**Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD7 OC-Tips-Bios-Discussion Thread**

[thijs]

Then i have the feeling liquid nitrogen might not change anything , o well...

[Orion24]

I am cooling limited as it seems. The heatsink (ZALMAN CNPS9900 with AS5) is cold in touch making it look like watercooling won't change anything at all. The heatspreader is a possible cause of the problem. Only phase cooling will do something under these circumstances.

Currently I run at 3.8 GHz (19x200) and try to find the least voltage necessary (1.2V passed 8-hours PRIME95 and 1.15V failed. I'll end up somewhere inbetween). Even at this low voltages it is getting way too hot

[C3ntury]

So what seems to be the overall consensus of this board? Does it seem to be worth its price, especially if you are just going to run on air?

[Orion24]

So what seems to be the overall consensus of this board? Does it seem to be worth its price, especially if you are just going to run on air?

Personally I didn't find it much more expensive than other X58 solutions I had in mind (P6T, P6T DELUXE, GA-EX58-UD5), so I bought it despite the fact that I wasn't interested in any of the extra features, expcept slightly the USB3.

It's advantages compared to cheaper solutions are:

1) 24-phase power design. You don't make much use of it when running on air or even water. It has room for liquid nitrogen. But in theory it does provide more stable current.

2) Nice chipset cooling system. For running air-cooled overclocks you don't need anything exceptional, but boards with chipset coolers like those of the ASUS P6T (non-Deluxe) need you to add fans to support it even for light overclocks.

2) SATA 3. This is the least worthy feature. First, only SSDs are slightly bottlenecked by SATA2 and current models do not support SATA3. Furthermore, non-Intel chipset integrated controllers often do not match the performance of Intels. I even consider possible that a new SATA3 supporting SSD will still run faster on the ICH10R SATA2 controller, than on the external SATA3.

3) USB3. Probably the most worthy of all. However I would prefer the USB ports via pin-header and use them as front USBs.

4) Deluxe edition

[tipes]

So what seems to be the overall consensus of this board? Does it seem to be worth its price, especially if you are just going to run on air?

I think you answered the question already by the last part of your sentence. In my view people get very good overclocks on air with this board, but to truly get you moneys worth I would say it is only worth it if you watercool/phase etc etc. Having said that this board has many good features besides its overclockability - so each to their own to decide if it is worth it for you. I personally think it is a great board with much early promise - as always bios improvements will lead to more stability/improvements over time.

I am enjoying mine and am just starting out on the road of overclocking it with my old I7 920 Co chip - may upgrade this chip to a DO or maybe even wait for the 32nm chips due in the first quarter next year.

Mark

[OC Nub]

I'm also strongly leaning towards this board, picked up a 920do today from micro center. As far as price the UD7 is less expensive than the Classified, and not much more than the P6TD Deluxe I was looking at. I have been very happy in the past with the Gigabyte boards I have tried, I just got the UD6 board for my 870, it seems to be a very good board, was able to get higher stable clocks on it than with the evga p55 ftw board (maybe because I am more familiar with giga bios). I am undecided on what to get also so I guess I will keep following this thread

[C3ntury]

Are the UD7 features and OC ability on air more substantial (significantly better) than boards such as EVGA A1 and Giga UD5 then?

[thijs]

what's a classified A1? a 760? on air i think you'll be slightly better off with the classified, just because that'll do 230 or so ( i believe ) on AIR, never had a UD5, so cant judge that,
but either way, a X58A-UD7 isnt a bad purchase, you should be able to get around 220 baseclock, dependant on the rest of your setup aswell obvously.

[kayl]

So far havent been able to get 222 stable on AIR,

tried many settings here, but nothing seems to work for me so far,

rest of the system:

W3540
Dominator GT 1866CL7
HX1000W
XFX5770


Pci-e doesnt really seem to help, at least not around the 220 area.
going to try some more specific settings, but i was hoping to get 222 pretty easily, so that's a bit of a bummer.

Anyhow, ill be putting it under my singlestage tomorrow aswell, hopefully she will start shining then

try loosening round trip latency, 60 62 64 for channels A B C yet to check my max bclk

[thijs]

try loosening round trip latency, 60 62 64 for channels A B C yet to check my max bclk

Will try, yet it's weird another user a few pages back reported the same 'wall' at 237, instant freeze / weird mouse behaviour ( all jumpy and such ) at 238.

[raikkok]

Hi guys

Merry christmas for all.

Recently I changed my pc for one higher. Gigabyte UD5-X58, I7 950, 6 GB rams Mushkin Extreme and watercooling.

I want some advices about a great OC, Can anyone help me?

thanks in advanced

do you recommend easytune or change everything in Bios?

