Xeon X5660 Overlcoking Help

[Patrick Samuel]

Hello, so I tried to overclock my x5660 ( Yes I know its quite old) for about 1 year without success to exceed 4.2GHZ clock speed, I always get BlueScreens, I tried different voltages, multipliers, setting RAM speed very low, watching lots of videos and trying to copy every setting , etc... But couldn't get stable overclock past 4.2 GHZ, even 4.2 requires at least 1.41875 VCore voltage and I seen videos of guys running 4.4ghz on 1.35VCore. At first I thought it was my ram, but after I ordered another 8GB of RAM, it turned out to be the same. Also overheating is not the problem, I am running quite good thermal paste ( Don't know brand) and Air cooler with 3Fans running 2800RPM. I am looking for any help from you guys, because this system is quite old and i want to squeeze every bit of performance possible 
My PC specs:
CPU: Xeon x5660 Now running 4.150 GHZ
GPU: Nvidia GTX 1060 6GB
Motherboard: ASUS ROG Rampage 3 Extreme
RAM: 16 GB 1444 mhz : 4GB Hynix, 4GB Nanya, 8GB Kllisre
Storage: 360GB SSD, 300GB HDD, 720GB HDD
OS: Windows 10 64Bit

 

Bellow is pictures of my BIOS settings. Thanks for any type of help !

 

[jaslion]

Hate to break it to ya but some cpu's just don't overclock that well. Also 1.4 volts is really really high and will wear your cpu out a lot faster.

[Patrick Samuel]

38 minutes ago, jaslion said:

Hate to break it to ya but some cpu's just don't overclock that well. Also 1.4 volts is really really high and will wear your cpu out a lot faster.

So should I just give up ? Or there are posibility that something is wrong with BIOS settings, I am not planning to run this system for too long, so CPU wear didn't really matter for me

[jaslion]

1 hour ago, Patrick Samuel said:

So should I just give up ? Or there are posibility that something is wrong with BIOS settings, I am not planning to run this system for too long, so CPU wear didn't really matter for me

No everything seems normal part from the high voltage.

[Patrick Samuel]

18 hours ago, jaslion said:

No everything seems normal part from the high voltage.

Yeaa, I know its high, but any number below 1.4 Vcore gives me bluescreen, and i tried quite bunch of settings, I think I'm missing something, because that voltage is wayyy to high for this amount of OC. Maybe u can help me and suggest some settings to change ? Thanks, I really appreciate your time helping me !

[GreyestGoat]

Set your BCLK to 201 and use 1.38v

Uncore to the lowest divider.

Memory close to it's rated spec.

 

QPI needs lowering a divider too.

 

CPU PLL down to 1.7v

 

IOH to 1.18v

 

1.4v is nothing on Westmere.

 

 

https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/overclocking-the-x58-a-practical-guide.108526/

 

Keep adjusting the CPU PLL and frequency with your CPU miltiplyer leaving the BLCK at 201 and you will find your maximum divider you can use, then adjust with BCLK.

 

You have also mixed ram.

[toasty99]

Yeah you're done. That's pretty much what these do. 4.15 is completely normal max OC for these. 

[GreyestGoat]

13 minutes ago, toasty99 said:

Yeah you're done. That's pretty much what these do. 4.15 is completely normal max OC for these. 

 

 

https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/xeon-x5660-x58-full-review-comparison-to-x79-high-end-cpus-and-xeon-l5639-benchmark.2365518/

 

 

[toasty99]

49 minutes ago, GreyestGoat said:

 

 

https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/xeon-x5660-x58-full-review-comparison-to-x79-high-end-cpus-and-xeon-l5639-benchmark.2365518/

 

 

No, I said "completely normal max OC". As in 4.15 is what you should expect. Golden samples can do 4.8ghz. It's extremely dependant on ram, the motherboard, and the CPU all together with baseclock overclocking. 

[bimmerman]

The motherboard he has, the rampage 3, is a top tier board. It should be able to do more than 4.2 if the chip isn't bad. ( @Zando Bob iirc has used this board?)

