Need help with i7 920 OC

[Zhelor]

Hello,so for the past.."few" years,I've had this 7 year old watercooled pc,with an i7 920 and a Radeon HD 5870.It still runs literally everything,though not at the best quality options,but I don't even expect it to run 3x4k eyefinity,on ultra.At the moment I'm hoping to get more power from it,by the means of overclocking.I haven't overclocked yet,so this will be a whole new world for me.Thing with my CPU is: it's not a D0,it's a C0/C1,although I saw wonders all over the internet about lucky C0s hitting 4GHZ with stock cooler,and minimal voltage increase.I think I'm aiming for 3.33Ghz for now,maybe 3.66Ghz.And as I said,cooling won't really be an issue,since I have a custom waterloop.

I haven't altered the processor in any ways,so it's full stock.

Uh..Let's get to the point: I'm looking for tips/'how-to's/and generally just advice about overclocking.

Also,question: If I want to discuss the OC of my GPU,I have to open a new topic over at 'Graphics cards',right? Since this sub-forum is dedicated to CPUs.

[Lotus]

When you say completely stock, are you also talking about the cooler, or is your cooler water cooled? I'm confused. I too have an i7-920, although it's D0. I'm at 3.97 GHz including turbo boost, 3.6 GHz without, and I kept Turbo on.

 

The trick for me because I have slow memory (1066) is lowering other multipliers while I raise the BCLK. My memory and uncore multipliers are at x6 instead of x8, and I'm running a BCLK of 180 @ 1.3v, but I'm only using a Hyper 212 and the i7-920 is a 125W TDP chip, so the Hyper 212 isn't really ideal but it does the job. A stock cooler can barely keep up, and some even see thermal throttling with the stock cooler at completely stock clocks. Also don't forget to turn off adaptive voltage and that other shenanigans.

[Zhelor]

When you say completely stock, are you also talking about the cooler, or is your cooler water cooled? I'm confused. I too have an i7-920, although it's D0. I'm at 3.97 GHz including turbo boost, 3.6 GHz without, and I kept Turbo on.

 

The trick for me because I have slow memory (1066) is lowering other multipliers while I raise the BCLK. My memory and uncore multipliers are at x6 instead of x8, and I'm running a BCLK of 180 @ 1.3v, but I'm only using a Hyper 212 and the i7-920 is a 125W TDP chip, so the Hyper 212 isn't really ideal but it does the job. A stock cooler can barely keep up, and some even see thermal throttling with the stock cooler at completely stock clocks. Also don't forget to turn off adaptive voltage and that other shenanigans.

Thanks for the reply,my whole pc is water cooled,including the processor,by stock I meant that I haven't touched it in the Bios

[Nup]

Perhaps this  guide will help you

Linus' guides are pretty good indicators as to how to OC, i don't have much experience with it, but they are quite helpful. JayzTwoCents hassome good videos too. Although They are probably somewhat different to what is needed for the i7 920. 

 

I'm sure there is a wealth of info on that processor online, seeing as that it's a little older. Sorry I don'y know more about this! 

 

Yep the Graphics card sub-form would be a good place for that! 

 

P.S. welcome to the forums!  

[Zhelor]

Perhaps this  guide will help you

Linus' guides are pretty good indicators as to how to OC, i don't have much experience with it, but they are quite helpful. JayzTwoCents hassome good videos too. Although They are probably somewhat different to what is needed for the i7 920. 

 

I'm sure there is a wealth of info on that processor online, seeing as that it's a little older. Sorry I don'y know more about this! 

 

Yep the Graphics card sub-form would be a good place for that! 

 

P.S. welcome to the forums!

Thanks for that,I'll take a look at it right now.

[Nup]

Thanks for that,I'll take a look at it right now.

I hope it helps, so far as i'm aware the bases for over clocking are more or less the same from generation to generation. 

[Lotus]

I hope it helps, so far as i'm aware the bases for over clocking are more or less the same from generation to generation. 

This is more or less true so long as the CPU we're talking about has an unlocked multiplier, although overclocking the i7-920 is WAY tougher because it has a locked CPU multiplier. You can only overclock with a BCLK overclock, and that causes you to overclock EVERYTHING. It's nothing like a K series overclock or AMD Black CPU overclock.

 

PS: here are my passmark scores with that overclock I mentioned above (BCLK = 180, CPU multiplier = 20, turbo boost @ 22x on)

CPU Total - 6848

CPU Single Threaded - 1613

 

You'll notice that this 7 year old CPU still spanks the FX-6300 in everything, and any AMD CPU in single-threaded performance for that matter, and I'm doing this on a budget cooler too and didn't try maxing the test scores because I kept on turbo boost which IMO is better for gaming where loads can spike for one frame only, but results in lower benchtest scores.

[Nup]

This is more or less true so long as the CPU we're talking about has an unlocked multiplier, although overclocking the i7-920 is WAY tougher because it has a locked CPU multiplier. You can only overclock with a BCLK overclock, and that causes you to overclock EVERYTHING. It's nothing like a K series overclock or AMD Black CPU overclock.

 

PS: here are my passmark scores with that overclock I mentioned above (BCLK = 180, CPU multiplier = 20, turbo boost @ 22x on)

CPU Total - 6848

CPU Single Threaded - 1613

 

You'll notice that this 7 year old CPU still spanks the FX-6300 in everything, and any AMD CPU in single-threaded performance for that matter, and I'm doing this on a budget cooler too and didn't try maxing the test scores because I kept on turbo boost which IMO is better for gaming where loads can spike for one frame only, but results in lower benchtest scores.

Oh wow I had no idea, i just assumed that it was an unlocked variant. Can one overlclock modern non-k cpu models? 

