The stuff for my upgrade came today, I ordered:
Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz
Asus P8P67 Pro.
2 x Asus HD 6850 1GB GDDR5 OC Graphics Card
Noctua NH-D14 Dual Radiator and Fan CPU Cooler
Kingston 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1600MHz
Gelid GC-Extreme Thermal Compound
Slight hiccup I forgot to order a Sata DVD drive as my gaming comp still had a IDE one, so I popped down to my local, friendly PC shop/rip off merchant! he wanted 26 quid for a 10 quid Samsung drive! ....so after I told him to f**k off! I came home and borrowed the one out of my HTPC.
The cooler is bloody massive and has quite possibly has the worst colour scheme this side of the 70's!
(http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k26/bobbins53/gc1.jpg)
(http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k26/bobbins53/gc2.jpg)
It was easy to install the fitting kit is excellent and came with a long screw driver to reach the 2 fixing screws in-between the radiators. I was a bit worried that I wouldn't be able to close the door on my case that houses the side cooling fans, as it is about ½ inch taller than my Tuniq tower and that was a tight fit, but did get it closed with a bit of effort.
It felt very strange using a mouse in Bios! first thing I did was check the temps, CPU was in the high 20's so set the v-core to 1.35, locked the FSB to a 100 and set the multi to 45, then installed windows! lol
Very impressed windows installed perfectly it ran any benchmark at that that speed so I upped it to 50x for 5GHz, not fully stability tested yet but it's looking pretty good so far, temps did rise quite a bit from 4.5GHz to 5GHz, but under full load using LinX the max I have seen is 66c there is about 6 or 7 degrees difference from my coolest core to the hottest, seeing they are so close together I think the 1 or 2 of the sensor must be a little bit out?
I installed a couple of games WoW looks pretty in DX11 with everything at Ultra except shadow, with V-sync on I was getting a solid 60FPS and only dipping to around 50-55 in Stormwind, I also install the original Crysis seeing it is more of a performance hog than Warhead, with everything maxed out and AA at 2x I was getting 60 – 70 FPS. These card run cool I left HWmonitor running in the background the max they hit is 63c.
Here are a few screenies:
(http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k26/bobbins53/linx.jpg)
(http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k26/bobbins53/pi.jpg)
(http://i84.photobucket.com/albums/k26/bobbins53/WE.jpg)
Will play some more tomorrow! :ptu:
Impressive figures for such a quick setup!
What case are you using out of interest? This seems to be the cooler of choice at the moment but it is bloody huge.
I don't know if the below has been proved a load of rubbish but this statement was put out last month, I'd watch that VCORE :gag: does it not jump up and down a bit? or is it absolutely steady at what it is :tinhat:
Hi there
Right guys myself and our technical guys have spent the entire weekend and this morning in discussions with Intel regarding the alarming amount of reports of Sandybridge CPU's dying and have been conducting our own testing as have Intel to find out what is a definite no no.
Sandybridge maximum safe voltages
Core Voltage - Not recommended too exceed 1.38v, doing so could kill the CPU, we therefor recommend a range of 1.325-1.350v if overclocking.
Memory Voltage - Intel recommend 1.50v plus/minus 5% which means upto 1.58v is the safe recommended limit. In our testing we have found 1.65v has caused no issues.
BCLK Base Clock - This is strictly a NO, anyone using base clock overclocking could/will cause damange to CPU/Mainboard.
PLL Voltage - Do not exceed 1.9v!!
Processor - Basically we recommend customers not to exceed 1.35v to play it safe, all our bundles are set at 1.3250v or lower, any competitors offering bundles above 4.6GHz you should be enquiring as to what voltage they are using as we believe anything over 1.38v will limit CPU lifespan and anything over 1.42v will likely kill the CPU or severely limit its lifespan.
Memory - Intel recommend 1.50v plus/minus 5% which means 1.60v is the ideal safe maximum, but we have found in our testing all 1.65v memory is fine. We have also found most new 1.65v like Corsair XMS3 will run at its rated timings with just 1.50-1.55v which is well within Intel specifications. So people upgrading to Sandybridge you can still use your old DDR3, but we do recommend you run it at 1.60v or less. We are shipping most of our bundles which feature Corsair XMS at 1.50v-1.55v at rated timings. We've also discussed with Asus and MSI regarding voltages for memory and they also confirm in their testing 1.65v caused no issues with reliability.
Base Clock - To put it simple if you value the life of your components, do not overclock using base clock!
PLL Voltage - Again do not exceed 1.9v!
These are just guidelines we recommend you follow, if you want to push more voltage through your CPU's then just be aware they could die on you. Your warranty is un-affected and we will honor any CPU's that die, we just won't ask questions as to how you killed them.