 

OP, search the HEDT thread for overclocking tips or follow the techpowerup guide above.

 

Super fast step by step:

1. Figure out max bclk your setup can handle with memory and cpu multipliers set to minimum. Adjust CPU/VTT voltage

2. Turn memory mult to desired final setting (e.g., 10x) and turn up bclk and adjust mem and cpu/vtt voltages.

3. Reduce bclk again, set cpu mult to desired freq (e.g., 21x), and then ramp up bclk again while adjusting cpu voltage.

 

Sounds simple, but takes a lot of time to do. In the hedt thread I've posted more detailed guides and also screenshots of my settings (4.5ghz for three years now at ~1.35V)

[GreyestGoat]

1 hour ago, toasty99 said:

No, I said "completely normal max OC". As in 4.15 is what you should expect. Golden samples can do 4.8ghz. It's extremely dependant on ram, the motherboard, and the CPU all together with baseclock overclocking. 

Many people got them to 4.4+ me included...

[Patrick Samuel]

23 hours ago, GreyestGoat said:

Set your BCLK to 201 and use 1.38v

Uncore to the lowest divider.

Memory close to it's rated spec.

 

QPI needs lowering a divider too.

 

CPU PLL down to 1.7v

 

IOH to 1.18v

 

1.4v is nothing on Westmere.

 

 

https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/overclocking-the-x58-a-practical-guide.108526/

 

Keep adjusting the CPU PLL and frequency with your CPU miltiplyer leaving the BLCK at 201 and you will find your maximum divider you can use, then adjust with BCLK.

 

You have also mixed ram.

 

20 hours ago, bimmerman said:

The motherboard he has, the rampage 3, is a top tier board. It should be able to do more than 4.2 if the chip isn't bad. ( @Zando Bob iirc has used this board?)

 

OP, search the HEDT thread for overclocking tips or follow the techpowerup guide above.

 

Super fast step by step:

1. Figure out max bclk your setup can handle with memory and cpu multipliers set to minimum. Adjust CPU/VTT voltage

2. Turn memory mult to desired final setting (e.g., 10x) and turn up bclk and adjust mem and cpu/vtt voltages.

3. Reduce bclk again, set cpu mult to desired freq (e.g., 21x), and then ramp up bclk again while adjusting cpu voltage.

 

Sounds simple, but takes a lot of time to do. In the hedt thread I've posted more detailed guides and also screenshots of my settings (4.5ghz for three years now at ~1.35V)

First of all thanks for replies !  And Happy Easter.

So for few hours I tried setting OC with your suggested settings and techniques, and that's the results I got: I figured out that 1.38 Vcore with CPU PLL 1.7 and IOH 1.18 4ghz was achievable with Multiplayer 20 and BLCK 201. It was stable, but 4ghz wasn't enough so I pushed it forward. 4.2 Ghz I achieved with CPU PLL 1.8 And Vcore 1.42. Anything below that Vcore caused a bluescreen:

Then I tried higher multiplier 21. It crashed at first, 4.0 ghz was possible with Vcore 1.4 and CPU PLL 1.7. And higest CPU speed i achieved was 4.2 Ghz with Vcore 1.42 and CPU PLL 1.8: 

It looked like anything above 4.2Ghz needed bunch of Vcore and it was really unstable. Even with these 20 and 21 multipliers i got less fps than with my stock settings, even tough CPU frequency was higer 4.25, 4.23 Ghz. So I tried my "Stock" settings 4.15 Ghz and pulled down CPU PLL to 1.7 and these are results I got. I tried CS GO benchmark with three of these multipliers First picute is multiplier 20, 2nd is 21 picture didn't fit but it was 314FPS and 3d is 23 my stock settings

It looks like that anything above 4.2 GHZ seems very unstable or requires to much Vcore, I tried RAM settings and also changing, pulling some of RAM sticks out. RAM seems to not be a problem (Some x58 boards have problems with RAM). So I have one more question: Is buying another CPU for example X5675 worth it ? Becouse it costs not much ( 20$ ) But I don't know if performance gain is worth it Thanks !

[bimmerman]

Don't adjust PLL yet. Your specific knobs to turn are the CPU Vcore and QPI/DRAM. The Vcore is for cpu multiplier amd frequency, the QPI/DRAM is for bclk, uncore, and stability.

[Patrick Samuel]

13 minutes ago, bimmerman said:

Don't adjust PLL yet. Your specific knobs to turn are the CPU Vcore and QPI/DRAM. The Vcore is for cpu multiplier amd frequency, the QPI/DRAM is for bclk, uncore, and stability.

I updated my post above. And the result is that 4.2 GHZ requires at least 1.42 Vcore and anything below that would make a computer crash or bluescreen. I tried bunch of QPI,Dram and Vcore settings, but anything below 1.42 Vcore with 4.2 ghz would crash.

 

[bimmerman]

Set everything to stock.

 

Adjust BCLK and QPI voltage as you figure out what your max is. Then do the same for memory, setting memory voltage for 1.5 or 1.65 depending on your rated modules. Then adjust CPU Vcore and CPU multiplier.

 

CPU PLL is not a useful knob until you are trying to stabilize a crazy overclock, which you aren't at. Your primary voltages are CPU Vcore (cpu multiplier, aim for <1.4 V), QPI (bclk, uncore, memory speed, memory controller, motherboard, everything, aim for <1.35), and memory voltage (1.5 or 1.65 per xmp). You also want to keep a ratio between uncore and qpi link. Follow the techpowerup guides or my guides in the hedt thread.

 

PLL does almost nothing, from experience. QPI/DRAM or otherwise known as CPU/VTT is the single most important for stability.

[Patrick Samuel]

46 minutes ago, bimmerman said:

Set everything to stock.

 

Adjust BCLK and QPI voltage as you figure out what your max is. Then do the same for memory, setting memory voltage for 1.5 or 1.65 depending on your rated modules. Then adjust CPU Vcore and CPU multiplier.

 

CPU PLL is not a useful knob until you are trying to stabilize a crazy overclock, which you aren't at. Your primary voltages are CPU Vcore (cpu multiplier, aim for <1.4 V), QPI (bclk, uncore, memory speed, memory controller, motherboard, everything, aim for <1.35), and memory voltage (1.5 or 1.65 per xmp). You also want to keep a ratio between uncore and qpi link. Follow the techpowerup guides or my guides in the hedt thread.

 

PLL does almost nothing, from experience. QPI/DRAM or otherwise known as CPU/VTT is the single most important for stability.

Thanks for suggestion, I will try it tomorrow, because today I'm to busy. I will update my status Thanks for helping me again, hope it works !

[RAM555789]

Not every chip will overclock as well as another chip. This why there is a market for "binned" chips.

[Patrick Samuel]

On 4/12/2020 at 8:39 PM, Patrick Samuel said:

Thanks for suggestion, I will try it tomorrow, because today I'm to busy. I will update my status Thanks for helping me again, hope it works !

 

On 4/12/2020 at 7:49 PM, bimmerman said:

Set everything to stock.

 

Adjust BCLK and QPI voltage as you figure out what your max is. Then do the same for memory, setting memory voltage for 1.5 or 1.65 depending on your rated modules. Then adjust CPU Vcore and CPU multiplier.

 

CPU PLL is not a useful knob until you are trying to stabilize a crazy overclock, which you aren't at. Your primary voltages are CPU Vcore (cpu multiplier, aim for <1.4 V), QPI (bclk, uncore, memory speed, memory controller, motherboard, everything, aim for <1.35), and memory voltage (1.5 or 1.65 per xmp). You also want to keep a ratio between uncore and qpi link. Follow the techpowerup guides or my guides in the hedt thread.

 

PLL does almost nothing, from experience. QPI/DRAM or otherwise known as CPU/VTT is the single most important for stability.

