Overclocking an i7 920 Advice PLZ Amidoinitrite?

[RAD]

Hi guys,
I finally decided to try out a little bit of overclocking and here is what I did:
I went into my bios and disabled the XMP profile so that it wasn't forcing any custom settings.

Then all I did was change the Bclk to "160"

Here is a screenshot while running prime 95. Does this look normal? Is that how the voltages are supposed to be / etc?

I would love to get any advice or education if I am doing anything wrong or could be doing anything better, or if I am screwing up terribly and run the risk of junking my comp, etc.

THANKS!

 

[RAD]

On a side note, when overclocked the windows system menu is not showing the overclock even when CPU-Z does. Is that normal? If not, any idea what is causing that?

Also, my ram is rated for 1600 speeds, at what overclock points will those ratios be fully reached? For example in the above overclock it is automatically setting the ram to 1280. I am still a little unsure of how to relate the bclk to the ram spd multiplier. Can I just adjust the ram speed multiplier freely to whatever generates the 1600 speeds or would that be a bad idea? Does the difference between 1280 and 1600 not even matter in real world performance?

On a final question I ran a 3dmark benchmark after overclocking and my cpu score actually went down a couple points...I am confused.

 

[RAD]

Bump for hoping for some advice... Is there a better place to ask?

 

[RAD]

^^^

 

[Kaze105]

Please ignore this post.

 

[RAD]

If you never start trying you never get anywhere. If you followed that logic no one would ever overclock because no one is sure of what they are doing on the first try. I have a basic understanding but I am looking to learn more.

 

[Suprfire]

Um
ok!

is 160 (bclk) as high as you want it?
if so, start dropping vcore, you don't need that much voltage to hit 160bclk
drop vcore till you BSOD or fail p95 or can't boot
then start raising it a bit to get it "stable" at the lowest possible vcore

there is no real-world benefit for 1600mhz memory unless you run applications that utilize the extra headroom
...that said, you can just go to your memory settings, set mem voltage at 1.65, and set the memory divider to 2:10 [bclk:mem]
that will let your blck of 160 -> x10 = 1600mhz
i suppose if you want to keep it simple you leave all the timings on auto etc.

your temps will lower as you drop your vcore
also keep in mind you wont be able to run your memory @ 1600mhz if you decide to go with a higher CPU clock unless you use a lower strap (you may be able to run it higher but you will hit your head on a ceiling)

oh, and about the windows showing lower clocks, yeah that's normal

 

[RAD]

That is some great information, thank you very much! I think my ideal target overclock would just be 3.4 ghz total (so a bclk of 170 I think).

Is the vcore the only setting I should be adjusting? And what increments do you recommend moving it down by? I think right now it is just controlled by auto.

Should I turn hyperthreading and turbo mode off, or can I just leave them alone?

 

[Suprfire]

at 170 bclk you have two options of memory speed

1700mhz (if your memory can do it)
or
1360mhz

to me, no actual performance difference between the two

at the 170bclk point, vcore should be the only thing to adjust under most common circumstances

hyperthreading... it depends on the application of your processor, RTS games use multiple threads... video editing and encoding uses multiple threads etc. turning it off will reduce your LOAD temperatures by 10c on average
turbo mode looks good, and it doesn't hurt to have it on in your situation

since you want 170 blck:
-set the bclk
[now you MIGHT have to mess with the timings on your memory to get it running at 1700mhz, don't fret if you cant get it to work]
strap/ratio/divider @ 2:10
timings to max (check cpu-z memory tab)

if it doesn't post
just use 2:8 divider and leave timings on auto and you should be A-OK

then start dropping vcore (if you want, cause you don't really have to... you will just see lower temps)