I also do OC in my gtx 295 zotac.

Thanks a lot

[thijs]

try loosening round trip latency, 60 62 64 for channels A B C yet to check my max bclk

I just tested it, but it seems to do more harm then good? stuck at 69 trying 60 -62 - 64. odd...

[fritzman]

Hi guys
Merry christmas for all.
Recently I changed my pc for one higher. Gigabyte UD5-X58, I7 950, 6 GB rams Mushkin Extreme and watercooling.
I want some advices about a great OC, Can anyone help me?
thanks in advanced
do you recommend easytune or change everything in Bios?
I also do OC in my gtx 295 zotac.
Thanks a lot

Without wishing to sounds condescending... have you tried Googling? There are already plenty of guides out there, with plenty of info... in fact way more than you've posted in your question. You should probably have a go, and come back with specific questions once you've done that.

[nyeah]

I'm hitting a wall here, i can't get pass 218 BCLK and i don't know where did i go wrong,

Advanced CPU Features:
CPU Clock Ratio ................................ [x12]
Intel(R) Turbo Boost Tech ...................... [disabled]
CPU Cores Enabled .............................. [All]
CPU Multi Threading .............................[enabled]
CPU Enhanced Halt (C1E) ........................ [disabled]
C3/C6/C7 State Support ......................... [disabled]
CPU Thermal Monitor ............................ [disabled]
CPU EIST Function .............................. [disabled]
Virtualization Technology ...................... [disabled]
Bi-Directional PROCHOT ......................... [enabled]

Uncore & QPI Features:
QPI Link Speed ..............................[auto]
Uncore Frequency ............................[auto]
Isonchronous Frequency ......................[]

Standard Clock Control:
Base Clock (BCLK) Control .......................... [enabled]
BCLK Frequency (MHz) ................................[218]
PCI Express Frequency (MHz) ........................ [100]
C.I.A.2........................................... .. []

Advanced Clock Control:
CPU Clock Drive ..............................[800]
PCI Express Clock Drive ................... [900]
CPU Clock Skew ............................. [0]
IOH Clock Skew ............................. [0]

Advanced DRAM Features:
Performance Enhance ...................... [turbo]
Extreme Memory Profile (X.M.P) ........... [disabled] 
System Memory Multiplier (SPD) ........... [x6]
DRAM Timing Selectable (SPD) ............. []

Channel A + B + C

Channel A Timing Settings:
##Channel A Standard Timing Control##
CAS Latency Time ......................[8]
tRCD ..................................[8]
tRP ...................................[8]
tRAS ..................................[20]
CR.....................................[1]
B2B.....................................[-]


Advanced Voltage Control:
CPU Intel Core i7 920 D0 Stepping
Load Line Calibration ................. [level 2]
CPU Vcore ..............................[1.275] 
QPI/VTT Voltage 1.150v .................[1.415]
CPU PLL 1.800v .........................[1.800] 
PCIE 1.500v ...........................[1.500]
QPI PLL 1.100v ........................[1.100]
IOH Core 1.100v .......................[1.24]
ICH I/O 1.500v ........................[1.500]
ICH Core 1.1v .........................[1.14]

DRAM
DRAM Voltage 1.500v .............. [1.66] 
DRAM Termination 0.750v.......... [AUTO]
Ch-A Data VRef. 0.750v ...........[AUTO]
Ch-B Data VRef. 0.750v ...........[AUTO]
Ch-C Data VRef. 0.750v ...........[AUTO]
Ch-A Address VRef. 0.750v ........[AUTO]
Ch-B Address VRef. 0.750v ........[AUTO]
Ch-C Address VRef. 0.750v ........[AUTO]

any advise?

[boostedevo]

Will try, yet it's weird another user a few pages back reported the same 'wall' at 237, instant freeze / weird mouse behaviour ( all jumpy and such ) at 238.

Same limit on my old(er) PCIe modded Giga X58-UD4P. Ambient or cold on the proc makes no diff. I have no idea what the hold up is right at that specific point (like 237.5), but I can't really complain about 230+ BCLK benchable even on ambient cooling so I just take what it will give...anything over the 220BCLK it was stuck at before the mod is a gift

I'm hitting a wall here, i can't get pass 218 BCLK and i don't know where did i go wrong,

Raise your PCIe Freq for starters.

[nyeah]

Raise your PCIe Freq for starters.

i've tried it to pcie 104 still no POST,
what max safe for pcie freq ?

[boostedevo]

i've tried it to pcie 104 still no POST,
what max safe for pcie freq ?

Hmm. I think you need more Vtt.

