Issue with overclocking Xeon W3670 on ASUS P6T SE
Issue with overclocking Xeon W3670 on ASUS P6T SE
I need some assistance.
I purchased a W3670 xeon to replace my i7920, hoping everything would work out.
I made sure the BIOS was up-to-date (from 2010, okay).
It booted and ran smoothly, I managed to overclock it to a stable 4.2ghz while keeping the CPU voltage just above 1.3.
This continued without any problems for some time.
Then, after a Windows 10 update, I started getting a message saying "update bios to unleash full potential," but the computer wouldn’t boot at all.
I reinstalled the 920 and everything worked again.
After that, when I returned to the xeon, things began to behave oddly. The system wouldn’t start with the default BIOS settings. However, if I overclocked it, it booted up fine.
Running Prime95 for a few minutes caused it to shut down. If I pushed the CPU further, random BSODs appeared, with 4 or 5 error codes mostly related to driver issues.
I thought maybe overheating was the cause—it gets hot (60–65°C) during full load on a Noctua NH-D14, but that seemed unlikely.
Since I have an RX580 with 8GB VRAM, I wondered if the PSU might be the issue. It’s 800W and has been in use for about ten years.
So I reinstalled the i7 again with a 4.2ghz OC, plus a small boost on the GPU as well. The PSU reported everything was fine.
I used 1600 GSKILL RAM in some tests, Corsair at the same frequency on others, and a mix of both.
They all worked together for about half a year with the Xeon.
Now I’m stuck. I don’t know what else to do. Honestly, I’m considering upgrading to a Rzyen 7, but it’s tough to let go of a machine that just a few days ago let me play The Outer Worlds on ultra for an entire night without issues. And for a few hours a day afterward, it was fine.
Any suggestions would be appreciated.
Switching to Windows 7 is also problematic (10 is on the main SSD), but I booted from a backup HDD and nothing changed.
I even performed a clean install of Windows 10, but it didn’t help.
I’m reaching out to the experts for advice.
Thanks in advance.
Not an expert in this field, but I have a few suggestions.
Reset your BIOS settings and then switch to the xeon version to test booting.
If that doesn’t work, try using a Linux live CD to see if it boots.
The message you received seems suspicious, so I’m wondering if it’s related to Windows.
Thank you for the reply. I mentioned that I've formatted the main SSD and performed a fresh installation of W10. On any occasion, the computer boots normally but doesn't stay on when I press the CPU. It only lasts about two minutes before the software closes. Only during the stress test does the BSOD appear.