A Fr3ak having fun with Biostar's Tpower I45 (xtreme pics inside)

[Fr3ak]

As stated in this thread ([Fr3ak] Biostar Tpower I45), I had trouble with the Biostar Tpower I45 to get past 600 MHz FSB. I couldn't even boot at 600 MHz into Windows. I tried 4 different E8500, one of them with my single stage, but the result was always the same. Crash between 550 and 595 MHz. I posted pictures of the BIOS and the max. selectable voltages in the thread mentioned above btw.

First, lets have a look at the board first what it looks like when it comes out of the box:




More pictures of the board can be found here:
http://extreme.pcgameshardware.de/at...wer-i45-01.jpg

For the weekend, we had a "little" bench session in Germany called AOCT which stands for AwardFabrik Overclocking Treffen (Meeting). We were between 20 and 30 people doing weird things and benching all over the place.

I didn't have any time for preparations, so I decided to try to break my current personal percentage OC value, which I set last year with a E2140 at a 151.51% OC. To reach that goal, I bough 3 E1200 from 3 different shops. What can I say: One CPU was worse than the other. Couldn't even get 2 CPUs running at the 456 MHz my E2140 runs on plain aircooling.

Ok, so what can I do to spend the rest of te 24 hours? First of all, I desiced to give the E2140 a try again, because I reached the previous (personal) record on P35 without a temp probe. That E2140 kept me busy for about 5 hours. After some time, I got the idea to "insulate" the NB with Armaflex and use dry ice on the stock NB, just for the fun of it. To my surprise, the FSB wall of my CPU increased and I was able to gain another 1.5%. Wow, what an archievment for 5 hours of benching, but it has been fun:


http://valid.x86-secret.com/show_oc.php?id=391707

Here is a picture of my ghetto NB cooling with dry ice:


For whatever reason, the CPU doesn't seem to scale with voltage and temperature din't even imporess it too. I was surprised seeing 516 MHz FSB with a multiplier of 6. I ran the E2140 with 2V which moved the coldbug to -145C, which was nice, but as I said, it was of no use.

After using dry ice:


Right, after benching with the E2140, I still had plenty of time and mainly LN2 left, so I decided to see what FSB I can reach with a E8500. I knew the CPU runs at 575 MHz on air with a X38, so there was hope to get at least past 600 MHz FSB. After the good results with the dry ice and one of the guys copying my method to bench with his Tpower with dry ice too, I decided to do some improvements to my previous idea: I did a better job at insulation everything from the start. The NB was pretty much completely sealed. I then made a funnel for the NB. Being known for stupid things, I now wanted to cool the NB with liquid nitrogen, using the stock NB cooler.







Now the fun could continue:



600 MHz FSB was kind of a piece of cake. It took me some time to try all kind of different values, but running the NB at -186.6C (according to the bad blue K-type probes) and +0.7V VNB / +0,65V VFSB made it all the way up to 673 MHz FSB. I could have probably gotten a little higher than that with more finetuning. I didn't touch DRAM timings at all, which might have been a stupid thing since I had it set to semi decent bench settings.


http://valid.x86-secret.com/show_oc.php?id=391714


http://valid.x86-secret.com/show_oc.php?id=391705


Whatever, I had a lot of fun, everybody thought I am totally nuts, so mission accomplished! The low NB temperature had some side effects, that went even worse as soon as the CPU started coldbugging. If you want to know what on a mainboard is connected to the northbridge, just freeze the NB with LN2 and you will find out! Everything that starts forming ice in seconds has traces to the NB

Enough of the talking: Here are the pictures:



















Surprisingly, everything was still working fine - more or less. =)

Finally, I was able to make a longer post in this section again, time is killing me, I would still be busy haveing 48 hours days =/

The NB after the LN2 madness:

[systemviper]

WOW you are wak, that is some krazy benching, gotta love it

[nachthymnen]

haha, you're crazy my friend
I love the pics and also the results!!
Really nice start with tihs awesome board!!!
I don't see any USB key insert...why?

[redratamd]

Pics are crazy like the guy

[andre X_X]

that is xtreme bench there
i really love the pics

[Marvin_The_Martian]

Love the frost pics, very much so

Want more benches to

[boblemagnifique]

It's crazy cooling Freak , congratz for your Overclocking !!!

