the RAM (MSI used to show double-rate rather than quad rate, so you're looking for 4500MHz here). Don't push the RAM to the ragged edge - find out where it starts artefacting and dial it back about 300-400MHz. If you increase your RAM in 100MHz increments and it starts sparkling and corrupting textures at 9.2Ghz, your stable overclock is probably 8.9GHz. Running RAM close to its stability limit is very bad for overclocked GPUs because it's really hard to know if a crash was the game, the core overclock, or the VRAM overclock. Once you have a definitely stable VRAM overclock, then you can start work on the core clocks - Pascal GP106 tops out at between 1900 and 2100MHz depending on your luck.
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