Help me tweak my 6700k to reach 5ghz

Nebell

Nebell

2[H]4U
Joined
Jul 20, 2015
Messages
2,384
Hello.

I have managed to get my 6700k to 4.9ghz at 1.440v.
And before anyone asks, no it's not stable in Prime95 :)
But Prime95 is irrelevant, working normally and gaming has caused no issues at all for the past 3 days I've had it at. I've even left the PC on for days without turning it off.

The only thing I've done was increase voltage, change bus speed to 104.3 and multiplier to 47. Now bus speed at 105 doesn't seem to work.
I don't feel like going higher than 1.440v, but I feel that there might be some more tweaking options that I don't understand since I'm not a pro overclocker.
Temps are fine, they stay in high 20's and low/mid 30's while surfing, gaming somewhere around high 50's and low 60's. This is in Celsius.

Any suggestions what I should change to get to that magical 5ghz? :)
The motherboard is Gigabyte Gaming G1.
 
You do realize that only the smallest fraction of those CPUs can even hit 5GHz right? What's your RAM set at? Reducing the memory clocks might allow it to happen. My test 6700K can do 4.8GHz at DDR4 2666MHz on some motherboards, but no more than that. I can hit DDR4 3000MHz speeds in some cases at 4.7GHz. 4.5-4.6GHz, I can do DDR4 3600MHz all day.
 
DDR4 is at 3250mhz if I recall correctly, and so far it's working fine together with a 6770k at 4.9ghz.
 
WIll do once I get home, maybe even increase the timings as well.
 
Nebell said:
WIll do once I get home, maybe even increase the timings as well.
Click to expand...

Relaxed timings will help, tighter timings won't. Although, you may find that you can get away with tighter timings at lower speeds while maintaining a higher CPU clock speed.
 
I didn't attempt to change the timings, but I turned off XMP or whatever it's called, dropped ram speed to 2666 or so mhz and got blue screen when I get to log to Windows.

It just feels weird that I can't bump it those measly 97mhz. RAM seems to be holding well at higher frequencies.
Maybe it's my PSU, I'm using my old 850w and have a whole lot of stuff hooked up to it.
I didn't bother connecting my new 1200w since I'm getting a new case next week.
 
Last edited:
I find that loosening the timings help more with OC's than just lowering the speed.
 
Nebell said:
It just feels weird that I can't bump it those measly 97mhz. RAM seems to be holding well at higher frequencies.
Click to expand...

I would listen to Dan_D. Your CPU is talking to you but you are not listening. And even though you don't want to hear it, 5GHz is an arbitrary number and you aren't even really stable at 4.9GHz.

Also, what is your cooling at 1.44V or don't you care about that either?
 
I think you're at the wall. From working with my 6700k as soon as your voltage needs start to spike your heat is going to spike and then you don't have much wiggle room left because it's just going to get worse and worse.
 
Quix said:
I think you're at the wall. From working with my 6700k as soon as your voltage needs start to spike your heat is going to spike and then you don't have much wiggle room left because it's just going to get worse and worse.
Click to expand...

Yes I think you're right. I tried looseing timings and didn't help (went from 15-17-17-35 to 17-19-19-37 and nothing). It boots to Windows login at 4950mhz but it just won't go those 5 ghz. I tried bumping voltage to 1.5 and it actually let me log to Windows but choked shortly after.
So I decided to do something else. Lowering voltages. Now I'm running it at 4.9ghz (100 x 49) at 1.404v. Haven't tried stability yet since I'm downloading a bunch of games on Steam. So far so good.

aldamon said:
I would listen to Dan_D. Your CPU is talking to you but you are not listening. And even though you don't want to hear it, 5GHz is an arbitrary number and you aren't even really stable at 4.9GHz.

Also, what is your cooling at 1.44V or don't you care about that either?
Click to expand...

I have a H100i. Ordered custom water cooling parts from EK that should arrive sometimes next week. Temps are not an issue.
Also what's with the attitude? Who said that I'm not listening to Dan_D? He told me what to try and I tried it. Didn't work. But I'd rather listen to someone and try than listen to someone and not try.
I don't understand the need to bench it running 100% load for 24h on Prime95 because that situation is not realistic. Not in my case anyway. It's the worst case scenario and in case I some day hit 100% and get a bluescreen then fine, I'll just restart the PC. I have yet to see a game today or in 3-5 years that will force 4.9ghz 6700k to 100% usage.
Leaving my PC on for days and gaming with no issues is what I'm going to base on if it's stable or not.
 
