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Old school overlock: Opteron 165

B

brons2

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jul 16, 2008
Messages
503
OK so I'm trying to avoid getting a new system for a few more months as I just bought a new C2D laptop last month. So I'd like to overclock the desktop some more.

System is
eVGA NF41
Opteron 165 at 2.250 (250x9)
2GB Kingston Value RAM
Antec Truepower Trio 550w
eVGA GeForce 7800GT at 445/1070

I currently have the RAM underclocked to DDR333, pretty sad. I really think this is what's holding me back. When I set the FSB up to 260, it hard locks before I get anywhere, even if I scale back the RAM timings and the HT bus. I have tried upping the CPU voltage too, that doesn't help. It seems happy at 1.35 at 2250, but no amount of extra voltage will make it happy at 2400.

The CPU runs very cool at 2250, idle around 32-33 C. Barely above room temperature as it's about 26 or 27 in here. It has the stock Opteron heatsink and fan, which has 4 copper heatpipes and looks pretty beastly.

Any suggestions?
 
You wouldn't happen to know the stepping code for that chip? Only reason I ask is that some 165's clock better than others and some just don't OC well at all.

My old LCB9E would do 300x9 @ 1.375v with no problem. Also had a CCBWE that wouldn't go over 266x9 no matter what.

Could also be a FSB hole in the motherboard.
 
I remember looking at it in the beginning and writing it down, but now I don't remember what it was. I remember thinking it was a good one, maybe not. Is there any way to see it again without taking off the heat sink?
 
Oh and what do you mean by 'FSB hole' in the motherboard? I did a google search and other people with the same board have gotten an Opteron 165 to 2.8 on this board.

I did update the BIOS last night to 6.1 from 6.0, backed off the memory timings some more (3-8-8-5)@170mhz, HT at 742 and it ran stable at 2295 (255x9.0). I played Quake Wars: Enemy Territory for about an hour successfully and then left it running Orthos. It has been running Orthos for almost 7 hours when I got up to go to work so I think it's gonna be stable at this config.

I don't think it will still be stable when I get home as I turn down the AC in the daytime when I am gone at work; temps in the study will be close to 90F but we'll see. I may go home at lunch and turn the machine off just to be on the safe side.
 
actually I am here at 1:15, it's about 87 degrees in here, and orthos is still running on this very machine I am typing on. I'm sweating more than the chip is, it's at 40c under continuous 100% load. So heat certainly can't be my problem. I'm leaning towards memory more than anything. Seems like backing the timings way off got me another 50mhz. Maybe a couple of sticks of DDR500 or DDR550 would help the cause, although, I went into this not wanting to spend more money that could just go towards a new system instead. I guess I could always put the memory in here now into my XP 3000+ machine that I use occasionally for Xubuntu.
 
amd cpus especially k8 are very sensitive to memory quality when overclocking. Just get some good ddr 3200 memory and you will probably see a higher overclock. Since i've got these 2 1gbs ddr 3200 ocz platinum sticks my stable oc went up from 2.5 to 2.9.
 
FSB hole is essentially an area of the FSB range that the motherboard does not like. May not be the case in your situation.

Like you said, get some good memory. I always ran Mushkin Redline XP4000 DDR-500 3-3-2-8 on my 165's. And that memory is good to overclock to 585. With that ram I got my LCB9E up to 333x9 (3.0Ghz) with no problem.

Also, check the voltages coming out of your PSU. I've had some problems with Antec's before not performing as specified.
 
Ironically, I'm watching a couple of Mushkin Red DDR500 on the fleabay. Thanks for the confirmation on the memory.

The system eventually did lock up running Orthos, but the room temp may have pushed into the low 90s in the afternoon as the thermostat is downstairs, ergo it gets very warm in the daytime when I am gone at work. I think it's stable at 2300 using normal room temps but still I want more. :D I don't leave it on all the time anyways.

I have a digital multimeter. What would I be looking for in testing the voltages? Which connectors? Just a regular Molex?
 
1. Set your HT frequency to 600Mhz. Opteron 165s can clock close to 3.0Ghz and a 3x multiplier will keep the frequency close to 1Ghz. Overclocking the HT won't gain you anything.

2. With a 166mhz (DDR333) ratio set your memory will be operating on a 11x divider. So at 2250mhz your RAM will be at 205mhz and may be running into a wall. First thing you should do is set your DRAM ratio to 133mhz. This will put your RAM on a 14x divider and allow you to clock up to 2.8Ghz without exceeding specs. If your CPU is capable of going higher, start pumping up the VRAM to get the memory to run a bit faser. Your mobo is capable of delivering 3.2V to the mem, don't be afraid to use it.
 
Unfortunately, the HT and memory are already that way. :(:confused::mad:

cpuzX2.jpg
 
Well drop the DRAM clock down to 100Mhz and see if that offers any improvement. Are you running 4x512MB sticks or 2x1GB?
 
2x1GB. I gotta go to bed pretty soon but I'll play with it more tomorrow.
 
For what its worth, my opty 165 would do 2.7ghz at 1.45 vcore. Temps were 33/50 under a thermaltake big typhoon. Hell of a chip, the 1mb cache really helps keep it competitive, and I scored close to 11000 in 3dmark 06 with it in a dfi lanparty sli-dr expert and 8800gts 512. As others have said drop your memory speed down to 133 in the bios, this will keep it under 200 with the cpu bus at 300. These are good chips, if I could have gotten my system to cooperate with 4gigs of ram I would still be using it, unfortunately the memory controller on the opterons pretty much refuses to run overclocked with 4 sticks of ram in.
 
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