Not all CPU's are as fragile as others, we have experimented upto 1.50v Vcore and 1.70v memory and had zero issues with reliability, so it seems some of fine when pushing hard.
Clock'd I've got a CM Stacker 832, pic of the side cooling:
(http://img244.imageshack.us/img244/5404/stacker832frontui9.jpg)
I have 3 quiet 120mm in the top left and the bottom 2 slots, the top right is empty as it would only be blowing air on the top of the cpu cooler and wouldn't fit with this new one anyway lol
Cheers for that Matt I had read it, its from OCUK while I'm not saying there isn't some truth in it people did leave the v-core on auto and tried to boot 5GHz+ and killed there chip! The consensus around the OC community now is still slightly nervous about volts but so long as your sensible, have decent cooling and don't let the temp's get silly you should be ok, it certainly got there name all over the net at SB launch! I do wonder if it was a publicity stunt it is big on plugging there OC bundles and saying they will RMA killed chips with no questions asked! ...Wonder what Intel thought of that? lol
My v-core is stable I'm not getting Vdroop at all, my vcore is set to 1.35 and under load and at idle its 1.34-1.35, will have a go at maxing it out most likely go up to around 1.4v for short periods, then set it to something like 1.3 -1.325v @ 100-200Mhz under whatever the max OC is at that voltage for normal daily use. :)
so.... how fast does it feel ?
I keep thinking about upgrading.... then I decide my rig is fast enough and it's too much hassle to mess with the water cooling.....
but then someone else comes along and posts some new pics and benchmarks and I the feelings of needing to upgrade come flooding back!
Well my Wolfdale was 4 GHz and this is a big upgrade for me, so I guess for you the same.
As for your watercooling the SB mobo's are passive and with no FSB increase because you use the multi to OC, you don't need the same amount of cooling as it isn' t running over the standard speed, I would bet you would get away with a slow 120mm fan at 7v to cool it. ;)
Fair enough Shaun :D mine despite being set to something on some settings it would boost the volts up and down above the 'set limit' when speedstep kicked in and it was running full throttle, so what should have been 1.35 max was suddenly 1.37 then at times 1.39 so I had to really keep my eye on it. That said I haven't tried o/cing again on the latest firmware revision, will you be re-enabling speedstep or just leaving it set to the max o/c?
Matt I left speedstep on as I do intend to use it normally, I get whinged at every time we get a electric bill "with all my stupid computers and gadgets!" :lol:
Not had much time to play over the last few days but last night I had another look at the OC and can't get it to even make it into Windows at 5.2GHz, went as high as 1.4v but it just wouldn't have it. 5.1GHz needs 1.4v and I managed to get under 7 mins in Superpi for the 32m test, but temps where to high for my liking hitting 70 on the hottest core under LinX :P
But 5GHz is rock solid at 1.325v temps in the 63-64 running stress tests, so think I'm going to leave it at that, under gaming and normal use it's in the high 50's max, I have been fiddling around with video editing software over the last few days quite a bit, god this thing renders things in no time, compared to my old Wolfdale which wasn't exactly a slouch to say it only had 2 cores.
I'm wondering if it's worth having a crack at 5GHz myself, Shaun what have you left it on as your 'daily' settings? (PLL etc) 5GHz on 1.325V is really good :yarr:
Looking round the net I do appear to have been lucky with the chip I got, most need a lot more volts to get to 5GHz, which is nice for a change as I have been plagued by poor clocking chips over recent years lol
Matt I really haven't needed to mess about with other settings to much as I think heat is my main issue going over 5GHz, I will list my Bios settings after lunch when I have a bit more time. :)
new bios for the pro 1302 http://hardforum.com//showthread.php?t=1578865
Here are my settings:
AI OC tuner: Manual
BCLK freq: 100
Turbo ratio: by all cores
By all cores: 50x
Internal PLL overvoltage: Auto
Memory freq: 1600MHz
CPU power saving mode: Disabled
Load line calibration: Auto
VRM freq: Auto
VRM spread: Disabled
Phase control: Optimized (this is the one that can cause your CPU voltage to jump around a lot and overvolt briefly, set it to standard if it is jumping higher than you would like)
Duty Control: Extreme
CPU current compatibility: 100%
I have all the voltages set to Auto apart from:
CPU manual voltage: 1.3250v
Dram voltage: 1.6v
CPU PLL voltage: 1.75v (undervolting this helps OC'ing strange as it sounds)
Good luck at going for 5GHz! :) every board is slightly different so don't be scared of playing around and using slightly more volts for short periods! ...so long as you keep an eye on your temps! personally I draw the line at about 70c, others draw it at 80c :lol: