Newbie, Overclocking i7700k tips

[HeyIAmInfinity]

Hi everyone, i just overclocked my new pc for the first time:

i7700k at 4.9ghz with a kraken 62 from nzxt, i set the voltage to manual 1.35. Memory is at xmp profile 3000 mhz.

I run a 4 hour xtu benchmark and played some games

CPU run smooth with temperatures at high load between 60-75, got some spike near 85 with no thermal throttling, vcore was never above 1.29 on xtu.

 

I would like to know:

1- how should i care about temperatures? i understand that staying below 90 is good but is it related to the average temperature on high load or the max spike i can get?

2- i have not changed cache speed, should i? what are the effects? (simple pls)

3- should i do something with bclk? (left it at 100)

4- if i set vcore to adaptive i get a lot of options: offset, choose sign +/-. Should i keep it in manual or even auto? (asus maxiums ix formula)

5- any raccomandation on how far i should overclock this, related to question 1, should i try to go until i crash on benchmark? up to 5.0-5.5? 

 

Thanks

[Zando_]

IDK much about OC, but you should make sure your max temp is below 90. 

[wzrd]

1 minute ago, HeyIAmInfinity said:

Hi everyone, i just overclocked my new pc for the first time:

i7700k at 4.9ghz with a kraken 62 from nzxt, i set the voltage to manual 1.35. Memory is at xmp profile 3000 mhz.

I run a 4 hour xtu benchmark and played some games

CPU run smooth with temperatures at high load between 60-75, got some spike near 85 with no thermal throttling, vcore was never above 1.29 on xtu.

 

I would like to know:

1- how should i care about temperatures? i understand that staying below 90 is good but is it related to the average temperature on high load or the max spike i can get?

2- i have not changed cache speed, should i? what are the effects? (simple pls)

3- should i do something with bclk? (left it at 100)

4- if i set vcore to adaptive i get a lot of options: offset, choose sign +/-. Should i keep it in manual or even auto? (asus maxiums ix formula)

5- any raccomandation on how far i should overclock this, related to question 1, should i try to go until i crash on benchmark? up to 5.0-5.5? 

 

Thanks

1. You should focus most on the average temperature under max loads. A single big spike can just be due to some heat transfer latency and shouldn't do much.

 

2. The cache speed just affects how quickly your CPU can read from the cache. You can overclock it a bit, but it won't make a massive difference to overall performance so feel free to just leave it where it is.

 

3. No, BCLK overclocking is a more difficult and more advanced version of overclocking. Stick to OCing the multiplier for now, it's not usually necessary to overclock the base clock. The base clock is related to other components too so can cause all sorts of problems.

 

4. You should usually tweak it manually, the motherboard will usually overestimate the voltage needed, resulting in higher temps than are necessary. For 4.9GHz, try starting around 1.27/1.28 volts, and increase by 0.01 if it crashes until you are stable.

 

5. It depends why you are overclocking it. If you just want better performance, you probably won't see a major difference by adding another 100 or 200MHz, but if you want to try and get it higher for fun then go for it.

[wzrd]

4 minutes ago, wzrd said:

1. You should focus most on the average temperature under max loads. A single big spike can just be due to some heat transfer latency and shouldn't do much.

 

2. The cache speed just affects how quickly your CPU can read from the cache. You can overclock it a bit, but it won't make a massive difference to overall performance so feel free to just leave it where it is.

 

3. No, BCLK overclocking is a more difficult and more advanced version of overclocking. Stick to OCing the multiplier for now, it's not usually necessary to overclock the base clock. The base clock is related to other components too so can cause all sorts of problems.

 

4. You should usually tweak it manually, the motherboard will usually overestimate the voltage needed, resulting in higher temps than are necessary. For 4.9GHz, try starting around 1.27/1.28 volts, and increase by 0.01 if it crashes until you are stable.

 

5. It depends why you are overclocking it. If you just want better performance, you probably won't see a major difference by adding another 100 or 200MHz, but if you want to try and get it higher for fun then go for it.

But as a general rule, keeping it below 1.37v and 90C Tmax is a pretty good limit, or so I have found with 7700ks. And even then, for longevity's sake, and to keep noise down, etc., you would probably be best to dial it back down to 4.8GHz ish for general use after you have found the max overclock. There's little point in running at your max overclock all of the time, because you won't notice a significant difference in performance.

[HeyIAmInfinity]

thanks for the quick reply.

 

a few more clarifications:

 

Generally how far should cache speed be related to clock speed? should i increase it close to clock speed?

I set the vcore to 1.35 so what you are suggesting is lower it to what my cpu is actually using? or should i first find the sweetspot for temperature and then reducing vcore?

I want to overclock for performance, im running a 1080 ti and i play some cpu intensive games (ksp for example).

On 3d Mark the bottleneck is the cpu, when i did the benchmake after oc i got 200 point more on time spy (around 9050).

Should i run a 12 hours or more benchmark? or is the 4 hour i did good enough? will running aida64 or furmark help me or just waste my time?