Biostar is impressive with the little P45 !!! i like that

[scooter.jay]

Crazy but good some nice clocks and some new ideas thanks.

[ZoLKoRn]

Nice pics nice result Fr3ak

I really love Ice on G.SKILL picture, that 8500HK right ?

You're rock

[alexio]

Awesome fr3ak An epic OC session indeed!

[saaya]

lol, nice, so you just poured the ln2 onto the nb? didnt it run over the pcb?
i wonder if we are going to see FSB 775 on socket 775 before it dies out

[Fr3ak]

Originally Posted by systemviper

WOW you are wak, that is some krazy benching, gotta love it

Thanks =)

Originally Posted by nachthymnen

haha, you're crazy my friend
I love the pics and also the results!!
Really nice start with tihs awesome board!!!
I don't see any USB key insert...why?

I disabled USB and I didn't want to risk the data on my USB stick =)

Originally Posted by redratamd

Pics are crazy like the guy

haha, lol, thanks!

Originally Posted by andre X_X

that is xtreme bench there
i really love the pics

Thank you!

Originally Posted by Marvin_The_Martian

Love the frost pics, very much so

Want more benches to

I should have run 1M, as the CPU wasn't as bad as I though initially. Even though the board ain't good for 1M. I am planning to do some more benching as soon as a certain new CPU is out

Originally Posted by boblemagnifique

It's crazy cooling Freak , congratz for your Overclocking !!!

Biostar is impressive with the little P45 !!! i like that

Yep, I like it too. Worked like a charm, even while half of the board was frozen. All BIOS settings I tried, worked too. I had way more trouble with other P45 boards on air =)

Originally Posted by scooter.jay

Crazy but good some nice clocks and some new ideas thanks.

Thanks!

Originally Posted by ZoLKoRn

Nice pics nice result Fr3ak

I really love Ice on G.SKILL picture, that 8500HK right ?

You're rock

Thanks mate! I like those frozen memory pictures too. The colors seem just right. I have them in full resolution, so I am gonna make some wallpapers out of them I guess =)

Originally Posted by alexio

Awesome fr3ak An epic OC session indeed!

It has been fun, but at some point it was just plain stupid hehe

Originally Posted by saaya

lol, nice, so you just poured the ln2 onto the nb? didnt it run over the pcb?
i wonder if we are going to see FSB 775 on socket 775 before it dies out

That is why I insulated the NB completely, so it was kind of good sealed. I only poured bit by bit and not half the thermo on the NB =) The LN2 was trapped in between the fins of the NB cooler. I benched for 4-5 hours using that method, so it can't be that bad of an idea.

[[XC] gomeler]

I'm surprised the NB was stable that cold, my X48 would bug out with dry ice + acetone, had to use just dry ice pellets. I'll have to give that a shot with some P45 boards. Nice numbers there

[G H Z]

Hardcore Oliver

I'm with Zolkorn, the frozen GSkill pic rocks! Nice bench session

[marmott]

I like this ghetto NB cooling !!

great scores congrats !!

[overcrash]

You are CRAZY m8, is that board still alive

[Solarfall]

whhhhhhhhaaaaaaaaaaaaaattt awesome pics + crazy results Fr3ak..

[InsaneOne]

is that motherboard still alive? memorys?

[Fr3ak]

Yes, everything is still working just fine. I was benching like this for 3 hours, then I had to heat up the board to make a better insulation. After that I was benching for another 2 hours. Board, CPU and memory haven't been damaged at all. Very little corrosion marks on the memory, but that's about it =)

[saaya]

Originally Posted by Fr3ak

That is why I insulated the NB completely, so it was kind of good sealed. I only poured bit by bit and not half the thermo on the NB =) The LN2 was trapped in between the fins of the NB cooler. I benched for 4-5 hours using that method, so it can't be that bad of an idea.

i did almost the same thing with a vga heatsink at the oc session close to alternate above frankfurt with blackpearl and sof and other awardfabrik guys... but it kept leaking unfortunately...

so did you use armaflex or what did you use?

[Fr3ak]

Tissues + Armaflex. Have a look at this picture:

[hiwa]

very nice my friend can't found it in germany need one

[Oliver]

Sweet work Oliver and i love the pics of the ln2 affected G.skill stick...

Keep pushing it...

[3lfk1ng]

Sick. Looks like you had a lot of fun.

[blind_ripper]

great work freak loving it