Overclocking is going to become an increasingly more complicated art on Intel's P45

[WoZZeR999]

Everything can be set to AUTO, you don't HAVE to use the new settings.

[[XC] gomeler]

I'm sorry, I fail to see how this is more difficult? I typically can leave these settings on auto and hit 480FSB with my quad with ease which is also much higher than necessary as I tend to boot at much lower FSBs and probe the limits. I suppose with a dual-core this could be an issue but how many users strive for 600FSB?

gigabyte has no options on purpose thier market isnt the smartest its mainstream, get a dfi lt/ut then u will have the options and more now, or learn to hex edit on gigabyte bioses

what do u mean, gigabyte isnt marketing to the overclockers, and they set most values that u dont see in the bios without u seeing them

Gigabyte has changed their mentality on overclocking considerably. P45 should reflect this, hell they have a board that caters direct to us

[saaya]

that article is very misleading... it makes it sound like ocing p45 is a nightmare and you need to spend hours and learn about electronics and ee before you can overclock it at all...
both of which is not true at all

[WoZZeR999]

I would put this article akin to something fudzilla or INQ would write. This article could go right after "We think Big Blue is stopping support for the overclockers, here is our *proof*" (in reference the to recent Nehalem article). GTL's are not blind, you don't just throw random numbers at it. It even says in the article where to start. If the 65nm proc needs somewhere around 67%, start at %66 and work your way to %68. Again, this only applies if you want a heavy o/c. For most overclocking, AUTO will work fine.

[zanzabar]

this review has the asus bios for the p45, it looks like the maximus with a few settings gone
http://sg.vr-zone.com/articles/Asus_...ew/5758-6.html

its still missing a bunch of ram options

[virtualrain]

FSB has hit its limit...hence Intel are dropping it soon IMO

Personally, I will not miss the FSB at all once it's gone and Nehalem is here.

Tweaking GTL settings to get the most out of hardware is a very frustrating experience but can be rewarded with higher stable OC's.

I agree with someone else that said that many P45 boards are finally offering BIOS tweaks on the level that DFI has for years.

However, most people, some of whom have posted here, will simply ignore them and use the hammer that is voltage. It reminds me of an old saying... "If all you have is a hammer, then everything looks like a nail!"

[virtualrain]

that article is very misleading... it makes it sound like ocing p45 is a nightmare and you need to spend hours and learn about electronics and ee before you can overclock it at all...
both of which is not true at all

It's not saying that... it's saying that if you want to get the absolute max OC out of your system, you do need to pay attention to these electrical engineering aspects of your system.

I would say from some of the responses here that some overclockers are only concerned with the max OC they can get with voltage tweaks. They are missing out.

[fireice2]

Time and patience is needed if you want to OC you're system. For the SOHO users, they wouldn't care anyways.

[dinos22]

Dinos, I highly doubt you will ever see high (600+) fsb on X48(x38). That chipset is great for QX cpus

not really

Pt1t boots on air cooling at 600MHz FSB with his E8500 (Gigabyte X48T-DQ6)

i'm sure we can tweak FSB to get there

i've been benching 600+ FSB with E6850 and even E6700 on X38-DQ6

i've also benched another of my E8500s with Asus P5E3 DLX/Gigabyte X38T-DQ6 at 560MHz 32M Superpi on air as well

so under cold it will be even better

[saaya]

It reminds me of an old saying... "If all you have is a hammer, then everything looks like a nail!"

never heard of that one before hahahaha, awesome

It's not saying that... it's saying that if you want to get the absolute max OC out of your system, you do need to pay attention to these electrical engineering aspects of your system.

its not giving the impression that ocing p45 is a nightmare and you need to studdy vtt and gtl and clock skew tweaks? then whats this?

overclocking is going to become an increasingly more complicated art with the release of Intel's P45 chipset

wrong

if you want to buy and overclock on an Intel P45 board (or X48, X38 and P35 for that matter), Leach believes that you must learn how to use:

* GTL Reference Voltages
* CPU VTT and its relation to GTLs
* Clock Skews
* CPU PLL Voltages

wrong

It’s a case of spending a lot of time increasing the CPU VTT

misleading, if you want to reach the max, then you you need a LOT of time to tweak the system, but hows that new?

Next you HAVE to play with the clock skews

misleading, you dont HAVE TO

The kicker that this is a completely blind art

wrong

you’ve quite literally got to sit there for hours and tweak the nuts off the board trying combinations of GTL and Skew settings until you find something that works

misleading, you dont HAVE TO

So there you have it, prepare to invest in some serious time if you’re upgrading

misleading, makes it sound like when i upgrade to a recent intel chipset i need to invest days into tweaking my system to get it stable above stock speeds

all those tweaks are helping to reach higher ocs, yes, but they only give very small boosts and arent necessary to overclock your system. this all makes it sound like its some extremely complex science or art to oc a system which will only scare people from buying a new board or from ocing it.

this is a 1 page article! and yet there are 3 wrong and 4 misleading statements in it...
i agree with whoever said this article is what youd expect on fudzilla, but not bit-tech

[Kasparz]

Dinos, I highly doubt you will ever see high (600+) fsb on X48(x38). That chipset is great for QX cpus

No, no, and no.
Once its tweaked, it will fly with every cpu at high FSB including wolfdales.
There are LOTS of hidden optionns in BIOS for every board, once manufacturer would put them into BIOS, everyone would be upset again. Some of the people are complaining about tweaking board at xs, this is where xs belongs, if you don't want to put all your effort into overclock, you definitely hit wrong forum.

[JumpingJack]

http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=3309&p=8

Anand appears to have no major issues. He mentions raising the MCH voltage to 1.5 V ... but also notes that the test version was not final reisions either.

[kiwi]

No, no, and no.
Once its tweaked, it will fly with every cpu at high FSB including wolfdales.

Proof? Show me any "tweaked" result

[saaya]

http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=3309&p=8

Anand appears to have no major issues. He mentions raising the MCH voltage to 1.5 V ... but also notes that the test version was not final reisions either.

it wasnt anand, it was kris aka freecableguy

kiwi, pm pt1t

[Richard Dower]

Majority of times leaving most options at Auto is enough, i personally have only needed to adjust (G)MCH voltage for FSB stability, the time consuming part is fidning the right voltage level to attain stability, throwing +0.20V may not be needed..spending some time testing could allow you to use less voltage. Rule of thumb...you try leave voltages at normal as much as possible while getting the best overclock possible.

[kiwi]

it wasnt anand, it was kris aka freecableguy

kiwi, pm pt1t

While his 65nm chip doing 630fsb on x38 is nice it is still 65nm. Do it with 45nm and I will be sold In fact you can probably count a number of 600+ 45nm validation results on your left or right hand fingers

[dinos22]

While his 65nm chip doing 630fsb on x38 is nice it is still 65nm. Do it with 45nm and I will be sold In fact you can probably count a number of 600+ 45nm validation results on your left or right hand fingers

Pt1t has done 600+ with 45nm chip

[Bindibadgi]

never heard of that one before hahahaha, awesome


its not giving the impression that ocing p45 is a nightmare and you need to studdy vtt and gtl and clock skew tweaks? then whats this?



wrong
wrong
misleading, if you want to reach the max, then you you need a LOT of time to tweak the system, but hows that new?

misleading, you dont HAVE TO

wrong

misleading, you dont HAVE TO

misleading, makes it sound like when i upgrade to a recent intel chipset i need to invest days into tweaking my system to get it stable above stock speeds

all those tweaks are helping to reach higher ocs, yes, but they only give very small boosts and arent necessary to overclock your system. this all makes it sound like its some extremely complex science or art to oc a system which will only scare people from buying a new board or from ocing it.

this is a 1 page article! and yet there are 3 wrong and 4 misleading statements in it...
i agree with whoever said this article is what youd expect on fudzilla, but not bit-tech

OK, let me just try to explain my point - my news post was NOT designed for the readers of XtremeSystems - you guys have the time to play and you know a system inside out. It was designed to introduce bit-tech readers, the average overclocker, to more advanced BIOS settings - that is all. Can you imagine the effect if I just had written "yea, these are new and you'll see them everywhere, they do stuff" - no one would have bothered to notice. I don't write with you guys in mind, I expect you lot to be more educated and read between the lines with what I (and other sites) put who aren't aiming their reviews at the extreme end of enthusiasts.

Your statements are just wrong though - I have sat down with Taiwan engineers from Asus, MSI and Gigabyte who have all told me the exact same thing I posted: to get the most out of a system you need to learn the other options. 1.25V-1.3V through the P45 northbridge is all you need.

You have to understand my position as well - I've been thrown stuff from all angles harping on about all these things. I've sat through presentations explaining how to get the most of out these boards and they all revolve around the "new stuff" and not voltages, so it's hard not to think it.

MSI and Asus are specifically bringing down the X48 tweaks to P45 - everyone is committed to offering MORE, not less to play with. I will always be pushing for more too, but in a way that's elegant, intuitive and user friendly (for example, if the technical field was level: DFI are not, but Asus are).

It was just prior warning to my readers given the significant effort I had to put in trying to overclock the DFI X48 T2R recently. I will accept that the two things have influenced one another to a degree and the intended outcome of replies is not as I had hoped. I had expected people to be interested in a "wow, OK then" approach, not negative.

That's not to say these boards won't be overclockable from just drop in and play - they absolutely will - so those with Q6600s at 3Gs will still be able to do this easily enough. I meant it as just an extension to the simple terms of voltages that some already know. However if you spend the time playing with skews, vtts, plls and GTLs you won't need half as much voltage increase on CPU, NB or memory for the same effect - this gives your hardware a better lifespan (providing that is, you respect VTT and PLL voltages ). Whether BIOS engineers make automatic adjustments inside to aid all this, like some do (at the time of writing, having played with a few early P45 BIOS this didn't seem to be the case but it IS changing rapidly as launch approaches), has yet to be finalised

For those of you looking for OC or benchmark records having EVERYTHING at your disposal is a given. X48 will still be better for this, but despite Intel telling me A2+ revisions of X48 silicon will be 65nm at CeBIT at the 4-series "launch", it doesn't seem to be verified/the case at all.

The one thing I regret putting in is the Nehalem stuff, and only because Fudzilla posted something about it a day earlier so we ended up being associated with that. I was talking to the TWese and a few other industry people last weekend about it and they were echoing my suspicions about the two tier SKU approach Intel is taking (why else? You shouldn't need triple channel memory if it's more efficient?!). However, having just spoken to Asus this very afternoon - the PM of the RoG line has recently looked at the Intel stuff on paper and already "has ideas" so I think we'll be safe. As it is anyway, mainstream parts won't be around for another 9-12 months anyway.

I will keep pestering TW about Nehalem between now and December I'll resist posting anything about it until then, promise (can't let BT seem like a FUD site when it isnt :|) I'm gonna go back to work now so I regret to say I won't read the replies - just that ya'awl have a nice day and I'm sure I'll be reading your ocing stories soon ^_^

EDIT: FYI: Asus P5Q BIOS looks ing awesome. MSI have pulled its socks up too, but it still needs work I've got a meeting with DFI to see their new DK/LT too Feel free to drop me a line or forum post over there if there is anything specifically you want me to ask. I spose you lot don't really care too much about the greener-power saving features too much, do you?

[Eldonko]

I like a challenge, bring it on.

[MikalCarbine]

Brings me back to my DFI Ultra-D where I spent weeks finding my max clock on my TeamGroup Cronus Micron B5-F I say bring it

As for overclocking on P35, I adjusted my GTL voltages to nearly every possible voltage combination and it didn't help me gain any fsb Too bad the IP35 Pro does have these other options mentioned (DRAM skew, etc)

Anyone know any hex hacks?

[Leeghoofd]

For nOObs there's the CPU up level on the Asus boards, for real men there are bios settings... if we just know each settings is correctly explained in the booklet or what it affects that would be nice... overclockign indeed has evolved from upping some voltages and FSB to general tweaking to get best performance...

I go with El Donko : bring it on , she can't be that hard as 680i with a quad...

And really Gambit you gonna fight to breach the 3ghz barrier for lesser performance, beats me... forum threads will help ya well on the way, like usual... stay with the dark force...

[kiwi]

Pt1t has done 600+ with 45nm chip

Yea, he posted results as we discussed. Well, he is the 1st one and hopefully not the last one with more or less decent result for 45nm + X48