Nebell said:
I didn't attempt to change the timings, but I turned off XMP or whatever it's called, dropped ram speed to 2666 or so mhz and got blue screen when I get to log to Windows.

It just feels weird that I can't bump it those measly 97mhz. RAM seems to be holding well at higher frequencies.
Maybe it's my PSU, I'm using my old 850w and have a whole lot of stuff hooked up to it.
I didn't bother connecting my new 1200w since I'm getting a new case next week.
Click to expand...

If your 850 watt PSU can handle the system at 4900MHz with all your devices while playing games, a 1200 watt CPU will not help you. People have a tendency to blame the PSU for problems on this forum that aren't indicative if PSU issues. A power supply that is insufficient will randomly shut down or won't start the system from a colt boot. A weak PSU may allow you to do most tasks, but when you increase the power draw through usage it will randomly shut down or bounce the system. You aren't going to see BSODs with a PSU. At least I never have in the 20 years I've been doing this.

You've got to understand that past a certain threshold 97MHz is a lot of clock speed. Anything after 4.7GHz on these CPUs is a gift. Many of the CPUs that can do 4.7GHz can't do 4.8GHz without a shit ton of voltage and heat loads that the cooling system can't keep up with.

Trimlock said:
I find that loosening the timings help more with OC's than just lowering the speed.
Click to expand...

I think that's been just about everyone's experience if they've spent any time overclocking.

aldamon said:
I would listen to Dan_D. Your CPU is talking to you but you are not listening. And even though you don't want to hear it, 5GHz is an arbitrary number and you aren't even really stable at 4.9GHz.

Also, what is your cooling at 1.44V or don't you care about that either?
Click to expand...

Agreed here. You say that your system isn't stable through Prime95 at 4.9GHz. Part of the reason why we tell you to stability test the piss out of it is because Prime95 over a course of time tells you weather or not the heat generated by the CPU can truly be dissipated by the cooling system. I can run 4.8GHz+ on my 6700K test CPU or 4.9GHz on many motherboards. The reason why this is not the final reported overclock at the end of the article is because it couldn't be sustained. What happens is that the temperatures will start out good and the system is stable. Eventually one of two things will happen. Either the CPU temperatures will climb and climb by a degree or two over a period of time. Say an hour or so. This is because the CPU cooling can't dissipate the heat. So you get extra build up or heat soak. Once this accumulated heat is sufficient to cause problems the system will either throttle the CPU or lock up / BSOD or whatever.

Prime95 and other applications like it may not be a realistic work load, but it's a worst case scenario. Other benchmarks you might run, or the next great game could have similar effects on your CPU. I can get Crysis 2 or 3 to draw enough power from my old rig to exceed the power output of my UPS which either resulted in a hard shut down of the UPS or cause a warning condition which would lead to a hard shut down. Ordinarily, this couldn't be achieved in other games or even synthetically. I'd have to run something like Prime95 or OCCT with Heaven or something running on the system at the same time to do the same job.

Another benefit of the worst case scenario testing is that the temperatures in the home, or office can change through the year and try as you might, you can't always regulate it the way you want. When a wife or girlfriend starts bitching that it's too cold, they will turn that thermostat up and your system will get warmer inside. You need to make sure that your CPU can handle the extra 5C of heat that it may hit because of that change. Stress testing via Prime95, OCCT, etc are good ways to make sure your CPU has the breathing room it needs for your current settings.

Think of it this way. If it's Prime95 stable, its fucking stable. If it's not Prime95 stable, then it might be, but you don't really know.

Having said that, those tests are synthetic and should only be trusted to a point. So if you don't want to trust that, try Handbrake encoding. We've found that FAR harder on these CPUs than Prime95 is. We've had overclocks that are Prime95 stable for days that fail in 10 minutes under a Handbrake encode.

Quix said:
I think you're at the wall. From working with my 6700k as soon as your voltage needs start to spike your heat is going to spike and then you don't have much wiggle room left because it's just going to get worse and worse.
Click to expand...

Exactly. For example, at 4.7GHz my test 6700K is solid on most motherboards. At 4.8GHz, the voltage required goes up a lot and so does the heat. Most of the time, this heat isn't manageable.

Nebell said:
Yes I think you're right. I tried looseing timings and didn't help (went from 15-17-17-35 to 17-19-19-37 and nothing). It boots to Windows login at 4950mhz but it just won't go those 5 ghz. I tried bumping voltage to 1.5 and it actually let me log to Windows but choked shortly after.
So I decided to do something else. Lowering voltages. Now I'm running it at 4.9ghz (100 x 49) at 1.404v. Haven't tried stability yet since I'm downloading a bunch of games on Steam. So far so good.



I have a H100i. Ordered custom water cooling parts from EK that should arrive sometimes next week. Temps are not an issue.
Also what's with the attitude? Who said that I'm not listening to Dan_D? He told me what to try and I tried it. Didn't work. But I'd rather listen to someone and try than listen to someone and not try.
I don't understand the need to bench it running 100% load for 24h on Prime95 because that situation is not realistic. Not in my case anyway. It's the worst case scenario and in case I some day hit 100% and get a bluescreen then fine, I'll just restart the PC. I have yet to see a game today or in 3-5 years that will force 4.9ghz 6700k to 100% usage.
Leaving my PC on for days and gaming with no issues is what I'm going to base on if it's stable or not.
Click to expand...

I understand where you are coming from, but in addition to what I said above, consider this: If it's Prime95 or better yet, Handbrake stable, you will never have to wonder if a crash, or a sudden restart in a given application is a hardware based issue. You can be fairly certain that it's a software problem. If nothing else that piece of mind helps you troubleshoot issues down the line. My overclock is stable. Therefore I know that if a game crashes to desktop or something, it's probably the game, a mod or something like that. It's proven true each and every time.

Do it however you want, but your overclock is a lot less impressive when it's bleeding edge and may not hold up on something you've not even installed yet.

Lastly, if your temps are really good, then a custom loop isn't going to improve the situation. If your current cooling solution can't keep the heat in a manageable range, then additional / more powerful cooling may just do the trick.
 
there's a lot of people that trade stability for whatever number they trying to hit....lol....it seems kinda obsessive....and im ocd anyhow lol..What percentage of people really have stable overclocks? lol who knows. op i would like to ask you run this benchmark Corona CPU Benchmark Download v1.3 take just over 3min. I guess what i getting at if it can pass it then thats good....if it cant then is it really worth it? (whatever unstable overclock i mean)
 
Last edited:
I understand what you guys are trying to say. I know that if it passes Prime95 torture it will be rock solid no matter what. And not getting stability in Prime95 could be considered "cheating". But I'm not trying to hit benchmark record or something. I think overclocking is fun and thought I could get to that 5ghz number :)
It's the same reason why I'm getting water cooling. It's partly because I need to get down temps on my cards (they are hitting 83c on air) but the ot her part is because hardline looks cool and I need a fun project.
While I consider it fun and have been overclocking for at least 10 years, I have never given much thought or tried to learn "advanced/pro overclocking". I know how to get my core voltage up and play around with frequences but I don't understand the fine tuning (which is what I asked to be helped with in the first place).

Also, Dan_D you're a reviewer, I understand that you can't overclock a CPU and say it's at 5ghz without it being stable. But my case is that I'm not that advanced therefore I'm just happy if I can max my stuff out.
I've been tweaking quite a bit now and figured out myself that it's just no point in going for that 5ghz since it seems to require too much voltage. I was able to log to Windows at 1.5v but I just did it to test it out. No way I'm going anything higher than 1.45v. Currently it's at 4.9ghz and voltage is jumping between 1.416v and 1.428v and it's "stable".
I have never fed a CPU that much juice (my 3770k at 4.5ghz was running at 1.35v if I remember correctly). My 920 which was also heavily overclocked is 7-8 years old and still kicking ass (my dad is using that computer).
I will definitely try to go down to 4.8ghz and see if I can get 1.35v. If that's possible and it's stable (this time more than just windows/gaming stable) then I will most likely leave it at that.
 
Hey i get the idea of not needing it pass a 24hr 100% load test.....how bout a 3 min test? if its not 3 min stable then well.....have fun with that!
 
If you want it to be gaming stable I would still suggest running stability tests. I started with Aida then Prime 95 and found that I was still not game stable. It went like this.

I was stable @ 4.4 with Aida @ 1.232, Prime95 27.3 (non AVX) @ 1.254 and Arma 3 would crash alot. I got Arma 3 stables @ 1.268.
 
From what I've heard, it's nearly impossible to hit 5GHz with anything after Sandy Bridge. The iGPU and the transistor design isn't conducive to overclocking anymore. Intel is optimizing for low voltage design, which means you can't just bump that up anymore.