Thanks for the info!  

[Lotus]

Oh wow I had no idea, i just assumed that it was an unlocked variant. Can one overlclock modern non-k cpu models? 

Thanks for the info!

I believe you can if you have a board that supports BCLK overclocking, but unless you're extremely careful you'll result with a really unstable overclock. BCLK overclocks mean everything gets overclocked, from cache to memory to some bus speeds (which is particularly problematic). I have no experience with BCLK overclocks on modern CPUs, but I suppose it's possible. I guess the problem is whether or not modern boards really support BCLK overclocking like the old ones do, and whether or not there's been changes to the architecture and so more bus speeds are affected. It's not something I've looked up, but it doesn't seem impossible to me.

 

Bottomline: I have no clue, but if I were to guess, I'd guess yes with the right board.

[Limounet]

Hello everyone, just signed up for this one !

 

What Lotus said is very true for the newest processor.

 

But 7 years is a long time... And it was a time when K/non-K CPU classification didn't exist !

In fact the i7 920 is part of the Nehalem microarchitecture, which is the last architecture before intel invented the locked/unlocked CPUs.

Back then, you could change absolutely everything with ALL the CPUs on the market (bckl, multiplier, qpi etc...), even for the Celerons !

 

So, as long as your motherboard is not too bad, it should be able to overclock. (back then, almost all high-end mobos had at least some overclocking capabilities)

 

This thread (specially the OP) was a reference for the i7 920 owners :

http://www.overclock.net/t/538439/guide-to-overclocking-the-core-i7-920-or-930-to-4-0ghz

 

While 4Ghz is a gamble with C0/C1s, I'm 100% sure you can reach 3.33Ghz very very very easily (less than 30 minutes, quick & dirty method, reading included).

3.8Ghz with a bit of tweaking should be possible.

 

For comparison, I've been running with a 920 i7 at 3.8Ghz from day one since Q4 2008 (was 4Ghz stress test stable but I lowered a bit to be extra safe).

I do have a D0, but I'm on air. Even if you have a C0, you are on water, i'm pretty sure 3.5Ghz should be a piece of cake.

 

A good advise is to start with the "quick and dirty method" just to get familiar with the bios. After that you can tweak and optimise to save some temps and electricity.

 

The i7 920 is really a piece of pure awesomeness, when it came out no body believed that it would be a future-proof platform because there wasn't any forward socket compatibility planned. But 7 years later it still holds its candle with 150 euro CPUs and still doesn't bottleneck most of the modern GPUs. I've had quite a few builds from both AMD and Intel, no chip has ever been relevant this long. The overclocking makes it still relevant in 2015, don't throw it away !

 

Hope your mobo allows overclocking, good luck !

Don't forget to stress test.

 

On a side note, I'm also with a 5870,but currently planning to upgrade the gpu though.

Would you have by any chance a P6T mobo and/or a Vertex SSD ? we would have the exact same build (aside from your better cooling)

 

Kind regards,

Limou

 

edited : my English is horrible, sorry, tried to correct at least a bit.

[Zhelor]

Hello everyone, just signed up for this one !

 

What Lotus said is very true for the newest processor.

 

But 7 years is a long time... And it was a time when K/non-K CPU classification didn't exist !

In fact the i7 920 is part of the Nehalem microarchitecture, which is the last architecture before intel invented the locked/unlocked CPUs.

Back then, you could change absolutely everything with ALL the CPUs on the market (bckl, multiplier, qpi etc...), even for the Celerons !

 

So, as long as your motherboard is not too bad, it should be able to overclock. (back then, almost all high-end mobos had at least some overclocking capabilities)

 

This thread (specially the OP) was a reference for the i7 920 owners :

http://www.overclock.net/t/538439/guide-to-overclocking-the-core-i7-920-or-930-to-4-0ghz

 

While 4Ghz is a gamble with C0/C1s, I'm 100% sure you can reach 3.33Ghz very very very easily (less than 30 minutes, quick & dirty method, reading included).

3.8Ghz with a bit of tweaking should be possible.

 

For comparison, I've been running with a 920 i7 at 3.8Ghz from day one since Q4 2008 (was 4Ghz stress test stable but I lowered a bit to be extra safe).

I do have a D0, but I'm on air. Even if you have a C0, you are on water, i'm pretty sure 3.5Ghz should be a piece of cake.

 

A good advise is to start with the "quick and dirty method" just to get familiar with the bios. After that you can tweak and optimise to save some temps and electricity.

 

The i7 920 is really a piece of pure awesomeness, when it came out no body believed that it would be a future-proof platform because there wasn't any forward socket compatibility planned. But 7 years later it still holds its candle with 150 euro CPUs and still doesn't bottleneck most of the modern GPUs. I've had quite a few builds from both AMD and Intel, no chip has ever been relevant this long. The overclocking makes it still relevant in 2015, don't throw it away !

 

Hope your mobo allows overclocking, good luck !

Don't forget to stress test.

 

On a side note, I'm also with a 5870,but currently planning to upgrade the gpu though.

Would you have by any chance a P6T mobo and/or a Vertex SSD ? we would have the exact same build (aside from your better cooling)

 

Kind regards,

Limou

 

edited : my English is horrible, sorry, tried to correct at least a bit.

Thanks for the extra tips,will probably OC tomorrow,if I can finally get some sleep and stop being a zombie.

You can check my full build,if you click on my profile,but unfortunately,no. We don't have the same motherboard,SSD. I have a Gigabyte EX58-UD4 and a Samsung 840 evo.

Also..I'll have to figure out which button is the BIOS for this specific mobo  :unsure: