The Maximus Formula Thread - Help/OCing/Guide/Rampage conversion

[Zucker2k]

Yes, vcore is quite high, but that's how this little chip likes it...this thing belongs in a server; high temps don't bother it. I think its a rebadged xeon chip I'll enable C1E and EIST so the chip can relax at idle.

My G.Skills seem to be maxed out @ 1158Mhz; I don't want to go above 2.20v, even with a 80mm fan blowing on them.

Screenies:

[les_paulde]

Advance clock skew 300PS
and get trfc off auto and set 55 this should allow the ram to run at 2.1 volts as high as 1100MHZ, after that you might need a drop or two more dram volts

Thanks grnfinger, I'm trying this as we speak. I had the skew only at 250 so that might definitely make a difference. When you say 2.1 volts, does this include the correction for the Rampage's overvolting or should I reach 2.1v when checking under Everest?

What about settings like DRAM static read control, AI clock twister and the transaction booster (PL)? Right now i have them on disable, lighter and set to 11, but am not sure if this is the right way forward?

thanks again for your help!

EDIT: system still keeps crashing, also using bios versions 0308, 0401 and 0408. Even using the official P5E Deluxe bios 0501 and 0502 does not result in a stable system, although the memory is clearly listed on Asus' QVL for this board... I've tried voltages ranging from 2.08v to 2.22v in the bios, and I also tried tRFC at 60 but unfortunately all to no avail.

Does anybody have any ideas what else I could try?

[Grnfinger]

Yes, vcore is quite high, but that's how this little chip likes it...this thing belongs in a server; high temps don't bother it. I think its a rebadged xeon chip I'll enable C1E and EIST so the chip can relax at idle.

My G.Skills seem to be maxed out @ 1158Mhz; I don't want to go above 2.20v, even with a 80mm fan blowing on them.

Screenies:

I've been trying to get 4.0GHz stable for some time now.
I didnt pump the volts you did in to my chip tho. You think 1.45 is a safe 24/ amount?
best I did was 1.5 hour run at 1.40 volts b4 1 core crapped out. Not sure if the GSkills will run at 1132 anyways

[Zucker2k]

I've been trying to get 4.0GHz stable for some time now.
I didnt pump the volts you did in to my chip tho. You think 1.45 is a safe 24/ amount?
best I did was 1.5 hour run at 1.40 volts b4 1 core crapped out. Not sure if the GSkills will run at 1132 anyways

I think this chip could do 1.60v 24/7. It just needs the volts. I can tell it will go higher because it'll prime at higher temps than in the ss. Also, my ambient temps haven't been the greatest. If I could get 60f in here, I could feed it more volts and maybe loosen up rams a bit, it's currently doing 1158Mhz @ PL7.

About your 1.45v 24/7 question, I think if you're already doing 1.40v, the extra .05v isn't going to do any harm. These quads are less voltage sensitive than the duals, it seems. I think plls are what you should look for. I never touch the plls (1.50v) when I'm overclocking 45nm chips. Also, fsbt is reasonable enough, and I've run way higher fsbt volts in the past without breaking anything.

I was in the MIIF thread and read a lot of unhappy posts; seems the P5Q Deluxe is doing better than the ROG board.

[Zucker2k]

Thanks grnfinger, I'm trying this as we speak. I had the skew only at 250 so that might definitely make a difference. When you say 2.1 volts, does this include the correction for the Rampage's overvolting or should I reach 2.1v when checking under Everest?

What about settings like DRAM static read control, AI clock twister and the transaction booster (PL)? Right now i have them on disable, lighter and set to 11, but am not sure if this is the right way forward?

thanks again for your help!

EDIT: system still keeps crashing, also using bios versions 0308, 0401 and 0408. Even using the official P5E Deluxe bios 0501 and 0502 does not result in a stable system, although the memory is clearly listed on Asus' QVL for this board... I've tried voltages ranging from 2.08v to 2.22v in the bios, and I also tried tRFC at 60 but unfortunately all to no avail.

Does anybody have any ideas what else I could try?

Try going back to RF 0308 bios.

I have a suspicion your cpu could be the culprit. This memory should do that frequency without sweat.

