**Official e8400/e8500 Retail OC Thread

[Damien]

Edit: I also saw a few Q746A518 over there. Should I have exchanged for that batch instead? I think the CS people might already be too tired of seeing me so often lately.

mine is a Q746A518, and the other one i saw somewhere in this thread and mine both do 4.0 at 1.296v, and 4.1 at around 1.34 prime stable. i can boot at 4.45 with 1.41v

[nidecker]

I've not find an official 8200 owner thread so...Maybe I'm OT

Take an E8200 retail this morning...FPO seems not expecially good.

8200 - Q750A079
Air - TR 120 UEx
DFI DK P35 T2RS

Really quick test:

Max fsb 535@WIP


3,8Ghz@1,26V


4Ghz@1,31V

[Cpl Ledanek]

where to buy this in USA? Newegg/Zipzoomfly/ClubIt are out of stock.

[xVeinx]

where to buy this in USA? Newegg/Zipzoomfly/ClubIt are out of stock.

If by "this" you mean the E8400, then MicroCenter is the place (you can buy it from them online as well as in store). I picked up one today for the price of 189.99

Pack date 1/29/08
SLAPL

EDIT: I got a P5K at MC for $111 as well (only have AMD mbs otherwise :p). any tips before I start tearing things open? Thanks!

[ThatGuy16]

mwave still has them in stock, if you don't have a micro center near you

I got mine from mwave, its $220 now though

http://www.mwave.com/mwave/viewspec....1&RSKU=BA24501

[Retro]

The reason Intel went to digital on chip thermal sensors was to get away from the inaccuracy of temperature readings from the on board diodes. I know the CPU temp reading on my P5B can vary by 10C depending on if I re-boot or resume from stand by mode. CPU temp readings can also change from one bios version to the next and from one board to the next.

The on chip DTS is consistent and individually calibrated. CoreTemp and SpeedFan are the only two programs that are reading this data correctly from the chip in real time. I've tested various other programs, including TAT, that take the raw data and averages it and does other sorts of bastardizations to it.

Running CoreTemp and subtracting 10C off of the displayed readings should be giving everyone some very accurate core temperatures so why bother screwing around with anything else?

My E8400 survived the heat baking. I think I'll make something close to this my 24/7 setting and see if it degrades any.



I was planning to EBay off my E6400 Conroe core but it's built like a tank compared to these new fragile 45nm chips so I'm keeping it. If Penryn can't reliably run 4.0 GHz then might as well dump it. All this worrying about degrading chips is taking the fun out of overclocking.

Edit: Almost forgot. When experimenting with my chip I noticed that when Orthos fails it is always Core0 that dies first. For me this is also the core that has a temperature sensor that gets stuck at 67C away from the throttling point. That is far enough away that it won't cause a problem for me but I was just wondering if anyone else with a stuck sensor has noticed Orthos crapping out on the same core? I think stuck sensors could be a warning sign of a second rate chip that is more likely to degrade and fail even if the core voltage never goes over 1.40 volts.

unclewebb:
Been following your Temperature measurements and reports on the inaccuracy of Intel temp. readings with interest. I also had an E6400 which I ran@3600 24/7 for over a year. It was the same batch as yours, which I found out when I asked you about it on another forum (I think it was the "H" forum?) quite some time ago. I gave my old faithful E6400 to a friend with a system upgrade I did for them, it's still as reliable as ever.
I bought my E8400 from NCIX last month. Have kept it @4005 since, it's nice and stable at that speed. No stuck sensors, the temps seem realistic with CoreTemp in terms of idle and Orthos load temps (but with a grain of salt ) Mine is the older Q740A555 batch with a "T" at the end. Did you get your E8400 from there or is it a newer batch?
It will be interesting to see how well these E8400's continue to run and if they suffer from any ill effects.

[HaTaX]

unclewebb, just realized our cpus were close to each other at one point in time.

I figured I'd chime in with an update since there's all this talk of degradation and such. Current E8400 has been running happily at 1.29 idle / load. Temps as reported by bios are always under 54c under full load, idle at 32-35. That seems pretty reasonable as coretemp reports them at 67c under full load, that's pretty close to what the bios is reporting.

