Powersupply limiting OC?

P

Psience

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Oct 6, 2006
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Hey guys, I've been running this rig for a while now, and it just doesn't want to be completely stable at my current settings. Now I know most of you will be telling me just to turn down my OC, but I really feel that the machine can be stabilized at these settings, I'm just at a loss on how to do it.

The system is an Opteron 146 running at 2.7ghz. I have OCZ 3200 platinum memory running on the 333 divider on my Asus A8N-SLI premium. A Zalman 9500 keeps my temps nice and low.

Here's what happens: The computer will run fine for days. I can do memtest or gold memory all night with no errors. Same deal with prime95\stressprime. After a while (usually a couple of days) though, the system will just reboot. I wonder if my PSU is the limiting factor here, but I've tried 2 - an Antec 450w that came with my case, and an Enermax Liberty 500w.

The only thing left is my cpu.

Someone please help me fix my system!!!
 
Powersupply limiting OC?

I doubt it.

you dont give us any voltages or memory timings blah blah.....



no clue here. As a wild guess I would give the cpu a tad more voltage and same with memory but I do not wish to download the manual for that board to see if its possible.
 
Thank you for replying

The ram is running at 2.5,3,3,6 @ 225mhz 2.7v

CPU is at 1.45v right now.

This system used to be running on a DFI Ultra-D, but I ended up replacing it because I thought it was the culprit in my rebooting problem.
 
Whether a PC functions or not when you push near its limits is a probability rather than a definite yes or no. It will fail when influenced by things that you wouldnt normally have to consider.
If you want a definite yes, declock a little.

If you want to see if the cpu can be pushed further then find out.
Its easy enough to find the max speed of your CPU as long as your motherboard clocks high enough.
If you dont know how high your motherboard can clock, then find out.
:)

Once you have found what is limiting your overclock, we may be able to help.
 
If I still had my DFI, I'd be happy to try and find out, but this board doesn't like any of the other memory dividers and won't post if I use them
 
A couple of questions: I'm curious about why I wouldn't be seeing any errors in any of the test programs I've used. Isn't that the hallmark of a stable system? Other than rebooting at random form time to time, the system seems completely stable.

Since none of the programs will produce any errors, how am I supposed to find out how high it will go?

Also are memory divider issues common with this board? I'm wondering if its a mem controller thing maybe.
 
Maybe gettiong to hot? or maybe you could just turn your system off while you sleeping if if just turns off after a couple of days.
 
With my old Enermax 535W I was unable to overclock more than 4 %.
My PC would not even boot!!!!
I installed an OCZ GameXtream 700W power supply to replace the Enermax and I can now reach 17% stable. There is not doubt that my old PSU was the problem.

Remember when you use Prime or Memtest you only stress one component at a time. Playing a video game for example will stress all the parts and put much more pressure on the power supply.
IMO, it is possible that your problem is the power supply.
 
I even tried running prime and rhtdrbl all night with no errors or crashing. I'm not very happy if it is the PSU, because I bought this Enermax as a replacement for my Antec 450 I thought was causing this problem.
 
Seems to me you're asking two different questions here.

1. Is the PS limiting OC?
2. Why does my system randomly reboot?

Answer to #1: It's possible.... without accurate (voltmeter, not software) voltage readings of the various system voltages (3.3v rail, 5v rail, 12v rail, LDT voltage, Chipset Voltage, CPU voltage, etc....) it's hard to determine. Like others have said, you can bump the voltages up a little and see if you can get more out of your system.

Answer to #2: In my experience, a reboot WITHOUT a BSOD (or any other warnings -ie: temp alarm, voltage dip or spike) is a faulty/weak power supply. Most power supplies will test fine (power on), but really don't show their problems till they are stressed by adding a load... and not just a constant load... but a variable load.

Just curious.... what motherboard did you replace the DFI with??
P.S. You ditched a DFI board???? :eek:
 
Sorry for the slow answer, I was too busy playing Gears of War. I replaced the DFI with an Asus A8N-SLI Premium. The heatpipe is really nice and my overclock is exactly the same with the Asus. The Asus won't get anywhere near 300htt though and it will crash if I use most of the dividers. Thankfully, the one I need seems to work OK though.

I wasn't really asking if the PSU is preventing me from going higher, I just want to know if its causing the reboots at my current setting of 2700mhz.

The DFI had some sort of issue where, after one of those reboots, would become flaky and keep crashing over and over again, until I made it sit for a while and think about why its being bad. It did have impressive features though. I'll prolly try another DFI board for my next system and see if I have better luck
 
450-500W should be MORE than enough power.

My system has 3 HDDs, a 7600GT, Opteron 148 (clocked higher than yours at times), DFI lanparty UT nF4 Ultra-D, TV tuner card and I have had a wirless card in as well as a PCIe 4x sound card in before and I have it all running on a 500W PSU with no problems.
 
Yeah, it should be enough, but that doesn't mean this particular PSU is giving the juice it needs to be. When I started this thread, I'd just had my first reboot on my Asus board. The DFI one did it all the time. At the time of the reboot I was launching Nero 6 while a dvd was spinning up in the drive. I'm wondering if there wasn't a dip in the 5V(?) line while this was happening, causing the reboot.

I have a feeling that my old DFI board was quite power hungry and was maybe doing a better job of exposing a weak rail. Anyways I'm going to keep my eye on it.

At this point, I just want stability so I can enjoy my machine.
 
Heh, I've got 2 HD's 1 optical drive, loads of fans and lights, an E6300 @ 3.5ghz with a watercooling setup (so pump), AND an 8800GTS all on an ULTRA 500w Xconnect powersupply.

Like, supposedly the worst one ever built (I love mine btw, it's been verrry good to me!)
 
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