You're so close to 1.60v @ only 1.38Ghz? I also think your fsbt is too much, at only 415 fsb. set it at 1.36v (should be even lower). Disable dram static read control, and set clock twister to auto. set ram to 1.94v (2.00v real) in bios; not any higher until you're certain ram volts are your problem; these sticks are voltage sensitive. Set pll to 1.60v real. manually set PL to 6, if you fail, 7. Goodluck.

Don't forget to advance clock skews to 300 as have been suggested.

[steve30x]

Can anyone tell me what is the highest temp for a Q6600 that is safe? Would 70 celcius be too high. I am getting 60 celcius with 3.6ghz and would like to try and push a bit more but I dont want the CPU to get too hot.

[Grnfinger]

I think this chip could do 1.60v 24/7. It just needs the volts. I can tell it will go higher because it'll prime at higher temps than in the ss. Also, my ambient temps haven't been the greatest. If I could get 60f in here, I could feed it more volts and maybe loosen up rams a bit, it's currently doing 1158Mhz @ PL7.

About your 1.45v 24/7 question, I think if you're already doing 1.40v, the extra .05v isn't going to do any harm. These quads are less voltage sensitive than the duals, it seems. I think plls are what you should look for. I never touch the plls (1.50v) when I'm overclocking 45nm chips. Also, fsbt is reasonable enough, and I've run way higher fsbt volts in the past without breaking anything.

I was in the MIIF thread and read a lot of unhappy posts; seems the P5Q Deluxe is doing better than the ROG board.

I am a little disapointed with teh board , I expected alittle more from such a hefty $$ board.
I have a Rampage comming this week if it performs better than the P45 the MIIF is gone to ebay. Seems Asus has dropped the ball on bios support. A board half in price should not be beating the ROG line.
The board is stable and runs cool, has alot of bios options and looks very sweet. To bad they spent more time with eye candy than engineering

[zlojack]

The new ROG boards have a lot of potential, but it seems like they're a bit fussy. My RE is very fussy about RAM so far, though I'm really only starting to play with the bios. The fact that I'm back on air cooling temporarily doesn't help either, I'm sure.

[kup]

I am a little disapointed with teh board , I expected alittle more from such a hefty $$ board.
I have a Rampage comming this week if it performs better than the P45 the MIIF is gone to ebay. Seems Asus has dropped the ball on bios support. A board half in price should not be beating the ROG line.
The board is stable and runs cool, has alot of bios options and looks very sweet. To bad they spent more time with eye candy than engineering

I'll be eagerly awaiting your verdict because I can't decided between the Rampage or the MIIF...

The 16 Phase CPU Power sounds nice, but does it really offer anything over the Maximus/Rampage...? I'm hoping a well run X48 would overclock as well as a P45...

[les_paulde]

Try going back to RF 0308 bios.

You're so close to 1.60v @ only 1.38Ghz? I also think your fsbt is too much, at only 415 fsb. set it at 1.36v (should be even lower). Disable dram static read control, and set clock twister to auto. set ram to 1.94v (2.00v real) in bios; not any higher until you're certain ram volts are your problem; these sticks are voltage sensitive. Set pll to 1.60v real. manually set PL to 6, if you fail, 7. Goodluck.

Don't forget to advance clock skews to 300 as have been suggested.

Thanks for the suggestions! I had a go at trying out different settings yesterday, but still didn't achieve a stable system at 1066mhz. I changed back to RF0308, and setting the skew at 300 definitely helped the stability, but the Vram at 1.94v would result in my pc not booting up. I think I found a sweet spot at 2.04v in the BIOS, which results in 2.08v in Everest. This will let me run prime blend for hours without fail, but simultaneously running memtest will result in errors after about an hour. So obviously I was still not happy with these results, (although definitely happier thanks to both your suggestions Zucker2k and Grnfinger! ) so I decided to run a DOS memtest while I was catching up on some sleep at night. This morning, it turns out that 33 errors were generated, but all on just one of the two sticks. I dunno if this is hard proof, but i'm suspecting one of the modules is broken, and I therefore took it out and am currently running another memtest on the supposedly good module, hoping that when I get back from work it will have no errors and I can safely assume one of the modules is broken.

If so, I will post my final stable results after the RMA drag has been completed... Luckily I kept my older Ballistix Tracers which I can use for now, and in the mean time I will have a go at implementing those voltage changes you suggested Zucker2k!
cheers!

EDIT: one of the 2 modules was indeed broken, so I returned the package to the shop, hopefully the exchange won't take too long but the single, good-working stick worked flawlessly at 1066mhz, so I know that once I receive the new RAM, this should make my quad fly like anything!

[les_paulde]

Can anyone tell me what is the highest temp for a Q6600 that is safe? Would 70 celcius be too high. I am getting 60 celcius with 3.6ghz and would like to try and push a bit more but I dont want the CPU to get too hot.

Personally I like to keep my Q6600 around 65C, just out of longevity concerns. Theoretically, you could run it hotter than this, as long as you're below Tjmax. If u really wanna know how far you can push it, try out RealTemp, which will tell you your distance to TJmax- as long as this is at least 20 degrees C, I think its safe to assume your CPU won't melt down.

Also, I'd say that 70C at full Prime95 small ffts is actually still alright, even under my 65C rule, as normal use (even while gaming) will never ever be able to fully load your cpu as prime95 is...

[RCG_Bex]

God damn, feeling pretty poo. I need more RAM. (my photo res's are so high they're crashing my PC hen I flick through them lol)

So anyone want to recomend me some DDR2 4GB min - to be overclocking a QX9650 4GHz+

Currently using Adata Extrem 1200's which I had running as high as 1400mhz

~Bex

[RCG_Bex]

Please excuse the double post! But on a side note - played qith my QX9650 a little... Results speak for them selves - 1st time right off the bat with a 266 strap



Adata Extreme 1200 running @ 1203MHz

Obviously I doubt it's prime stable but who knows. So far runs fine. Think I need to tweak the NB voltages though... Will tweak it in the morning... My first quadcore so should be fun learning new voltages

~Bex

[MaXXimus]

Curious... using 1201 BIOS and wondered since its listed only as BETA within ASUS's download section if any other version may have a better track record? Or possibly do the Rampage Conversion? Thoughts?

[zlojack]

Curious... using 1201 BIOS and wondered since its listed only as BETA within ASUS's download section if any other version may have a better track record? Or possibly do the Rampage Conversion? Thoughts?

I really liked the Rampage conversion and the extra options and bandwidth I was able to squeeze out of my RAM.

[MaXXimus]

Well that sounds like a good deal, appreciate the reply... now of course I know one persons experience is always going to differ from another when dealing with this kind of hardware, so... anyone else care to share their personal experience, so I can narrow down what Im going to do?

[zlojack]

What RAM have you got? CPU? That would be helpful as maybe those with similar hardware could give you an idea of what to expect.

[MaXXimus]

QX9650 and Dominator 1066 2X2Gig.

[zlojack]

Then I can definitely say that I had the same setup and it worked well.

Here's an old Everest benchmark Performance Level 6 on the Corsairs with a QX9650

[MaXXimus]

PMed ya zlojack...

[Grnfinger]

Well that sounds like a good deal, appreciate the reply... now of course I know one persons experience is always going to differ from another when dealing with this kind of hardware, so... anyone else care to share their personal experience, so I can narrow down what Im going to do?

Conversion is worth the 3 mins of your time.
It will make the Maximus fly, it yeilds better FSB and lower volts.
I RMA'd my board to Asus with Rampage bios flashed and they sent me a new board so warranty is not an issue.
I would recommend it to anyone with a X38 Maximus.

[MaXXimus]

Very nice... thanks for the feedback and will be my #1 priority when I get up tomorrow to give it a go. Will post back my experience. BTW, I was recommended to use the 0308 BIOS... thoughts on that? I always liek to get more then one opinion.

[Grnfinger]

Very nice... thanks for the feedback and will be my #1 priority when I get up tomorrow to give it a go. Will post back my experience. BTW, I was recommended to use the 0308 BIOS... thoughts on that? I always liek to get more then one opinion.

308 is the best for bandwidth
unless you need E0 support then I would recommend it otherwise 407 is the best to date.

[Barr3l Rid3r]

308 is the best for bandwidth
unless you need E0 support then I would recommend it otherwise 407 is the best to date.

410 is pretty good here.

[RCG_Bex]

Yeah I think I'm going to flahs back from 407 to 308 now that I have my quad. Board's getting pimped out in the next few weeks so hopefully I can get this baby was some flying OC's but I really need to get my hands on some bigger RAM

~Bex