This CPU has installed 4 different OSes on a single HD with no issues or corruption. That was a pretty good test of stability, normally you'll have SOMETHING start acting up if you don't have a stable system when setting up a new OS. (Even OSX passed the test)

I haven't seen any signs of degradation on this chip, but the one I had before this one I had put up to 1.47v on it for a while and was able to return to stock voltages and previous overclocks with the same voltage as before.

Just thought I'd throw an update in here.

[Cpl Ledanek]

thanks xVeinx & ThatGuy16, microcenter is out, mwave have some...checking them out now.

[LagunaX]

If by "this" you mean the E8400, then MicroCenter is the place (you can buy it from them online as well as in store). I picked up one today for the price of 189.99

Pack date 1/29/08
SLAPL

EDIT: I got a P5K at MC for $111 as well (only have AMD mbs otherwise :p). any tips before I start tearing things open? Thanks!

Do the vdroop pencil mod.

Board probably won't run the chip out of the box. You might need to flash the bios with an older chip first.

[scwam]

http://www.mcshaneinc.com/html/Sens_TS91HP.html#170


Any of you that are concerned about your temps you can use the above thermistor and mod it onto a fan controller with temp input (everyone of them that I have used has a matching 10k input, including some motherboard temp spdif inputs). Just buy spdif connectors, solder and run the polyimide protected wires carefully between the pins and hot glue the probe tip to the middle of the socket. These are accurate to within +/- 1C, of which I've tested at varying ranges of 10c to 90c against a Hanna probe with same accuracy with consistent results. You got to have some balls to do this and you won't get exact load temps (under anywhere from 5 to 10c actual). On the other hand it reports idle very close (depending on vcore). Kevin Johnson has been selling these to me for 3 years and I love them. They are so small you can apply them to almost anything. And they are only $11 shipped.

Model TS91-170

[unclewebb]

Here's my 24/7 overclock and a good enough baseline so I can check for degrading in the future.



It needed a little more voltage than I would have liked but nothing too crazy.

Now it's time to try and determine how much temperature head room I have.
Here's the baseline temp:



I needed a way to raise the core temperature in a nice orderly fashion so the only smart thing I could think of was to disconnect the CPU fan and let Orthos continue to run until......



My always eager to fail Core0 packed it in at a CoreTemp reported temperature of 82C. That is still 23C away from TjMax which I found to be kind of interesting. My original E6400 Conroe core also needed a minimum of 25C of temperature head room when overclocked on air to run Orthos stable at 3600 MHz.

That's the key to these core processors. If you are overclocking and stable, you really don't have to worry about temperature hurting your processor. It will error out and/or reboot long before you ever get anywhere near the Intel specified safe maximum operating temperature (TjMax) at full Orthos load.

Here's what SpeedFan reported during the test. Keep in mind that I have TjMax set to 95C in SpeedFan so these numbers are 10C less than what CoreTemp reports. Also notice that the individual core temps track each other almost exactly across the entire operating range. I believe that's a positive sign that the IHS is reasonably square and making good contact with both cores.

[mysticwizard]

I have my E8400 now at 3.6ghz(9*400) at 1.32v in bios and 1.21v in cpu-z. (with OCCT cpu gets maximum 49 degrees). WHat should be the maximum voltage i can put in my bios for 24/7? so i would be 100% safe. (i just have a noctua aircooler)

[unclewebb]

What should be the maximum voltage i can put in my bios for 24/7? so i would be 100% safe.

Where you're at now is about the only 100% safe setting. You will likely be 100% safe up to a CPUz reported core voltage of 1.40 volts for 24/7 use but these processors haven't been out long enough for anyone to guarantee you that. If you can't risk a dead CPU then maybe 1.36 volts might be a better maximum number for you.

See if you can find a mod for your board to reduce voltage droop so that your full load and idle voltages are closer together. I was able to run my overclock above with the FSB Termination voltage set to the minimum my bios allows which is 1.20 volts. Keeping this number close to the Intel spec of 1.10 volts +/- 5% for the E8400 might also help keep these processors from degrading over the long term.

[rge]

Man what ~3C will do for my E8400 OC.

I posted a while back while testing 4.1, including screen shot ...
below 1.3375v bios get stop messages
1.3375v reboot 10 hrs 50 mins
1.34375v orthos shut down 6 hrs
1.35625v reboot at ~ 5 hours, then 9 hours
1.3625v stable 14hr+, 19hrs+.

I think I found out why the seemingly random reboots on mine, at some voltages. As i run orthos for long time, my internal intake temps gradually rise, which i think was causing reboots. I put a fan inside my case, which prevents that rise in intake temps regardless of how long I run orthos. I finished running 4.1 after lowering two notches to 1.35v (pic). I did a shorter run, where I lowered 4ghz required voltage by 3 notches.

I am thinking the 1.3375 volts is now going to be stable for 4.1, which is 4 notches lower, instead of rebooting after 10 hours....just started testing that theory out now.

But definitely no degradation here after ?200 hours of orthos runs, half that near or at vid max 1.3625.

Edit: well temps not whole reboot problem, at 1.3375, computer just shut down after few hours, looks like 1.35 is as low as I can go for 4.1. 1.325 stopped orthos on previous testing in 10 mins, made it 18 mins today....ie, same stoppage time for 1.325.

edit2: turning heat in house down 2 degrees, and using open case with box fan on low, keeping intake temps at ambient...1.3375 now works, and still 1.325 stopped at 9 minutes.

4.1 at 1.3375v is stable if DTS >~39, at 1.35v is stable if DTS > ~36, at 1.3625v is still stable at DTS 33 but no crashes to know limit at that voltage.

[HaTaX]

Yup! It's passed it long enough to suit me. Closed up in a cabinet in my computer desk the cpu never got above 52c as reported by the BIOS, coretemp reported a peak of 69c but I am taking that as 59c and a good temp for me. I think I will see if I can take core voltage down any but I am pleased with 24 hours stable at this voltage. Orthos small FFTs run for 24 hours for CPU stability testing and 30+ hours of Memtest86+ for memory stability testing.

450x9
Mem @ 1:1/5-5-4-12 (Cheap memory)

VCore 1.284v verified by DMM, hardware monitors report 1.28-1.29v
CPU VTT 1.16 ~ HWMON: 1.18v
DDR2 2.125v ~ HWMON: 2.12v
DDR2 REF 0%
MCH 1.37v ~ HWMON: 1.39v
ICH 1.09 ~ HWMON: 1.10v
ICHIO 1.60 ~ HWMON: 1.63v
GTLREF 0&2 / 1&3 65%/64%

[Leeghoofd]

Nice Vcore mate I got an Q746A502, Pack Date 01/25/2008, Vid 1.125

Does 3.6Ghz at 1.18Vcore 24 hours folding@home stable( 100% CPU), though for 4.05ghz I need 1.32V to be Folding without errors... I don't do Prime as I find it pretty useless, at least the folding is usefull...



Board tested on was the Asus Maximus SE... 4gig Gskill PC8000 5-5-5-15 - Stock EVGA 8800GT...

Vcore set in bios 1.34
NB : 1.47
PLL : 1.5
FSB : 1.3

[Origin_Unknown]

omg my e8500 has come back from RMA.... ill be able to test tomorrow

[Benny Lodewijk]

My E8400 Q746A474....

[laragirl83]

Benny, the core voltage is risky... theres a great chance the cpu will degrade!
If I were u, i would find the max clock speed under 1.400V load voltage.

[Benny Lodewijk]

Benny, the core voltage is risky... theres a great chance the cpu will degrade!
If I were u, i would find the max clock speed under 1.400V load voltage.

yes... i know.. just testing to find max clock stable with prime.

[laragirl83]

yes... i know.. just testing to find max clock stable with prime.

All right then!

[Zucker2k]

Not to jinx anything but it's been a while since anybody reported a "degraded" cpu. God, I hate that word!

[Origin_Unknown]

Not to jinx anything but it's been a while since anybody reported a "degraded" cpu. God, I hate that word!

you've just put a hex on it

[zlojack]

I've been avoiding anything above 1.35v on this chip since I might be selling it!

[barzi]

I have a weird problem:

I have an E8400 and it runs from the beginning on 4ghz (1.264v real). When I tested with orthos(at the beginning) it runs perfect for 50 minutes. Then I stopped the test by myself.
But when I test it with orthos now(same votlage/speeds) it stops after 3 minutes..
What's the problem?

The PC is running perfect. I can play COD4 for 2 hours and also run a few 3dmark benches after each other, no problems.