I don't have a UD7 yet, but it shouldn't be much diff than X58. 108-112 should be enough (safe?) to get max BCLK. So if 108-112 doesn't help at all, I'm thinking you need to raise Vtt some more. Even though CPU and mem are pretty light in your template, 220+ BCLK isn't necessarily a walk in the park. IIRC (too many boards/procs), I'm usually at 1.50-1.55Vtt on my 920 for >220 BCLK benchable (on the UD4P with 108 PCIe).

You might also try lowering CPU PLL to 1.50V and try adding a bit more to IOH Core to see if it helps.

[nyeah]

Hmm. I think you need more Vtt.

I don't have a UD7 yet, but it shouldn't be much diff than X58. 108-112 should be enough (safe?) to get max BCLK. So if 108-112 doesn't help at all, I'm thinking you need to raise Vtt some more. Even though CPU and mem are pretty light in your template, 220+ BCLK isn't necessarily a walk in the park. IIRC (too many boards/procs), I'm usually at 1.50-1.55Vtt on my 920 for >220 BCLK benchable (on the UD4P with 108 PCIe).

You might also try lowering CPU PLL to 1.50V and try adding a bit more to IOH Core to see if it helps.

i will try raising pcie freq first then, hope it can boot.

[boostedevo]

I'm pretty sure it's going to be Vtt. You really shouldn't need much/any extra PCIe until you're looking to pass 220, but a little extra doesn't hurt. It really shouldn't take 108 @ 218 no matter what, so get yourself prepared for adding voltage

[nyeah]

I'm pretty sure it's going to be Vtt. You really shouldn't need much/any extra PCIe until you're looking to pass 220, but a little extra doesn't hurt. It really shouldn't take 108 @ 218 no matter what, so get yourself prepared for adding voltage

yea i want to try to pass 220 bclk, max bclk for my system, i've tried to up vtt at 1.53 IOH core 1.34 and pcie freq 104 cpu pll 1.84 but no post (219 bclk)

i saw at the early page, people can get to 230+ bclk with 1.4 cpu pll, as far as i know it, intel standard is 1.8v?

[boostedevo]

Lower CPU PLL can help. 1.84V is almost definitely not helping. Set your clock drives to 700mV each, that generally works best for me.

Have you tried booting at like 215 and clocking up on the desktop with SetFSB, etc to see how high it will go that way? Have you tried booting at 220 to see if there is maybe a strap change that might loosen things up?

That may still not be enough Vtt. What is your Uncore speed? Try manually setting it to 18x for now (less = easier). Don't go lower than 2x your mem ratio. So if you're at 8.0x mem, don't lower uncore multi below 16x. QPI should be at 36x.

You can try disabling HT too and if it all of a sudden boots, it's almost guaranteed to be not enough Vtt and possibly Vc. You might also try raising Vc a bit (~1.35) even if you don't need it for CPU clocks. It may not like the fairly big separation between your low Vc and higher Vtt.

One other thing you can try is leaving all voltages (except mem) on AUTO. If it works, open EasyTune to see what the voltages are once you get to the desktop and that will give you an idea where you need to be. Chances are that AUTO voltages may be higher than you are willing to go with manual settings yourself and may also be higher than needed, so be warned and keep an eye on temps if you're on air.

[nyeah]

Lower CPU PLL can help. 1.84V is almost definitely not helping. Set your clock drives to 700mV each, that generally works best for me.

Have you tried booting at like 215 and clocking up on the desktop with SetFSB, etc to see how high it will go that way? Have you tried booting at 220 to see if there is maybe a strap change that might loosen things up?

That may still not be enough Vtt. What is your Uncore speed? Try manually setting it to 18x for now (less = easier). Don't go lower than 2x your mem ratio. So if you're at 8.0x mem, don't lower uncore multi below 16x. QPI should be at 36x.

You can try disabling HT too and if it all of a sudden boots, it's almost guaranteed to be not enough Vtt and possibly Vc. You might also try raising Vc a bit (~1.35) even if you don't need it for CPU clocks. It may not like the fairly big separation between your low Vc and higher Vtt.

One other thing you can try is leaving all voltages (except mem) on AUTO. If it works, open EasyTune to see what the voltages are once you get to the desktop and that will give you an idea where you need to be. Chances are that AUTO voltages may be higher than you are willing to go with manual settings yourself and may also be higher than needed, so be warned and keep an eye on temps if you're on air.

Thanks a lot for the tips, i'll try it when i get home

EDIT:
i tried all above except leaving it on auto, i still can't pass 218 bclk

[jacek]

bios f3h is out.
^^still can't get past 218 BCLK

[nyeah]

jacek, can you do 220 bclk with your extreme ?

[jacek]

yes, without any problems, 222-225 for tests