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

[nyeah]

it's not bad, but you have to tweak it more, try to read previous pages and several threads of i7 overclocking if you have time.

[Chrono Detector]

Can somebody confirm that 12GB of RAM does work on this board, at 1600Mhz or over? Because I'm planning to get another 6GB soon and I would be very disappointed if 12GB at 1600Mhz will not work/not stable.

[lowfat]

is 12GB of RAM with this board working yet?
just got my board today, was going to upgrade from P6T Deluxe (need more SATA ports), but I have 12GB of RAM

thinking maybe I should sell it and go with a UD5

The memory controller is in the CPU. Most of the time issues w/ 12GB of ram has been CPU dependent. I'll be throwing in another 6GB today again (as the F@H bigadv is a ram pig). Hopefully it won't limit my OC.

[OC Nub]

nice temps. What sort of water cooling have you got?

Thanks, I am using the XSPC rx360, mcp655, apogee XT, and the ek multioption res150. The chip is 1.28125vid and runs fairly cool. I use a small window unit AC behind the PC blowing at the rad for LinX and Blend runs.

[lowfat]

The memory controller is in the CPU. Most of the time issues w/ 12GB of ram has been CPU dependent. I'll be throwing in another 6GB today again (as the F@H bigadv is a ram pig). Hopefully it won't limit my OC.

Well I am up to 12GB now. Didn't have to decrease the bclk either. Sitting nicely @ 229.

[Sam_oslo]

Noctua NHD14 in the house, this thingy is HUGE.
Installed horizontally (blowing towards the back of the case) with 2 push-fans and fitted fine .
Just installed, and didn't have a chance to look at temp load-temp yet, but idle-temp seams to be a couple of degree lower . Just fist impression, tho.

If you install the NB-cooler, then forget using 12GB tall RAM at all. You may use 6GB tall RAM by removing the first push-fan, tho. I'm glad for having low-profile RAM, my Corsair XMS3 sneaks just under the cooler and I can use 12GB, but don't need it yet, anyways.
So far so good

[luther138]

First of all let me say thanks for all the passive help I have recieved from trolling these forums the last 2 months, it has been pivotal in my success so far.

Anyway I am building a system that I need to run stable and fast,
it consists of one of these motherboards 6GB of Corsair Dominator
ram (CMG6GX3M3A2000C8) and a megahelam with push pull fans.
and a i7-975 (for stability)

As you can see below my temps get up to 96C when running LinX.

https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/barrowsr...HramHbclkL.png

This seems awfully high compared to others similar overclocks on the 920.

I have some ideas on what may be some options but I was curious if anyone had any suggestions I havent thought of.

Here are my ideas...
1. You will notice the corsair ram fan slightly blocks the intake fan of
the HS, I am hoping that when my two low profile scyths arrive this
problem will be subdued.

https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/barrowsr/Pics/DSCN0539.JPG

2. I was considering mounting the HS horizontally but was unsure if this
had been decided as a bad idea by others, I thought I read previously
that this had helped decrease temps in one persons case but not another.
3. This ram has excessively high stock voltages (Ram 1.65, QPI 1.55), so I
think I may have to opt for some lower voltage ram because I am under
the impression that one of those voltages is located on the CPU die and
therefore adding to the high temps I am seeing.


Hopefully someone will have some insight into what I am doing wrong, I
thought 4.2 would be easy but at these voltage settings it just isn't stable.

Maybe if I can get this up and running well my next step will be water or
subzero.

FYI I am only using that Gigabyte tool to display voltages not change any settings.

Thanks in advance if anyone can help.
-Luther

https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/barrowsr/Pics/DSCN0537.JPG

[KorbenD]

Well I am up to 12GB now. Didn't have to decrease the bclk either. Sitting nicely @ 229.

Thanks for checking that. I have a GA-X58A-UD7, i7 960, and 12GB of RAM arriving Friday to replace my aging Crosshair and Phenom 9950. Glad to hear it should work fine with that amount of RAM.

[OC Nub]

luther138, If your case vents from the top, mounting the cooler horizontally should be fine as long as it isn't in the way of your memory slots. I used the True that way on my p45 rig with good results. I have the same ram as you but run it using the 2:8 divider, it helps lower QPI/VTT, and you can just use tighter timings, those Dominators should do 1800+ cas7. I am not crazy about that Corsair fan for the memory, I took it off and have a fan sitting on the gfx card blowing on the ram.

[luther138]

luther138, If your case vents from the top, mounting the cooler horizontally should be fine as long as it isn't in the way of your memory slots. I used the True that way on my p45 rig with good results. I have the same ram as you but run it using the 2:8 divider, it helps lower QPI/VTT, and you can just use tighter timings, those Dominators should do 1800+ cas7. I am not crazy about that Corsair fan for the memory, I took it off and have a fan sitting on the gfx card blowing on the ram.

Thank I will give that a try. Out of curiosity what are your ram/QPI voltages. And I am assuming your using water cooling with these temps...
http://img686.imageshack.us/img686/7239/4500.png
which one? I probably wont be going water any time soon, unless someone makes a cheap
closed loop one.

Thanks again.

-Luther

[OC Nub]

For 4500mhz I was using 1.40vtt, mem was 1.640v, but normally run at 4ghz 1.220vtt. Haven't had this board but a few days or so, will work on lowering voltages.