I tried your settings and the results I got is that anything below 4.185 Vcore would make system extremely unstable. So I can't go lower than 1.4185. QPI I set to 1.32 and it seems pretty stable, Ram is also set to 1.64 just in case it lower number would make system unstable. These are the pictures of my settings. And even with higer CPU frequency my FPS is much lower than before. In bechmark I got 340 FPS with 180BLCK, Same Vcore, 4.15 GHZ, and RAM speed set to 1444. And now with higer frequency 4.25 I have 290FPS... Can higher frequency generate more heat and than my CPU throttle down. And also does ram speed matter in games (F.E CS GO) compared 1144mhz to 1444ghz. Running dual channel and one RAM stick out of three is in another channel, because it cant fit and make tripple channel with my huge CPU fan

 

[Patrick Samuel]

On 4/12/2020 at 8:51 PM, RAM555789 said:

Not every chip will overclock as well as another chip. This why there is a market for "binned" chips.

So I think my chip is just not as good as it should be ? Would it make sense to buy another x58 CPU like x5675 and try my luck overclocking that chip? Or performance wont be much different compared to 4.15 ghz now ?

[bimmerman]

@Patrick Samuel You may just have a bad chip, or poor cooling / contact with cooler.

 

Things to try-- raise BCLK higher with EVERYTHING else turned down. In other words, aim to get a ~200-205 BCLK stable, if you can (adjust QPI voltage), with CPU multiplier down at ~10 and Mem down at ~6. The point here is to isolate each specific variable so that you only tinker with one at a time. Important to note is to do this starting from stock voltages too. Write down your settings now and then just hit 'reset to defaults' in bios if all you've tinkered with are the voltages and speeds. You want to do this procedure from a clean sheet reset.

 

Then try keying in a memory multiplier of ~8, should put you at 1600 MHz speed. I don't notice a major difference between 1600 and above, but 1000 to 1600 would make a difference. This is contingent upon your modules working nicely.

 

Then dial in your CPU multiplier, and go through the whole process again. It's laborious but effective.

 

Other things to note-- per the techpowerup article, you want a 2:1 ratio between QPI speed and UCLK (uncore clock). The higher you can get uncore the snappier your system is. This is driven by BCLK. Generally you also want a 2:1 ratio between uncore clock and memory speed. In other words, for QPI : Uncore : Memory, you'd aim for 6400 MHz / 3200 MHz / 1600 MHz, which is super easy with a BCLK of 200 and respective 32 / 16 / 8 multipliers.

 

You may be limited on BCLK by your dissimilar memory modules.

 

Additionally, X58 runs significantly better with higher BCLK and lower CPU multipliers. Aim for a stable fast BCLK (I suggest starting from stock per method above with CPU/Mem mults reduced, incrementing 10 MHz until ~180 then 5 MHz above, stress testing each setting), then QPI/Uncore/Memory, then finally CPU. One last thing to note-- there exist 'BCLK holes' where say from 180 to 195 the system just isn't stable, but magically is on both sides of that region. It's not the same for each board (hence the importance of messing about with each variable independently), but these do exist. Mine hated anything in that region but is rock solid way above it.

 

My X5675 is running 215 BCLK and 21 multiplier. It'll do a 23 mult happily enough, but there's not much performance benefit to be had between 4.5 and 4.7 GHz-- don't be target fixated on a high CPU Mult to the detriment of the other settings.

 

I would focus first on getting a matching set of RAM over swapping CPU, unless you have funds to do both. I'm not convinced your CPU is bad. All else equal, you will get more performance out of the system by tuning the uncore than by more frequency. If you can do 4.5 GHz, great, but if you can do 4.2 with a screaming fast uncore, that's likely to be better. Right now you have neither, so got some tinkering to do!

 

@Zando Bob this is making me want to just write a procedure out for the main thread, such that we can just hotlink it. And to say F it let's OC the SR2....on water.

 

EDIT couple things I missed previously--

Your CPU is idling at 48 C in bios. Your cooling is not working. More CPU Vcore is more heat, while more QPI volts does not necessarily mean more heat. More reason to focus on BCLK overclocking. Also the X5660 doesn't tend to go much above 4.2 without a dialed in high BCLK setting since it lacks some of the memory and cpu multipliers of the higher binned chips. It CAN do it, but it really needs BCLK help to get there.

