Can no longer overclock

[Marco01]

I had managed to overclock my E6750 from 2.66ghz up to 3.40ghz without any problems. This was done by using the Intelligent Tweaker and all I had to do was change the FSB to 425 and ensure that the voltage management was on auto. This worked fine and even after 3 hours of gaming the CPU temp never went above 55oC.

That was up until yesterday. After turning the pc on it shut down and then rebooted - windows indicated that the CPU was back running at 2.66ghz. So, I restart and enter BIOS and although the FSB was still set to 425 the CPU host control had been disabled. After enabling it I restart and the PC powers off and then reboots. Again, the CPU has been reset to 2.66ghz.

To make matters worse I installed CPU-Z and it seems to to be telling me that the processor is running at 333 x 6 and not x 8 which essentially means I am running at only 2 Ghz representing a total loss of 1.4 Ghz! Windows still insists the processor is running at 2.66Ghz (2.67 to be exact).

Any ideas?

[Jonny2Bad]

Is that a program for overclocking Intel tweaker? I find those progs very unreliable try to play with your setting in the bios, if you really want to oc, I also have found cpuz to give me the wrong readings on my multiplier and fsb, work through the bios to oc for best results.

[Lustral]

Try resetting the CMOS and try again.

reflash the BIOS if that doesnt work and hopefully all should be ok.

Lusty

[Marco01]

Is that a program for overclocking Intel tweaker?
It's in BIOS and allows for fiddling with cpu/voltage settings etc

I think I might ignore CPU-Z for now although for some reason it doesn't allow me to select between processors - this part is greyed out. Is that normal?


Try resetting the CMOS and try again.
reflash the BIOS if that doesnt work and hopefully all should be ok.
Lusty

Thanks, but ... I have no idea how to do this :shock: Any tips?

[system7]

Familiar stuff to any overclocking effort.

You set it up. It crashes.

Now you've got to get back to square one.

Unplug the power and use the CMOS Clear jumper, or take out the battery for 2 minutes.

Next time you boot, go into the bios and set it ALL up again. Hopefully with better settings. :D

[Marco01]

Familiar stuff to any overclocking effort.

You set it up. It crashes.

Now you've got to get back to square one.

Unplug the power and use the CMOS Clear jumper, or take out the battery for 2 minutes.

Next time you boot, go into the bios and set it ALL up again. Hopefully with better settings. :D

Thanks, will try the battery removal, but as for the settings, I'm not sure what will constitute better settings other than just not overclocking at all :lol:

[system7]

You'll have to read the bios section in the manual carefully.

Evidently a CPU bus speed of 400 might be a better place to start. Thing is, you will overclock the memory and the buses too while you are doing this, unless the tweaker is very adept.

There are all sorts of variables, like setting a 1:1 ratio for FSB:Memory, and relaxing memory timings to allow for the overclock. I can't remember what Host Control does, but it might be locking the PCI bus to 100MHz.

Best thing is to google your motherboard with the magic word "overclock" in front of it and see what the gurus have been doing.

[Jonny2Bad]

Ok its an auto overclocker in the bios so it ups the %speed of all your components, try and leave this alone as youve found out not reliable, have a good look around your bios learn what and where things are then start with the little tweaks, and do as system 7 says research your hardware with the wonderful google.

[djgandy]

CPUZ is working fine. Your processor is in the power saving magigy mode (Gone totally blank as to what its called). When EIST kicks in the cpu multiplier changes to 6x and the voltage is reduced.

CPUZ also doesn't let you choose the boxes since you only have 1 processor.

Your problem sounds like you are over overclocked and the motherboard safe overclock features are probably kicking in to prevent any damage.

[Marco01]

CPUZ is working fine. Your processor ('http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/products/a561x1y0z1p0s0n0m0') is in the power saving magigy mode (Gone totally blank as to what its called). When EIST kicks in the cpu ('http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/products/a561x1y0z1p0s0n0m0') multiplier changes to 6x and the voltage is reduced.

