Avoid exceeding maximum boost beyond overclocking limits (AMD)
Avoid exceeding maximum boost beyond overclocking limits (AMD)
Hey everyone.
I recently purchased a new case and a water cooler to slightly boost my CPU without taking too much risk. (Note: I’m not aiming for extreme overclocking, just a moderate increase.)
My setup:
Mobo gigabyte ga-970a-ud3p
Galax Gtx970 OC edition
10GB ram Corsair Vengeance 1600 (8Gb + 2Gb)
Amd Fx8370E
CoolerMaster Storm GX650
Watercooler Corsair H45
The goal is to increase the multiplier only. I managed to reach a boost of 4.3 (which is the maximum turbo boost for this CPU) at 1.32v in BIOS, with all power features turned off. So far, everything has been stable—no crashes or issues. The highest temperature I ever reached was 55°C while running DOOM on nearly every setting in ULTRA.
However, when trying more demanding games like Rising Storm 2 or Insurgency—which need strong single-core performance—I considered pushing the boost a bit higher. Maybe around 4.5 would work better for EnergyXperformance. But unfortunately, even at 4.4 (with a maximum of 1.38vcore), I couldn’t get started. I just received a BIOS message asking if I should set a default load or view the CPU speed at 3.6 (base clock).
So: should I go ahead and increase the Vcore, or should I skip it? Is this safe? What could be causing this problem? Is 1.38vcore insufficient for even booting at 4.4?
Hi,
attempt to raise the vcore to a maximum of 1.40-1.43. The 8370 is an overclocked 8320, leaving little room for further tuning. Turn off Amd cool n quiet, C1 state, C6 state, and turbo boost. Also, your motherboard's 970 chip isn't ideal for overclocking; using a 990fx chip might allow stable speeds up to 4.6-4.7 ghz. I have an FX 6300-990fxa socket and I'm running stable at 4.6 ghz with 1.42Vcore. Hope this helps.
Well, I've got some findings but there are still some issues:
I managed to get the clock working, but instead of increasing the multiplier, I just increased the bus speed to 209. Now I'm achieving around 4.5 (around 4.49) in a 1.4 Vcore setup. The only stability tests I've run are CPU-Z stress tests, benchmarks, and playing games like DOOM, THE HUNTER, CSGO, Rainbox Six, etc.
I've completed the tests so far but still can't figure out why. The results were:
- With a multiplier of 21.5 and a bus speed of 209, in the IBT AVX, in the 3rd cycle, it showed instability.
- In AMD overdrive stability test for 10 minutes, nothing happened.
- In Prime95, after 15 minutes, 6 cores passed the test, but 2 gave an "ERROR:ILLEGAL SUMOUT".
- In CPU-Z benchmark, it didn't crash and performed better than 4.3 GHz on games that heavily stress both GPU and CPU (Insurgency, Doom, TheHunter, Rising Storm 2, CSGO, Rainbow Six Siege).
- With a bus speed of 21.5 x 200 (the default max boost), all tests passed without crashes or issues.
- In CPU-Z benchmark, I got slightly less performance compared to 4.5 GHz.
In my view, as an unlocked CPU, I should only be able to increase the multiplier by raising it, not by changing the bus speed. Could it be that the bus speed is affecting RAM or something else that caused instability in the software?
But why can't I just raise the multiplier to 22 or 22.5 (with 200) if the same Vcore works fine at 21.5x209?
I've tried enabling HPC, APM mode, turbo boost, and set base clock to 22.5 (and 22). I also adjusted RAM settings to 1333 and toggled power features. I haven't tried changing HTlink or NBfreq, which my motherboard sets to default: 2400HT and 2200NB.
This frustration is really weighing on me right now.