I mean, I've heard of some people trying tricks like delidding the CPU or lowering the RAM clocks all the way down to 1600MHz and minimum timings to get it working in an unstable manner, but it's not going to be easy. Another thing I've heard of people doing is disabling cores to hit higher frequencies. Each of the cores generates heat. In other words, you'd have to gimp your system so much in other ways that it wouldn't be worth it to hit 5GHz, IMO.
 
athenian200 said:
From what I've heard, it's nearly impossible to hit 5GHz with anything after Sandy Bridge. The iGPU and the transistor design isn't conducive to overclocking anymore. Intel is optimizing for low voltage design, which means you can't just bump that up anymore.

I mean, I've heard of some people trying tricks like delidding the CPU or lowering the RAM clocks all the way down to 1600MHz and minimum timings to get it working in an unstable manner, but it's not going to be easy. Another thing I've heard of people doing is disabling cores to hit higher frequencies. Each of the cores generates heat. In other words, you'd have to gimp your system so much in other ways that it wouldn't be worth it to hit 5GHz, IMO.
Click to expand...

We've seen approximate reductions in overclocking headroom of about 100-200MHz with each generation after Sandy Bridge. Devil's Canyon and Skylake made some of the ground back up but for the most part anything over 4.8GHz is highly unlikely. As you pointed out, certain tricks can be used to hit that number but you have to make sacrifices in order to do it.
 
After some more tweaking I think that I will just stick to 4.8ghz with some rather high voltage (1.42v). But it seems quite stable this way. I've read that 1.45v and below is safe, and Asus recommends no more than 1.42v. I could stay at 4.9ghz but it would mean higher voltage at the safe limit and I've already spent €7000+ on this computer and don't feel like buying a new CPU anytime soon (or any computer stuff for that matter lol).
The temps are not a problem now, and will be even less of a problem in a week or two when I get my custom water cooling working. I'm rather happy with how it all turned out.
 
I read these threads and I feel like I hit silicone lottery. I'd be tempted to delid my chip but I don't really care about squeezing a few more Mhz. I am able to get my computer to boot to desktop at 5.1Ghz but it crashes if i try and do anything. Currently at 4.8Ghz at 1.35v
 
athenian200 said:
From what I've heard, it's nearly impossible to hit 5GHz with anything after Sandy Bridge. The iGPU and the transistor design isn't conducive to overclocking anymore. Intel is optimizing for low voltage design, which means you can't just bump that up anymore.

I mean, I've heard of some people trying tricks like delidding the CPU or lowering the RAM clocks all the way down to 1600MHz and minimum timings to get it working in an unstable manner, but it's not going to be easy. Another thing I've heard of people doing is disabling cores to hit higher frequencies. Each of the cores generates heat. In other words, you'd have to gimp your system so much in other ways that it wouldn't be worth it to hit 5GHz, IMO.
Click to expand...

Peeks at sig, nope you can reach 5Ghz (actually I'm like .0001% faster heheh) if you get a decent chip..Granted I have de-lidded this 3770K and am using $20 liquid TIM with a full water loop..


TMCM said:
I read these threads and I feel like I hit silicone lottery. I'd be tempted to delid my chip but I don't really care about squeezing a few more Mhz. I am able to get my computer to boot to desktop at 5.1Ghz but it crashes if i try and do anything. Currently at 4.8Ghz at 1.35v
Click to expand...

That is an extremely impressive OC if it is indeed 24hr Prime stable..I have always held to the rule that the a cpu must pass a 24hr torture test and then every major AAA game I have installed to be "stable"..Hell since I started putting my GPU's under water I do a 24hr CPU only bench, then do a 24hr CPU+GPUs (fully loaded as well) to determine their OC...As Dan mentioned, doing it this way ensures that any ambient temp change has ZERO effect on my gear...Just my $.02
 
ccityinstaller said:
Peeks at sig, nope you can reach 5Ghz (actually I'm like .0001% faster heheh) if you get a decent chip..Granted I have de-lidded this 3770K and am using $20 liquid TIM with a full water loop..




That is an extremely impressive OC if it is indeed 24hr Prime stable..I have always held to the rule that the a cpu must pass a 24hr torture test and then every major AAA game I have installed to be "stable"..Hell since I started putting my GPU's under water I do a 24hr CPU only bench, then do a 24hr CPU+GPUs (fully loaded as well) to determine their OC...As Dan mentioned, doing it this way ensures that any ambient temp change has ZERO effect on my gear...Just my $.02
Click to expand...