CPUZ also doesn't let you choose the boxes since you only have 1 processor ('http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/products/a561x1y0z1p0s0n0m0').

Your problem sounds like you are over overclocked and the motherboard safe overclock features are probably kicking in to prevent any damage.
Hmm, how would I get it off power saving mode? And I thought I had two processors, with it being a Core 2 Duo and all ... or have I misunderstood? :shock:

Anyhow, I've found some useful info here that might help: http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=2185&page=5

[djgandy]

You have 1 processor with 2 cores. The power saving mode is a featuer that kicks in when the processor is idle. There is no point the processor running at top speed when it has nothing to do.

You can turn it off, you need to turn off EIST and C0 state i think. And there is speedstep, which is what I couldn't think of the name of. They are all power saving features.

[system7]

dj is much better at this stuff than me, but that website article you found looks great.

But as a noob, I would avoid any voltage changes till you get a good grasp of it. That motherboard has some alarmingly high options. The Corsair modules are only warranted up to 2.1V, for instance.

You should be able to get to CPU 400 bus 3.2GHz and DDR2-800 speed with no voltage mods whatsoever. :D

[djgandy]

3.2 is a long shot with stock voltage. Usually you can hit ~2.8 sometimes 3.0 if you have a really good chip with stock voltage.

[Marco01]

The power saving mode is a featuer that kicks in when the processor is idle. There is no point the processor running at top speed when it has nothing to do.
I assume in that case that when full processing power is required the power saving is temporarily disabled? That would make sense. I wont go about trying to disable anything in that case ...


But as a noob, I would avoid any voltage changes till you get a good grasp of it. That motherboard has some alarmingly high options. The Corsair modules are only warranted up to 2.1V, for instance.
Too right. I have been very reluctant to make any changes to voltages which is why I left the voltage control settings on auto (seeing as I wouldn't actually know what it is I am doing :lol: )

Will remove the battery this evening, reboot, and try again - 400fsb should be more than adequate for my needs at this point.

[Marco01]

Hmm, tried restting the CMOS and no luck. Same thing when I removed the battery. This was despite the fact that I only raised settings to 335FSB just to be on the safe side - machine would power-off and then reboot each time without the new settings in place.

I did have some luck though - just for the **** of it I set the CPU at 400FSB and set voltage to manual control but did not change the current voltage setting (1.35v). I didn't expect this to work and yet it did! Seems to be OK so far and will hopefully not become tempremental again.

[system7]

You'll get the hang of it, but you need to watch the screen to decide if it's rebooting from bios or Windows. Those are different issues.

However you reset bios, you normally just redo time and date and set boot order to CD before HD and save changes and exit. That gets you back to stock settings.

It's a cool idea to partition your hard drive in two and save a stable image of your base Windows install before overclocking. Then if it crashes and FUBARS Windows, you can reinstall the image in 10 minutes. Maxtor give away a SATA HD utilities disk and Acronis Imaging software. You can burn the Maxtor Utilities to CD-R with free isorecorder.

[Marco01]

It's a cool idea to partition your hard drive ('http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/products/a502x1y0z1p0s0n0m0') in two and save a stable image of your base Windows install before overclocking. Then if it crashes and FUBARS Windows, you can reinstall the image in 10 minutes. Maxtor give away a SATA HD utilities disk and Acronis Imaging software. You can burn the Maxtor Utilities to CD-R with free isorecorder.
Thanks, will check this out when I get home 8)

One thing I have noticed however is that since overclocking performance has suffered. This is mostly noticeable when gaming - I could just about play COD4 at full settings but now everything is incredibly slow and unplayable. I've noticed the same in other games too.

Not sure if the two are related or whether something else might be causing this :?

[system7]

I think that is exactly why the backup image idea is so useful, besides recovering from crashes and bad software installs. Could be a driver conflict or almost anything.

At a bios level, I can only think that setting OPTIMAL DEFAULTS and resetting the boot order might cure it. Though I've never noticed a hit with SAFE defaults, if you have the option.