[Ender17]

Well I am up to 12GB now. Didn't have to decrease the bclk either. Sitting nicely @ 229.

so if I keep the same CPU and RAM, shouldn't have a problem?

[ants]

it's not bad, but you have to tweak it more, try to read previous pages and several threads of i7 overclocking if you have time.

I'll make time, your advice is appreciated mate.

[lowfat]

so if I keep the same CPU and RAM, shouldn't have a problem?

Not exactly. No CPU's are created equal

[OC_Nooby]

Hey all, I hope someone in here can help me out. I simply don't know what to do...I can only max out my i7 920 D0 @ 3.8Ghz. I cannot go any further without hard locking the computer during stress testing. I have tried upping the CPU to 1.35v, ram to 1.7v, qpi/vtt to 1.66v, and can't get this computer stable. Temps aren't the issue. I have attached a pic of my current system that is 100% stable...anything above that crashes....

HT is enabled, turbo disabled, that gigabyte tweaking thing is set to standard, RAM is set to manufacturer specs. If it matters I can boot at 4.0ghz just cant get anywhere with it...

Anything PLZ!

[jacek]

^^ try to increase QPI/VTT to 1.52-1.54 volts, pll=1.4V
your Nb frequency i 4000MHz, it's not easy to get it stable.

[Sam_oslo]

@ OC_Nooby
Those kind of VVT is really too much for 24/7 use.
Intel means you have to keep it under 1.35v for 24/7, but some people are using it without issue, yet. The heat-overhead is a real and even bigger issue.

Use x8 RAM with x16 Uncore with thigh timings, you will get the same performance with less heat and more stability. Those 2000MHZ CL9 is not better than than 1600MHZ CL6/7 for 24/7 use.

[nyeah]

@OC_Nooby
try to loose the ram settings first and push the proc, after you got the desired clock you can then play with ram

[Supershanks]

I'm really liking this board, currently working on 4.4ghz 21x210 having got 4.2Ghz stable:-
Click pics for more benches and bios settings.
1) 4.2Ghz 21x200 Ram x8 1600Mhz 7-7-7-19


I got my ram running at it's stock speed 2,000mhz but it needed an extra 0.3vtt from 1.28v to 1.58v to be stable:
2) 4.2Ghz 21x200 Ram x10 2,000 9-9-9-27

[OC_Nooby]

^^ try to increase QPI/VTT to 1.52-1.54 volts, pll=1.4V
your Nb frequency i 4000MHz, it's not easy to get it stable.

My bad, 1.6v for 4000mhz NB to be stable.

@ OC_Nooby
Those kind of VVT is really too much for 24/7 use.
Intel means you have to keep it under 1.35v for 24/7, but some people are using it without issue, yet. The heat-overhead is a real and even bigger issue.

Use x8 RAM with x16 Uncore with thigh timings, you will get the same performance with less heat and more stability. Those 2000MHZ CL9 is not better than than 1600MHZ CL6/7 for 24/7 use.

I read somewhere where vtt can be no more or no less then 0.5v from what the ram voltage is. In any case this was just an experiment to see if I can get to my ram timings/frequency. I can do 1600mhz with 7-7-7-20 timings and probably lower.

@OC_Nooby
try to loose the ram settings first and push the proc, after you got the desired clock you can then play with ram

I have tried going as low as 1200mhz with 9-9-9-27 timings and 1.66v on ram.

Its a hard brick wall after 3.8ghz....Was thinking. I have a 700 watts OCZ GamerXtreme power supply and maybe its a power issue? I have 7 antec fans,3 hdds, dvd drive, 5870, and the i7. Perhaps its a power issue? Im going to find out the power usage of all my devices and see if that may be the issue. Cause if it is the next 5870 thats on it way may not like it new home...Thanks for the help! KEEP IT COMING

[OC_Nooby]

OK, I don't think its a power issue.

[MikeMK]

Another quick question for you guys using this board. How much of a difference does the big NB air cooler make to NB temps? Just wondering as I may well want to use one of the PCI-E 1x slots for a sound card but with the additional cooling connected it wont fit.

I take it if I put the soundcard in the bottom 8x slot it will make one of the 16x slots drop down to 8x which will effect my crossfire performance?

[Sam_oslo]

First attempt with x21 multi and new cooler looks promising . Just a little LinX to check the it out, going to optimize more before finalizing.
Noctua NHD14 gave the "little extra" cooling one really needs at these speeds.
Using 38mm Scythe Ultra Kaze (3000RPM) as the first fan + the original NF-P14 in the middle, in a push/pull/push configuration. Both connected to fan-header using a Y-split.

W3520 @4.51GHZ(21x215) 1.34v , 10 run LinX

[OC_Nooby]

Lowered my bclk to 191 and multi to 21. Running at 4Ghz, 5 runs passed in Linx. I think its my qpi link speed thats messing with my overclock. Is there any smaller multiplier then 36x, cause thats all I got unless i'm missing something....

Going to try blck 200 and 20 muli and see where that brings me..

[R3alsp33dy0ne]

Lowered my bclk to 191 and multi to 21. Running at 4Ghz, 5 runs passed in Linx. I think its my qpi link speed thats messing with my overclock. Is there any smaller multiplier then 36x, cause thats all I got unless i'm missing something....

Going to try blck 200 and 20 muli and see where that brings me..

36x is as low as it goes (there is a "slow mode" but don't even bother trying that, it's useless). But QPI speed shouldnt become an issue until you get to about 220 BCLCK.