Like he ^ said if that is 100% stable good on ya. I can get this 6700k to 4.8 at 1.42 but temps scare me at 89 deg
 
ccityinstaller said:
That is an extremely impressive OC if it is indeed 24hr Prime stable..I have always held to the rule that the a cpu must pass a 24hr torture test and then every major AAA game I have installed to be "stable"..Hell since I started putting my GPU's under water I do a 24hr CPU only bench, then do a 24hr CPU+GPUs (fully loaded as well) to determine their OC...As Dan mentioned, doing it this way ensures that any ambient temp change has ZERO effect on my gear...Just my $.02
Click to expand...

I don't do prime because it's not realistic. Plus You can run Prime and it be stable and then encode video and BSOD after 30 seconds. I do run the Asus "RealBench" program to stress test (great tool since it stresses multpile abilities of the cpu vs just calculating pi) over night (8-10hours) plus the few games I play and have yet to BSOD/crash.
 
Nebell said:
After some more tweaking I think that I will just stick to 4.8ghz with some rather high voltage (1.42v). But it seems quite stable this way. I've read that 1.45v and below is safe, and Asus recommends no more than 1.42v. I could stay at 4.9ghz but it would mean higher voltage at the safe limit and I've already spent €7000+ on this computer and don't feel like buying a new CPU anytime soon (or any computer stuff for that matter lol).
The temps are not a problem now, and will be even less of a problem in a week or two when I get my custom water cooling working. I'm rather happy with how it all turned out.
Click to expand...

This is correct. Stay under 1.45v and you'll be fine.

TMCM said:
I read these threads and I feel like I hit silicone lottery. I'd be tempted to delid my chip but I don't really care about squeezing a few more Mhz. I am able to get my computer to boot to desktop at 5.1Ghz but it crashes if i try and do anything. Currently at 4.8Ghz at 1.35v
Click to expand...

4.8GHz @ 1.35v is excellent. My 6700K chip won't do 4.8GHz under 1.40v on any motherboard I've tried it with.

TMCM said:
I don't do prime because it's not realistic. Plus You can run Prime and it be stable and then encode video and BSOD after 30 seconds. I do run the Asus "RealBench" program to stress test (great tool since it stresses multpile abilities of the cpu vs just calculating pi) over night (8-10hours) plus the few games I play and have yet to BSOD/crash.
Click to expand...

This has been our experience (Kyle's and mine) with Prime95 and Skylake.
 
Dan_D said:
This is correct. Stay under 1.45v and you'll be fine.



4.8GHz @ 1.35v is excellent. My 6700K chip won't do 4.8GHz under 1.40v on any motherboard I've tried it with.



This has been our experience (Kyle's and mine) with Prime95 and Skylake.
Click to expand...

My 6700k seems to be a good sample, 4800mhz rock solid at 1.350V (I could probably go lower but I just don't care honestly, it will do 4700 at 1.315V). It will also run P95 for several hours at 5ghz 1.450V but about 3 seconds of CB15 will crash it. I have no desire to run 5ghz daily though, I run it at stock 99% of the time unless I'm benching. I value quiet over high clocks these days.
 
What LLC are you guys running. I can set mine at 1.36 volts but run LLC 7 and it hits 1.39 volts for a stable 4.7. if I run LLC 6 it crashes under Asus real bench.
 
Lucky_Lucciano said:
What LLC are you guys running. I can set mine at 1.36 volts but run LLC 7 and it hits 1.39 volts for a stable 4.7. if I run LLC 6 it crashes under Asus real bench.
Click to expand...

On most motherboards, I can actually get away with the default "auto" LLC setting.
 
I have to set LLC to "high" on my Gigabyte Z170X Gaming 7 for it to keep the voltage stable (still slight Vdroop), so most is not all. There are only 3 settings "auto", "normal" and "high". I can't really complain, it overclocks pretty well on the current version of the BIOS (the stock shipping bios was terrible). So there are always exceptions.
 
Quix said:
I have to set LLC to "high" on my Gigabyte Z170X Gaming 7 for it to keep the voltage stable (still slight Vdroop), so most is not all. There are only 3 settings "auto", "normal" and "high". I can't really complain, it overclocks pretty well on the current version of the BIOS (the stock shipping bios was terrible). So there are always exceptions.
Click to expand...

I have to do that on some motherboards, just not many of them.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top