[done12many2]

2 hours ago, HeyIAmInfinity said:

Generally how far should cache speed be related to clock speed? should i increase it close to clock speed?

 

1:1 ratio is ideal in a prefect world, but if you can't get cache to run that fast, run it as fast as you can while remaining stable and without having to add additional Vcore.  Usually 4.5 to 4.8 depending on the cache quality will run well without additional Vcore.

 

2 hours ago, HeyIAmInfinity said:

I set the vcore to 1.35 so what you are suggesting is lower it to what my cpu is actually using? or should i first find the sweetspot for temperature and then reducing vcore?

 

Whatever makes you more comfortable.  A lot of folks determine the highest Vcore that they are able to cool and then adjust clockspeed.  While I don't do that myself, I understand the logic.

 

2 hours ago, HeyIAmInfinity said:

On 3d Mark the bottleneck is the cpu, when i did the benchmake after oc i got 200 point more on time spy (around 9050).

 

Fire Strike and Time Spy test CPU performance in addition to graphics performance.  Your CPU score is factored into the overall score.  Just because your score improved when you overclocked the CPU does not mean that your CPU was a "bottleneck" prior to you overclocking it.  If your graphics score didn't go up any substantial amount, you were more then likely NOT bottlenecking and the 200 pt increase that you observed was just an increase to your CPU score.

 

I run 2 x 1080 Ti cards in a SLI and a 7700k will not bottleneck them.

 

2 hours ago, HeyIAmInfinity said:

Should i run a 12 hours or more benchmark? or is the 4 hour i did good enough? will running aida64 or furmark help me or just waste my time?

 

AIDA64 is one of the weaker stability tests that you can use, but if you are comfortable with it, that's really all that matters. 

[HeyIAmInfinity]

Ok after a few test I managed to OC up to 5.1 but its not stable, 5.0 is almost stable, had 2 crashes out of 6 tries, there is something that i might need to tweek to stabilize that.

Now I rolled back to 4.9 as that is perfectly stable, i've encoutered an intresting fact.

I get lower temperatures (never above 80) if i set vcore to auto on mobo, this causes vcore to sometime skyrocket to 1.41x.

I would like to know if i should keep my 1.35 that actually uses only 1.29 max with higher temperatures, still below 90 max is 85.

Or if better temperature with higher vcore is better, with vcore fluctuating a lot.

Any suggestions?

 

Regarding the 5.0, I have read about LLC but I have not activated it, would that solve my issue?

 

@done12many2 thanks for the explanation of 3d mark, now i actually understand a few things better.

[done12many2]

7 minutes ago, HeyIAmInfinity said:

 

@done12many2 thanks for the explanation of 3d mark, now i actually understand a few things better.

 

You're welcome bud.

 

7 minutes ago, HeyIAmInfinity said:

I get lower temperatures (never above 80) if i set vcore to auto on mobo, this causes vcore to sometime skyrocket to 1.41x.

 

This is more than likely due to your LLC being set to Auto.  When you manually increase Vcore, overshoot is probable with the LLC setting left on Auto.

 

Quote

Regarding the 5.0, I have read about LLC but I have not activated it, would that solve my issue?

 

What motherboard are you using?  LCC values do opposite things with different brands.  On Asus boards, the higher the setting the larger the overshoot.  On AsRock boards it's the opposite where 1 is the most aggressive LLC setting.

 

 

[HeyIAmInfinity]

1 minute ago, done12many2 said:

What motherboard are you using?  LCC values do opposite things with different brands.  On Asus boards, the higher the setting the larger the overshoot.  On AsRock boards it's the opposite where 1 is the most aggressive LLC setting.

I'm using an Asus z270 maximus ix formula. could LLC setting be the cause of instability at 5.0?

[done12many2]

1 minute ago, HeyIAmInfinity said:

I'm using an Asus z270 maximus ix formula. could LLC setting be the cause of instability at 5.0?

 

Nice choice of motherboard. See my signature.

 

To answer your question, yes it does affect stability. As load increases, voltage will drop otherwise referred to as "Vdroop". LLC is used to overcome this drop, but there is a trade off. Aggressive LLC will overshoot desired voltage by a little or a lot depending on how aggressive you get with your setting.  

 

Start with an LLC of 5 and work up from there. 

[HeyIAmInfinity]

@done12many2 thanks ill try that tomorrow, if that doesnt improve stability at 5 ghz should i still leav it on at 4.9 even if it works as is now?

[done12many2]

Just now, HeyIAmInfinity said:

@done12many2 thanks ill try that tomorrow, if that doesnt improve stability at 5 ghz should i still leav it on at 4.9 even if it works as is now?

 

Sure.  Definitely leave it where it's stable.

 

Are you willing to delid?  So much to gain in something so simple provided that you buy the correct tool.

[HeyIAmInfinity]

@done12many2 No i dont think i will delid now or in the near future, this is the first pc ive build and i want to get the best performance i can without altering hardware, in a few years when ill build a custom loop i will