Overclocking half my cores

[evilmeister13]

So I recently got an FX-6300, and despite what people have said about AMD processors, I decided to try out emulation. It actually works out quite well for some light-medium games, but the one game that I want to play, Twilight Princess, is still out of my grasp - but only barely. I was getting about a minimum of 19 FPS, a maximum of 31, and I would say an average of 24ish. So, obviously I'm only lacking a little of the power I need at stock speeds. Of course, my obvious first idea was overclocking. But it just so happens that I'm running the stock cooler from an 8320 that I got from a friend. (The stock cooler for the 6300 was a joke.) So, obviously not much headroom there. My questions for you guys is: If I disabled 2 or maybe even 3 of my cores, (emulation requires a max of 3) would I then be able to overclock (within reason) the remaining cores without having to worry about heat quite as much? Which contributes more to the heat, clock speeds or number of cores?

 

On a side note, I tried playing it in different resolutions and got interesting results. In 1080p, I got roughly 21 fps on average, 720p was about 24, and 480 was a meager 19. Why would it perform the worst in such a low resolution? I'm really confused because that's the games native resolution. I can understand 720 performing better than 1080, but why was 720 still better than 480? What turns it into the sweet spot? Any help at all on either topic presented here is appreciated, thanks in advance.

 

If I was to buy a cooler, which is better?

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835608016&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-na-_-na-_-na&cm_sp=&AID=10446076&PID=3938566&SID=

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103099

Edited May 27, 2014 by evilmeister13

[TriBeard]

What case do you have, and just out of curiosity, what GPU as well. I had the EVO for a while, and it was good, but I couldn't get that far with it overclocking wise due to temps. The noctua may be better (but I doubt it as I think that one is more for HTPC's and whatnot), but you may want to go with a larger air cooler if you can fit/afford it, or something like the h100i/h80i instead. That would give you more thermal room for overclocking. I wouldn't worry too much about disabling cores and whatnot in hopes of getting a few extra Mhz. I don't think that will be the difference between playable and not. You might actually be surprised by just the difference in performance you get from a better cooler as the processor may just be throttling itself some as well at full load. Here are some other suggestions, though the last two are more expensive (though also significantly better as well):

 

Air: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005869XYK/?tag=pcpapi-20

Water: http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Series-Extreme-Performance-Liquid/dp/B009ZN03AA

          

           http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Series-Extreme-Performance-Liquid/dp/B009ZN03AA

 

As for the lower performance at lower resolutions, you typically see that with games as it shifts more of the load away from the GPU to the CPU, and even the emulators do in fact use your GPU to some extent. 720p for that game must just be where the load is best split between your CPU and your GPU, though assuming you have a decent GPU I'm not quite sure why it dips at 1080p unless there's some inefficiencies in the emulator, which is entirely possible.

[evilmeister13]

What case do you have, and just out of curiosity, what GPU as well. I had the EVO for a while, and it was good, but I couldn't get that far with it overclocking wise due to temps. The noctua may be better (but I doubt it as I think that one is more for HTPC's and whatnot), but you may want to go with a larger air cooler if you can fit/afford it, or something like the h100i/h80i instead. That would give you more thermal room for overclocking. I wouldn't worry too much about disabling cores and whatnot in hopes of getting a few extra Mhz. I don't think that will be the difference between playable and not. You might actually be surprised by just the difference in performance you get from a better cooler as the processor may just be throttling itself some as well at full load. Here are some other suggestions, though the last two are more expensive (though also significantly better as well):

 

Air: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005869XYK/?tag=pcpapi-20

Water: http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Series-Extreme-Performance-Liquid/dp/B009ZN03AA

          

           http://www.amazon.com/Corsair-Series-Extreme-Performance-Liquid/dp/B009ZN03AA

 

As for the lower performance at lower resolutions, you typically see that with games as it shifts more of the load away from the GPU to the CPU, and even the emulators do in fact use your GPU to some extent. 720p for that game must just be where the load is best split between your CPU and your GPU, though assuming you have a decent GPU I'm not quite sure why it dips at 1080p unless there's some inefficiencies in the emulator, which is entirely possible.

Well, I know that people with older gpus like the 460 Ti are running this game at 1080p with AA turned up and AF maxed out so im pretty sure my 750 ti can push it easily. I'm assuming my cpu just can't do much at that resolution.

[Faceman]

@evilmeister13

 

Go with the 212 EVO.  If you are going to spend $50+ dollars on a cooler, that money would have been better spent on a more powerful CPU.

[Totally-A-Hero]

@evilmeister13

 

Go with the 212 EVO.  If you are going to spend $50+ dollars on a cooler, that money would have been better spent on a more powerful CPU.

+1

[Faa]

Just turn 3 cores or maybe 4 off and you should be able to clock it with the stock cooler. 4300's barely consume power.