3DMark06 should rapidly pick up any performance hit once you know your baseline. Should be around 4000 on graphics with your setup.

[Marco01]

Right, 3DMark ... something else for me to download when I get home :wink:

[system7]

Well, overclocking is advanced stuff... :lol:

We aren't the sort of numpties who install Windows to a single partition and then watch it get more and more buggy due to user error then and come begging to forums to figure out why the CD drive and stuff no longer works. :roll:

NO, we are POWER USERS who constantly test and improve performance! We create two partitions with HD utilities, and redirect the "My Documents" folder safely to the second partition. We make stable images of the primary partition before trying risky stuff. And store any downloads on the second partition.

We use FRAPS and 3DMark06 to see what our gaming framerates are after an overclock. We use PC Wizard to keep an eye on temperatures and fans. We use CPU-Z to see what the memory and buses are doing. Device Manager holds no mysteries and we nip through the bios in seconds flat. We are the sort of people who run Firefox Browser and Comodo firewall and dabble in Linux.

OK, it takes some setting up, but it's better in the long run. After all, 90% of computer problems are self-inflicted. Sorry to RANT... :lol:

[Marco01]

We aren't the sort of numpties who install Windows to a single partition and then watch it get more and more buggy due to user error then and come begging to forums to figure out why the CD drive and stuff no longer works. :roll:
What, you mean like me? :wink:

With regards to partitioning, can that not be done using the tools in Vista? Or would you suggest using the software provided by Maxtor for doing this instead?

[system7]

You're no numpty, Marco... :D

I was just looking at MaxBlast 5. It's the big 100MB Windows App like the Seagate DiscWizard that can create a bootable setup and imaging CD-R.

As far as I know, shrinking of the active partition has to be done outside Windows at a lower level. I have always used GPartEd on a Linux Live CD to do that. Can be flaky.

I don't know if Vista setup is easier than XP, but partitioning with fdisk was never easy. Whereas the manufacturers utilities are a snap in custom mode before OS install. They can also do complete wipes and repair a Master Boot record. I haven't used the Maxtor Acronis CD-R to partition because I also have the Seagate SATA utilities, but it seems to have the ability.

Once you've set up your main Windows partition, you can modify any other partition within Windows Disk Manangement. Quick format is preferable for speed reasons.

[Marco01]

Haven't tried the partitioning yet but I have noticed something else.

Yesterday the PC started playing up again - on start after BIOS the PC would reboot and all the BIOS settings I had made had been lost. I tried to think as to whether there was anything obvious that I might have done/changed since my last login. The only thing I could think was that I had connected an extenal drive - I also remembered that the first time I had this problem I had also only just connected the external drive but I thought nothing of it at the time.

Anyhow, I applied manual settings in BIOS for overclocking - with the drive still connected the machine would reboot each time after BIOS and all settings would be reset.

I changed the settings again and then restarted without the drive connected - everything started up OK.

I have tested it various times and I only experience the problem when the external drive is connected (regardless of which USB port it is connected to).

Is this unusual? It's a Western Digital Elements drive which I used with my previous machine (which was XP). At least now I know there is no specific problem with the Intelligent Tweaker/BIOS settings as I has my E6750 up to 3.6Ghz from 2.66Ghz (doesn't seem to go above 42oC even after hours of gaming although that might also be down to the fact that it is freezing in my room at the moment :lol: )

[system7]

It's not unusual for a machine to crash with almost anything connected to a USB port. Even printers sometimes do this. I think it's caused by the bios trying to boot an unsuitable device. The fix, usually, is to disable boot from USB in the boot order part of the bios.

The bios settings reset is probably the O/C safe recovery part of the bios. You should be able to disable it, but then you'll get endless reboots, I guess. :roll:

[Marco01]

Hmm, I'll just make sure that the drive isn't connected from now on. I think I'll be leaving the BIOS settings alone for now - 3.6Ghz is more than enough and I have no real need to push it any further 8)