 

Finally, you might find this post helpful (my OC settings) in the Intel HEDT (primarily X58) thread on the forum here. There is a TON of good info in the thread: 

 

 

[Patrick Samuel]

23 hours ago, bimmerman said:

@Patrick Samuel You may just have a bad chip, or poor cooling / contact with cooler.

 

Things to try-- raise BCLK higher with EVERYTHING else turned down. In other words, aim to get a ~200-205 BCLK stable, if you can (adjust QPI voltage), with CPU multiplier down at ~10 and Mem down at ~6. The point here is to isolate each specific variable so that you only tinker with one at a time. Important to note is to do this starting from stock voltages too. Write down your settings now and then just hit 'reset to defaults' in bios if all you've tinkered with are the voltages and speeds. You want to do this procedure from a clean sheet reset.

 

Then try keying in a memory multiplier of ~8, should put you at 1600 MHz speed. I don't notice a major difference between 1600 and above, but 1000 to 1600 would make a difference. This is contingent upon your modules working nicely.

 

Then dial in your CPU multiplier, and go through the whole process again. It's laborious but effective.

 

Other things to note-- per the techpowerup article, you want a 2:1 ratio between QPI speed and UCLK (uncore clock). The higher you can get uncore the snappier your system is. This is driven by BCLK. Generally you also want a 2:1 ratio between uncore clock and memory speed. In other words, for QPI : Uncore : Memory, you'd aim for 6400 MHz / 3200 MHz / 1600 MHz, which is super easy with a BCLK of 200 and respective 32 / 16 / 8 multipliers.

 

You may be limited on BCLK by your dissimilar memory modules.

 

Additionally, X58 runs significantly better with higher BCLK and lower CPU multipliers. Aim for a stable fast BCLK (I suggest starting from stock per method above with CPU/Mem mults reduced, incrementing 10 MHz until ~180 then 5 MHz above, stress testing each setting), then QPI/Uncore/Memory, then finally CPU. One last thing to note-- there exist 'BCLK holes' where say from 180 to 195 the system just isn't stable, but magically is on both sides of that region. It's not the same for each board (hence the importance of messing about with each variable independently), but these do exist. Mine hated anything in that region but is rock solid way above it.

 

My X5675 is running 215 BCLK and 21 multiplier. It'll do a 23 mult happily enough, but there's not much performance benefit to be had between 4.5 and 4.7 GHz-- don't be target fixated on a high CPU Mult to the detriment of the other settings.

 

I would focus first on getting a matching set of RAM over swapping CPU, unless you have funds to do both. I'm not convinced your CPU is bad. All else equal, you will get more performance out of the system by tuning the uncore than by more frequency. If you can do 4.5 GHz, great, but if you can do 4.2 with a screaming fast uncore, that's likely to be better. Right now you have neither, so got some tinkering to do!

 

@Zando Bob this is making me want to just write a procedure out for the main thread, such that we can just hotlink it. And to say F it let's OC the SR2....on water.

 

EDIT couple things I missed previously--

Your CPU is idling at 48 C in bios. Your cooling is not working. More CPU Vcore is more heat, while more QPI volts does not necessarily mean more heat. More reason to focus on BCLK overclocking. Also the X5660 doesn't tend to go much above 4.2 without a dialed in high BCLK setting since it lacks some of the memory and cpu multipliers of the higher binned chips. It CAN do it, but it really needs BCLK help to get there.

 

Finally, you might find this post helpful (my OC settings) in the Intel HEDT (primarily X58) thread on the forum here. There is a TON of good info in the thread: 

 

 

Thanks for your suggestion ! So I tried that settings and after like 4 hours of trying different settings now I came up to even bigger problem. Windows settings or any settings in general wont open, I can't even open start menu, Windows update or other menu options from settings dont work, even notifications. Before that I came up to a bunch of different BlueScreens. And one time system wont even boot. It sayed something like: Bios not detected. Try inserting Floppy Disk and try again. But after restart I signed up to my windows acc and now any windows related setting or window ( Calculator, windows store, settings, update, notification, time adjust ) wont work. Only control panel works. I probably won't overclock this chip again. This is probably caused by faulty RAM, but now I'm running only 1 8GB stick that i know really works without problems. I attached picture about what it says when i tried open (Display Settings) or (Personalise Settings) from my dekstop. Sorry for asking u for help again. But is there any way to solve this problem without reinstalling whole windows again ?

[bimmerman]

Does the problem go away with stock settings?

 

I think something else is likely the issue for windows to be all janky.

 

I would strongly encourage you to keep a log of some sort to keep track of each change and why you made each change. I can't help without data.

 

At a minimum, I would track the following three pairs of things: QPI/DRAM Voltage and BCLK frequency, DRAM voltage and Memory Multiplier / frequency, and CPU Vcore voltage and CPU multiplier. I would suggest making a spreadsheet and documenting every change and the results of a stress test after each change (e.g., intel burner, aida64, whatever). If it fails, bump voltage a single increment. If it passes, bump freq an increment, repeat ad nauseam.

 

At present, I can't do much more than guess at what your issue is. I have no clue how your windows got all screwed up, what exactly did you do? I would revert everything to stock and see if that fixes anything, then before fiddling with anything in the bios I'd run memtest on your ram modules.

 

Also, please note that your CPU temps were absurdly high. Consider remounting/repasting the cooler.

 

tl;dr be organized, be methodical, keep notes, change only one thing at a time and then test for stability, and start from bone stock with known good components. Your rig has some weird issues going on.

[Patrick Samuel]

3 hours ago, bimmerman said:

Does the problem go away with stock settings?

 

I think something else is likely the issue for windows to be all janky.

 

I would strongly encourage you to keep a log of some sort to keep track of each change and why you made each change. I can't help without data.

 

At a minimum, I would track the following three pairs of things: QPI/DRAM Voltage and BCLK frequency, DRAM voltage and Memory Multiplier / frequency, and CPU Vcore voltage and CPU multiplier. I would suggest making a spreadsheet and documenting every change and the results of a stress test after each change (e.g., intel burner, aida64, whatever). If it fails, bump voltage a single increment. If it passes, bump freq an increment, repeat ad nauseam.

 

At present, I can't do much more than guess at what your issue is. I have no clue how your windows got all screwed up, what exactly did you do? I would revert everything to stock and see if that fixes anything, then before fiddling with anything in the bios I'd run memtest on your ram modules.

 

Also, please note that your CPU temps were absurdly high. Consider remounting/repasting the cooler.

 

tl;dr be organized, be methodical, keep notes, change only one thing at a time and then test for stability, and start from bone stock with known good components. Your rig has some weird issues going on.

It was completely stock, it dosent matter what settings i use. So I will reinstall windows, I had similar issue about 6 months ago, when system crashed after like 30 mins. Reinstalling windows helped it and i taught it was memory, but now I'm running only one stick that i ordered about 3 months ago... And I changed only one thing at the time. I know that my max blck is 219, so I tried 19,20,21,23 and 23 seemed most stable . Also QPI and DRAM settings i found out that do almost nothing compared to Vcore, I tried setting QPI/Dram to 1.4 and PLL to 1.88 and system was extremely unstable at any multiplier ( It would crash about 10 secs after boot ) until I messed with Vcore. I think my chip is just not as good/binned. I also tried your settings from other Forums and TechYesCity( YouTuber ) bunch of settings. But only way I can get it stable is increasing Vcore. And at 4.15Ghz it seems like 1.41 Vcore is just fine but 4.3Ghz requires at least 1.44 Vcore to be stable at which point my system throttles down ( Because I use AirCooler ). And last thing, unfortunately I can't get new thermal paste, cuz its quarantine in my place and I dont have one by myself. Last time I changed it was about 8months ago. Thanks for your effort helping me ! Really appreciate your time. I will try one more time when reinstalled windows, maybe windows was the case. Altough I doubt it...