R3E + Nehalem = fail? Or am I doing something wrong?

[knopflerbruce]

Allright... first f all, I'm not THAT experienced with these chips However, I thought 5 GHz should be pretty easy on any D0 Nehalem at -70 or so, but that's not the case here. Seems to a CPU frequency "wall" somewhere, I cant get 5 GHz to boot into windows no matter what I do. Highest stable is like 4800-4850 MHz, and still at -70c and 1.55v vcore Either this board is a dud, or I have no clue what I'm doing. Bclk seems allright, did 245x19 without pushing the rig.

Here are my Extreme Tweaker settings:

mp: 25
bclk: 200
pcie: 120
dram: 1203mhz
uclk: 2406
qpi link: slow mode

cpu differential: 1000mv
cpu clock skew: auto
ioh clock skew: auto
digi+ pwr mode: x-power
pwm volt. control: 10v
LLC: disable
cpu voltage ocp: disabled
cpu pwm freq: 1000khz

extreme ov: disabled
extreme oc: mode 1

vcore: 1.55v
cpu pll: 1.9v
qpi/dram voltage: 1.38v
dram voltage: 1.65v
ioh voltage 1.44
ioh pcie: auto
ich voltage: 1.40
ich pcie: auto
spread spectrums disabled.

All dram ref voltages on auto, same with the timings.

Disabled all cpu features except ht.

Tried bios 0002, 1102 and 1401. Ran i7 965, w3550 and w3565 on the 1102 bios. Also tried alot of different uncore and mem combos, no change.Tried IOH from 1.25v to 1.45v, no change. Ditto with ICH, but 1.4v max. Tried up to 1.5v QPI, and i tried to run the lowest, non-slow mode QPI link setting, too.

So... what's up here?

[Hondacity]

1. vcore is too low
2. remount, bad mounts can limit max cpu by 100-200mhz

[knopflerbruce]

1. vcore is too low
2. remount, bad mounts can limit max cpu by 100-200mhz

If you count a different CPU as a different mount I guess I've had 6 mounts.

You sure voltage is too low? I always thought these Nehalems didn't like more than 1.55-1.6v or so (most wprime1024m runs at hwbot are between 1.5 and 1.6v, one at 1.63v). I also think I tried 1.6v once, but didn't help me much, if any.

[Calathea]

I don't think it's the vcore. I know a couple of guys here in sweden whose i7 920s didn't reach 5g on dice/phase. You could push vtt/qpi voltage more but many Nehalems really suck.

[Olly_K]

LLC: enable
CPU PLL 1.5 or 1.6

EDIT and oh yeah, more VTT

[Viss]

Here's the settings i used for a 920D0 on the R3F:



260bclk (17x multi)

[Gautam]

CPU junk!

[slaveondope]

1.63v vcore LLC on
1.83v pll
1.55v qpi/dram (vtt)
Lots of clock skew adjustments and some other things where needed for my 1024 wprime run.

[Gunslinger]

CPU junk!

[Gamer]

I had the same issue with a 920 C0, higher bclock on air, but nothing on Cascade.

[dejanbinladen]

over 1.6 qpi, dont be scared, and pll try 1.9
llc ofcource enabled

[bassplayer]

I needed about 1.65V for the max on my W3520.

[Linuxfan]

Every 920 needs slightly different settings to reach it's maximum potential...
If you've tried more than one 920 D0 chips by now, I'd hope you'd find one that does at least 5ghz Spi though....
Tried HT off?

[knopflerbruce]

Thanks for all the advice so far... will definately try higher qpi Unfortunately I forgot to pick up more ln2 today, so I cant test until next week.

[bassplayer]

I've never tried pushing with such low uncore, either. Try to set it to something more realistic, like 3GHz or higher.

Only thing I don't like about the RIIIE was the inability of any of the three that I've owned to push without slow mode above 220 BCLK.