My i7-4790k overclocking results

[SchrodingersCat_]

i7-4790k Overclocking

Motherboard: Asus Maximus VII Hero
Cooling: H100i

 

My predefined limits.
Voltage Limit: 1.3v
Temp Limit: 80C
Whichever comes first.

No BCLK Adjustments. I didn't want to fiddle with anything but the multiplier and voltage.
All adjustments made in BIOS.

Voltage in manual mode and changed to adaptive mode after stable overclock is reached and tested.

Must pass all tests to be stable.
Final stress test is 1 hour of Aida64 - There is no reason to torture your CPU for 72 hours with Prime95. It is a super unrealistic workload and is not even validated for Haswell CPU's. I read that you could damage your CPU by doing this.

Stress Tests:
OCCT - 5 minutes
PovRay Multithreaded Benchmark
Intel Extreme Tuning Utility - 5 minutes
Aida64 (CPU, FPU, Cache) - 5 minutes

 

Overclocking Table
1) 40x100.0 @ 1.000v || Result: STABLE
2) 41x100.0 @ 1.000v || Result: Crashed on Login
3) 41x100.0 @ 1.025v || Result: Crashed after 20 sec of OCCT
4) 41x100.0 @ 1.050v || Result: STABLE
5) 42x100.0 @ 1.050v || Result: Crashed after 10 sec of OCCT
6) 42x100.0 @ 1.075v || Result: STABLE
7) 43x100.0 @ 1.075v || Result: Crashed after 10 sec of OCCT
8) 43x100.0 @ 1.100v || Result: Crashed after 4 min of OCCT
9) 43x100.0 @ 1.110v || Result: STABLE
10) 44x100.0 @ 1.110v || Result: Crashed after 5 sec of OCCT
11) 44x100.0 @ 1.125v || Result: Crashed after 5 sec of OCCT
12) 44x100.0 @ 1.150v || Result: STABLE
13) 45x100.0 @ 1.150v || Result: Crashed after 5 sec of OCCT
14) 45x100.0 @ 1.175v || Result: Crashed after 10 sec of OCCT
15) 45x100.0 @ 1.200v || Result: STABLE
16) 46x100.0 @ 1.200v || Result: Crashed after 5 sec of OCCT
17) 46x100.0 @ 1.225v || Result: Crashed after 5 sec of OCCT
18) 46x100.0 @ 1.250v || Result: STABLE
19) 47x100.0 @ 1.275v || Result: Crashed after 90 sec of OCCT
20) 47x100.0 @ 1.285v || Result: Crashed after 5 sec of OCCT
21) 47x100.0 @ 1.295v || Result: STABLE - Comfort Level Reached

Dialing In Voltage
1) 47x100.0 @ 1.290v || Result: Crashed after 2 min of OCCT
2) 47x100.0 @ 1.291v || Result: STABLE - Overclock Complete - Passed 1 hour of Aida64

Final Results
i7-4790k @ 4.7Ghz @ 1.291v @ 75C

Cinebench R15 CPU Score: 937

 

Some interesting things to note here are the voltages at 4.4Ghz. I was able to achieve 0.1v less than the stock turbo voltage, which is surprising. If you were just trying to under-volt, you could achieve about 10C lower temperatures at stock turbo with 1.150v if your chip is decent. Intel was very conservative with their stock voltages it seems.

I made a graph of my voltages and you can sort of extrapolate to see what the voltage for a certain multiplier might be. Multiplier is X-axis, CPU voltage is Y-axis. https://www.desmos.com/calculator/jjgnmdh6ew

[asker509]

Wow close to my tests I ran on my 212 Evo tho it seems 4.7 is my max 4.8 is not stable

[Jedicake]

I don't want to sound cynical, but is it much of a difference going from the turbo of 4.4ghz to the overclock of 4.7?

[asker509]

I don't want to sound cynical, but is it much of a difference going from the turbo of 4.4ghz to the overclock of 4.7?

Turbo is only on one core usually so yes

[Jedicake]

Turbo is only on one core usually so yes

OH CRAP I feel dumb

[asker509]

OH CRAP I feel dumb

Idk a lot of people think this my cousins asked me how I over clocked to 4.4 when turbo was 4.4

[patrickjp93]

Did you delid the chip or was this all out of the box? My Dad's chip ran hot as Hell and we had to delid, fill in the heatspreader, and use some Coolaboratory Liquid Ultra to get it to run under 85 in AIDA 64 on 4.7GHz at 1.25 volts.

