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Help me overclock

leh18621

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jun 18, 2008
Messages
1,082
Q9550 and P5Q Pro Turbo

I know to most on here this is an "old" chip but I want a safe OC to 3.4. I realize this is modest. I have overclocked to 3.2 just by bumping the FSB. There has to be more to it than just this, settings in the bios, etc.

I am looking for specifics with bios settings that will give me the best chance without damaging anything.

FSB strap
PCIE Freq
Load line calibration

etc

Please help me out. Sure I could bump the FSB to 400 and call it a day (my ram is 800mzh which is why i want to stop at this and not go into a whole lot of other things), I just want to make sure it's safe.
 
yeah its safe.. just set the ram to 1:1 timing with the FSB.. increase the FSB in 10mhz increments, stability test.. between increases.. go til it crashes or fails the stability test.. raise the cpu voltage.. and just keep doing it til either it wont overclock any higher no matter how much voltage you give the cpu or you reach the 1.4v limit recommended by intel.. leave the pcie freq on auto or what ever the default setting is.. leave load line on unless its causing odd voltage's.. its not that difficult to do.. plenty of guides out there to explain overclocking on the lga-775 socket.. just make sure you have adequate enough cooling for the cpu and you should be good..
 
My Q9550 runs at 3.4 just with a FSB bump. I set it to 400 and that was the end of it. Just stress test to make sure its ok and you'll be fine
 
Thanks for the info. Thats all I did when I overclocked it to 3.2 was bump up the FSB, I just wanted to make sure I wasn't leaving anything out that might cause me problems.
 
A "safe" 3.4? Do you have a cooler that can keep up? If so, you should be able to get 3.4 (if it's a E0) without touching anything other than the FSB, you might even get 3.8, i have mine running 3.8GHz and I am UNDERvolted. I am running a Q9550 and a P5Q Pro as well, Can be seen here. Whats your VID?
 
I have this cpu cooler:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835150082

When my cpu was overclocked to 3.2, after running Prime95 for twelve straight hours it's max temp was 56c. And yes my q9550 is an E0.

You asked what is my VID? Please explain, I am not sure what you are asking. Also, I had seen some others recommending to set the PCIE Frequency to anywhere from 100 to 105. Is this really needed or recommended, or just leave it at Auto.
 
Keep an eye on temps, just try and keep it under 80C or so (TjMax is 100C). VID is the default voltage the chip runs at when running stock speeds. Keep PCIe set to auto or 100MHz, changing this can cause allot of instability problems or worse.

There is a good write up on the forums here for Core2 chips.
 
Thanks for the response and info. I have kept the default voltage as is and haven't changed it at all.
 
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