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

[xxDayTrader]

Oh hi, mate! Didn't notice; weather is looking good today, don't know about the winds though. Anyway, generally speaking, it all depends on your hardware and cooling.

Best thing to do right now is to shoot for that 3.6ghz "standard" of the G0s. I suggest 8x450 for a nice speed boost.

There are many OC profiles on the first page you can use. I suggest you begin there and then ask for help if and when you ran into problems.

I tried every one of them and either hung at DET RAM or had stability issues. I was eventually able to get things stable at 8x450 for a 24hr Prime run by increasing my voltages one by one but they had to be much higher than any others I saw around here/the net and my temps got pretty high during the stress test. Here were my 8x450 settings from a previous post here...if you see where I might have messed something up please feel free to correct me:
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...postcount=7647

For now, I'm using all my 9x450 settings but had to change CPL from 8 to 9 or I got BSOD when the OS tried to load (post was fine). I'm wondering if I had one of my CPU Config settings different than I do now or had something else changed because I didn't figure I'd get anything other than BSOD with these CPU, PLL, NB, and so on volt settings. Will start Prime and see what happens.

[Zucker2k]

I tried every one of them and either hung at DET RAM or had stability issues. I was eventually able to get things stable at 8x450 for a 24hr Prime run by increasing my voltages one by one but they had to be much higher than any others I saw around here/the net and my temps got pretty high during the stress test. Here's my 8x450 settings from a previous post here...if you see where I might have messed something up please feel free to correct me:
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...postcount=7647

I think both your nb and cpupll volts are too high for that overclock. You'll be surprised, but I'm sure even all auto settings would give you lower volts and still stable.

First off, run on the 333 strap, set both gtls to 67, advance both DRAm clockskews to 300 each
Set PL to 8
Too high vcore can also become a problem but you should generally add .40v for that 400mhz difference between 3.2 and 3.6ghz.
I'll set pll to 1.60v (real), check hardware info section in bios
NB to 1.55v
Run ram 1:1 so 900mhz 5-5-5-15 (you can tighten things later) set full max recommended volts too; test later with memtest if you're still having problems

Hopefully, this is not a cpu wall. remember, not all chips can do 3.6ghz stable. Goodluck.

[xxDayTrader]

Prime went for 5 minutes then got an error.... suggestions?




EDIT: just noticed the post above this one. Will try those recommendations.

......and thanks again, thanks a lot.

[xxDayTrader]

I think both your nb and cpupll volts are too high for that overclock. You'll be surprised, but I'm sure even all auto settings would give you lower volts and still stable.

First off, run on the 333 strap, set both gtls to 67, advance both DRAm clockskews to 300 each
Set PL to 8
Too high vcore can also become a problem but you should generally add .40v for that 400mhz difference between 3.2 and 3.6ghz.
I'll set pll to 1.60v (real), check hardware info section in bios
NB to 1.55v
Run ram 1:1 so 900mhz 5-5-5-15 (you can tighten things later) set full max recommended volts too; test later with memtest if you're still having problems

Hopefully, this is not a cpu wall. remember, not all chips can do 3.6ghz stable. Goodluck.

made all your recommended changes but I have 2 questions:
1. Re. vcore... you suggested adding .4v because I moved from 3.2 to 3.6ghz. Are you suggesting I increase the vcore from 1.54 to 1.58? --- just want to clarify

2. My PLL voltage... No matter WHAT I change it to, when I check the hardware section in the bios to see what it's 'really' at, I get the same reading: 1.68 or 1.69. I changed it down and checked, moved it down/rebooted/rechecked and still the same thing..... it always reads 1.68 or 1.68.

Other than that, all the other suggestions have been applied and I'll give Prime another shot.

Mike

[Zucker2k]

made all your recommended changes but I have 2 questions:
1. Re. vcore... you suggested adding .4v because I moved from 3.2 to 3.6ghz. Are you suggesting I increase the vcore from 1.54 to 1.58? --- just want to clarify

2. My PLL voltage... No matter WHAT I change it to, when I check the hardware section in the bios to see what it's 'really' at, I get the same reading: 1.68 or 1.69. I changed it down and checked, moved it down/rebooted/rechecked and still the same thing..... it always reads 1.68 or 1.68.

Other than that, all the other suggestions have been applied and I'll give Prime another shot.

Mike

You need 1.54v for 3.2Ghz?

[Commander_HK47]

Its rather simple, remove the screws, pull on the NB ( you might have to take a screw driver and use the dimm slot for leverage and GENTLY pry up on the NB)
Once you remove it, settle in for a while you now get to remove the cement like tim.

I think i may have miss spoke. I meant the actual IHS(the silver shim that is glued on top of the north bridge like a CPU has).

I also have a heat gun that is capable of up to 500C(did not use it at that setting). That is how i go the "cement" like TIM of in under a minute. I would just like to know where the resistors and such are so i don't cut into them with a utility blade.

[Commander_HK47]

Hey xxDayTrader, just out of curiosity do you have the 8 pin supplemental power connector plugged in? The one that sits behind the IO connectors.

[xxDayTrader]

Hey xxDayTrader, just out of curiosity do you have the 8 pin supplemental power connector plugged in? The one that sits behind the IO connectors.

YES, I do. Do my numbers look suspect? I'll recheck to make sure the plugs are seated firmly though.

You need 1.54v for 3.2Ghz?

No, I don't recall what I needed for 3.2 to be honest. I was 24hr stable at 8*450 with 1.55625 vcore and 1.76 PLL. Now, I believe I've got vcore at 1.54 and PLL at 1.6.

Does this help:

[Commander_HK47]

see if you can post with this:

Bios:
CPU v: 1.45
CPU PLL: 1.5
FSB Term V 1.4
North bridge 1.53~1.55

If your using the 400 FBS strap use:
static read to enabled
AI Clock Twister to light(for now)
set your memory PL to auto(for the moment as its a wired bug with this board then for 450FSB set no lower than PL 6, but start at 8 or 7 then walk it down between post).

Also a good rule of thumb i have found with this board; change the voltage/save before you change the multiplier/frequency/PL values in the bios.

[xxDayTrader]

see if you can post with this:

Bios:
CPU v: 1.45
CPU PLL: 1.5
FSB Term V 1.4
North bridge 1.53~1.55

If your using the 400 FBS strap use:
static read to enabled
AI Clock Twister to light(for now)
set your memory PL to auto(for the moment as its a wired bug with this board then for 450FSB set no lower than PL 6, but start at 8 or 7 then walk it down between post).

Also a good rule of thumb i have found with this board; change the voltage/save before you change the multiplier/frequency/PL values in the bios.

Zucker had me change it to the 333 Strap.

For what it's worth, when set to Auto, booted into Windows and restarted I got the following settings in the BIOS Hardware section:

CPU Vcore 1.46
PLL 1.616
NB 1.63
DRAM set to 2.20 by me (this is the max Mushkin "recommends")

Anyway, left in AUTO for those 3 settings (and FSB Strap @ 333) I tried Prime and after about 1 minuted I got BSOD.

Commander, I'll try those just for S&G.

[xxDayTrader]

see if you can post with this:

Bios:
CPU v: 1.45
CPU PLL: 1.5
FSB Term V 1.4
North bridge 1.53~1.55

Actuals were:
CPU v: 1.44
PLL : 1.60
FSB Term: 1.45
NB : 1.55

POST was OK but BSOD as OS was loading up.

[t_ski]

I think i may have miss spoke. I meant the actual IHS(the silver shim that is glued on top of the north bridge like a CPU has).

I also have a heat gun that is capable of up to 500C(did not use it at that setting). That is how i go the "cement" like TIM of in under a minute. I would just like to know where the resistors and such are so i don't cut into them with a utility blade.

I don't think you really need to worry about it. Throw a waterblock on it and you should be good. I have 1.65v going into mine and temps are always around 25C.

Otherwise, if you're still insistant, you could do a google search for dead ones

[ZenEffect]

Nice score m8

Heres my 3d06 @ 900/1000, going to push it further to see what I can get.

nice score! lets both push for 22k today, me on dual you on quad

[Commander_HK47]

I don't think you really need to worry about it. Throw a waterblock on it and you should be good. I have 1.65v going into mine and temps are always around 25C.

Otherwise, if you're still insistant, you could do a google search for dead ones

The reason why i ask is because i have not move to water cooling yet so i am stuck with the default maxims formula(non SE)north bridge heat sink atm. Leaving me to have to fight to cool the north bridge so it stays under 55c

[ZenEffect]

The reason why i ask is because i have not move to water cooling yet so i am stuck with the default maxims formula(non SE)north bridge heat sink atm. Leaving me to have to fight to cool the north bridge so it stays under 55c

what voltage are you using? i can run up to 540fsb with the rampage mod @ 1.53 which keeps the nb at 48c. that is with the factory heatsink with a antec spot fan on it. i did however re-do the thermal material *to tell you the truth for me it was very easy because there was no cement or anything like that... seemed like it was already done with mx2, so i re-did it with ceramique.

[Commander_HK47]

1.53 Bios, Everest says 1.57. I have not tested lower though... currently IBTing and NB is at 61, SB is at 57

[ZenEffect]

1.53 Bios, Everest says 1.57. I have not tested lower though... currently IBTing and NB is at 61, SB is at 57

test lower nb volts. my nb sets the voltage dead on, yours is obviously over volting. try 1.49? what fsb are u running?

[t_ski]

If you remove the IHS, you may not be able to get the stock heatsink as tight. Sort of like the Athlon chips and how clip-on heatsinks no longer worked with the RM in stock condition. Yo may have to do some modifying to get it to sit again.

Before I did have better luck with air cooling when I had a fan directly on the NB heatsink. TBH though, it would have been a lot better if I had just replaced the TIM. After seeing what mine looked like when I took it off for watercooling, I wonder how it ever got cool at all with the stock TIM.

[ChaosMinionX]

Been having a strange problem lately of my Western Digital 500GB HDD dropping in Vista and going from NTFS to uninitialized and then getting converted to RAW where I have to recover the data and reformat the drive as NTFS.... Does anyone know what the problem could be? Its a rather new drive on Rampage Formula 407, and I am using RAID mode but this drive is not part of an array.

I also ran Spinrite on the drive, and nothing came up out of the ordinary.

[OVERK|LL]

Is it an REII?

[ChaosMinionX]

Yep

[elvislee58]

Any people have flash the new RF bios (701) on MF??

[MJR]

yeah. seems on par, nothing special, but all I have to compare it to is 0601. Also, didn't solve the 430 fsb wall with 45nm quadcore.

[loften]

i took a old socket a cpu heat sink. i hacked it up, drilled a few holes, lapped it, put a small fan on it, put it on my n/b with artic silver and it stays much cooler then the stock se block did..

[ChaosMinionX]

yeah. seems on par, nothing special, but all I have to compare it to is 0601. Also, didn't solve the 430 fsb wall with 45nm quadcore.

That 430 FSB wall only seems to occur on X38, X48 flies past it with ease.