[SchrodingersCat_]

Did you delid the chip or was this all out of the box? My Dad's chip ran hot as Hell and we had to delid, fill in the heatspreader, and use some Coolaboratory Liquid Ultra to get it to run under 85 in AIDA 64 on 4.7GHz at 1.25 volts.

It is all out of the box. No modifications made to the chip itself.

[patrickjp93]

It is all out of the box. No modifications made to the chip itself.

Lucky... Intel cheaping out on their internal TIM sucks... If only AMD could compete and force them back to using solder...

 

We melted copper into our heatspreader, lapped the top to a mirror polish, used Coolaboratory Liquid Ultra between the die and IHS, put EK Indigo XS on the heatspreader, used an EK Supremacy EVO Full Copper waterblock,... We had to do the full monty on ours to get it up there. We broke 5 GHz, but we certainly wouldn't have without all that effort. 4.8 would have been impossible on AIDA64 out of the box. We smacked 95 on 2 cores at 4.6GHz on 1.2 volts.

[Sintezza]

Very nice scorings

[SchrodingersCat_]

Lucky... Intel cheaping out on their internal TIM sucks... If only AMD could compete and force them back to using solder...

We melted copper into our heatspreader, lapped the top to a mirror polish, used Coolaboratory Liquid Ultra between the die and IHS, put EK Indigo XS on the heatspreader, used an EK Supremacy EVO Full Copper waterblock,... We had to do the full monty on ours to get it up there. We broke 5 GHz, but we certainly wouldn't have without all that effort. 4.8 would have been impossible on AIDA64 out of the box. We smacked 95 on 2 cores at 4.6GHz on 1.2 volts.

Wow! 5Ghz! What voltage it it take to get that? I set my limit for overclocking at 1.3v because, from what I have read at least, it is the max voltage you should use for long term use. What is your opinion on that voltage and processor degradation? Also, Devils Canyon TIM seems to be a big improvement over original Haswell TIM. Anandtech did a comparison and Devils Canyon is as much as 16C cooler than Haswell. For $300 they definitely should be using solder though. Thanks.

[patrickjp93]

Wow! 5Ghz! What voltage it it take to get that? I set my limit for overclocking at 1.3v because, from what I have read at least, it is the max voltage you should use for long term use. What is your opinion on that voltage and processor degradation? Also, Devils Canyon TIM seems to be a big improvement over original Haswell TIM. Anandtech did a comparison and Devils Canyon is as much as 16C cooler than Haswell. For $300 they definitely should be using solder though. Thanks.

It might be improved on average, but ours came not fully tacked down I think. Now it runs nice. To reach 5.14 it took 1.375 volts, and yeah it's not good long term, but 2 hours of AIDA 64 FPU stress stable at 84 degrees shouldn't hurt it much. We pulled it back to 4.8 GHz on 1.22 volts and it runs in the mid to upper 60s for AIDA FPU stress. We could do better with a newer radiator and some Noctua Industrial 3000 RPM fans, but this will do him nicely for the next decade.

[Jedicake]

I kind of want to try overclocking again but when I was trying to reach 5.0 (can't remember the voltage) my motherboard hated it and it did that thing where booting my PC up the screen just stayed black, and it didn't post, so had to reset the cmos. made me nervous.

[patrickjp93]

I kind of want to try overclocking again but when I was trying to reach 5.0 (can't remember the voltage) my motherboard hated it and it did that thing where booting my PC up the screen just stayed black, and it didn't post, so had to reset the cmos. made me nervous.

Which board was it?

[Jedicake]

Which board was it?

Just my MSI z97 g55

[patrickjp93]

Just my MSI z97 g55

8-phase VRM. You're not gonna get to 5 unless you can cut down the heat significantly. Also, the heatspreaders on the VRMs on that board have shitty TIM underneath. You can try switching that out if you want to go for it again, but I think 4.8 is about the limit you're gonna get on that board.

[Jedicake]

8-phase VRM. You're not gonna get to 5 unless you can cut down the heat significantly. Also, the heatspreaders on the VRMs on that board have shitty TIM underneath. You can try switching that out if you want to go for it again, but I think 4.8 is about the limit you're gonna get on that board.

Poop. I actually wanted to get a Formula VII from Asus but just didn't have the budget.

[SchrodingersCat_]

Poop. I actually wanted to get a Formula VII from Asus but just didn't have the budget.

I have the Maximus VII Hero and it is a fantastic board for overclocking. You don't need anything more unless you are going for an OC record or something. The Hero looks great, performs great, and overclocking is downright easy these days, but the ASUS UEFI makes it even easier. My two cents.