feel a bit stupid but i just dont get it

TheDuke

guys,

I've read a pile of stuff on overclocking but I just don't get the principles of fbs ratios and ram settings, xmp and so on. I've got the msi rig and the bios to do it all and have lovingly hand build machines for many years now.... can anyone help me get it.

tnx

Monotype

What exactly don't you get? The maths of it - where the numbers are coming from?

Or a better question would be what do you understand?

Basically, FSB x Multiplier = CPU clock speed. On older Intel systems, you'd be raising the FSB to overclock.
On AMD systems, it's HTT x Multiplier.
On new Intel CPUs, it's BCLK x Multiplier. You can have a read of Serephucus' guide as well on this linked in my signature.

You can raise the FSB or HTT for CPU gains, but it'll also raise the speed of your RAM, so you have to underclock that to make up for it (by changing RAM dividers).
RAM settings or 'timings' can also be further configured to decrease the latency or time that it takes the RAM to do something internally.

TheDuke

Thanks for the response... the marbles are starting to roll into place... Had some serious paralysis by analysis...

My rig is an i5 750 with 2 x 2 GB Dominator PC3-10700 (667MHz) and a GeForce GTX 560 (1GB mem) on an MSI H57M-ED65 which was lovingly researched hand built it about 3-4 years ago.

Thanks for your help as I now understand the balance (and CPU-Z provided all the system stats).

To kick it off I tried a simple trick of just activating XMP which brought the mem timings from 9-9-9-24 to 8-8-8-24 but the rig would not boot properly... and no more testing was required.

As i want everything to run equally faster and in harmony I now see that that's probably not a runner unless I change the mem types which is not on the cards just yet.

As my rig as been impressively powerful over the years I think I'll leave it for now. I upgrade to a GTX560 a while back and have a 660TI in the post to replace it... next year I'll probably go for mobo, mem & proc... tend to roll components each year rather than a full new rig...

Thanks again... pennies have dropped...

Monotype

OK, well you're going to be overclocking with the FSB then.

So your RAM can do 667MHz, you're going to be looking at first box (DRAM frequency) in the memory tab in CPU-Z. Every time you increase the FSB, this frequency will increase. Your memory might be able to do more, but for now keep it below 667MHz.
The second box on the memory tab tells you what the ratio of the RAM speed to the FSB is.

Now, to prevent your RAM from being overclocked too, you need to find the place in the BIOS menu which allows you to change the RAM frequency - sometimes you'll just find a list of frequencies or RAM speeds to pick from, other times you'll find it listed under a divider or multiplier which controls the ratio. You want to slow the RAM down a notch or two - I don't know what options are available to you but say you can pick 533MHz. This would allow you to overclock by about 25% without overclocking the RAM.
For RAM timings - leave them at auto or set them high/loose to something like 9-9-9-24.

Set the PCI-E speed to 100 if it's at auto.
Switch off turbo as well, because that will mess with your overclock.

Your CPU starts at 133MHz x 20 = 2660MHz (2.66GHz).

You'll want to start increasing the BCLK a couple of MHz. Boot into Windows and run a quick stress test such as superpi or a prime95. If everything seems okayish, go back and increase by a bit more. When you finally get errors in the stress tests, increase the voltage by a few nudges. Careful, as this can increase temperatures fast. See if it's stable. If you're not getting any improvement by increasing the voltages, you should decrease the BCLK to match up.
When you're happy with your overclock, run a good long stress test for... well you'd want 6-24 hours to be sure.

Keep an eye on the temperatures - keep below 70° under load. Try to keep the voltage/vcore under 1.4V as well.

I've seen people get 4GHz with this CPU, but the H-series of motherboards tend to be not quite as good at overclocking, and a lot will depend on cooling and luck with the CPU. Still, a small overclock of ~3GHz should be possible anyway.

TheDuke

Thanks man... appreciate the detail feedback.

The proc goes between 21-24 and runs at 3.1GHz already (CPU-Z) - I put this down the MSI's OC Genie.

I'm going to try something different and play with the inbuilt OC Switch to boos the core clock speed. http://msi.com/product/mb/H57M-ED65.html#/?div=Detail

I know I seem like a right cheat here trying to get a boost without putting in the effort but important thing for me was that the penny dropped... which it has... so thanks for that!

I won't get to it till the weekend but keep you posted.

Phillip

TheDuke

Ok... I did some more work. My BIO's was way out of date and I was short some really next MSI tools.

Once update I re-actived XMP and my memory is now happily running at 800 Mhz with an FSB ratio of 2:10 (it's raised the core speed to 160 MHz). This in turn has raised the core CPU speed to 3.7GHz (multiplier is between 21 to 24). I thought those Dominator chips had that in them....

As I'm replacing my GTX560 with a 660TI when it arrives in the post I won't tweak my gpu just yet but am now interrested in what I can do with the PCIE frequency which is defaulted at 100Mhz. One for another time.

Thanks again - you really helped me break my mental barrier on this.

TheDuke

Ok... I did some more work. My BIO's was way out of date and I was short some really next MSI tools.

Once update I re-actived XMP and my memory is now happily running at 800 Mhz with an FSB ratio of 2:10 (it's raised the core speed to 160 MHz). This in turn has raised the core CPU speed to 3.7GHz (multiplier is between 21 to 24). I thought those Dominator chips had that in them....

As I'm replacing my GTX560 with a 660TI when it arrives in the post I won't tweak my gpu just yet but am now interrested in what I can do with the PCIE frequency which is defaulted at 100Mhz. One for another time.

Thanks again - you really helped me break my mental barrier on this.

Monotype

Don't mess with the PCI-E frequency in the BIOS menu. Leave it as it is.
Overclock instead with MSI Afterburner in windows. Nudge up the sliders bit by bit and test for stability every so often. Be careful with voltages on cards, as you can fry them, but usually the overclocking programs don't allow you to get into dangerous zones.

Monotype

Don't mess with the PCI-E frequency in the BIOS menu. Leave it as it is.
Overclock instead with MSI Afterburner in windows. Nudge up the sliders bit by bit and test for stability every so often. Be careful with voltages on cards, as you can fry them, but usually the overclocking programs don't allow you to get into dangerous zones.

TheDuke

interesting....are you saying 'don't touch the PCIE frequency or don't do it using the BIOS?? and if it is 'don't change the PCIE frequency'... why? Just trying to learn here and would have thought we'd wan the core bus speed of 160 also on the PCIE frequency line. Might be a stupid question but I want to learn here...

As for the GPU I can overclock that with the NVidia performance plug in but I'll also take a look at the Afterburner tool.

Monotype

Both. Don't change the PCI-E frequency.

You're increasing the speed at which the card communicates with the board. The card already has plenty of bandwidth to communicate with the motherboard so there's no gains to be had really. The downside is that you can get data corruption with the graphics card and the other PCI-E devices. Apparently this extends to the hard drives too which can completely corrupt your system. You could also damage the card as well, I suppose.

Best to leave it alone, therefore.

Overclocking the card itself is another story. You are changing speeds on the card itself and not how fast it communicates with the rest of the system. A graphics card is like a mini computer itself.

You can use whatever software you like for overclocking the graphics card, but it's normally done in Windows/OS as the BIOS menu really lacks any substantial influence over the graphics card's workings.

TheDuke

thanks man... I did a little reading before I got to your response and to your point... there's so much capacity on that link that's not the issue. Those that did test got minuscule performance increases but with many headaches...

I did a little 'what did you set your 560 to??' type research and got on average a move from 2000 to 2200 on mem and 810 to 965 on core clock so I changed and ran a few HD vids and it seems fine... ran GPU-Z to keep an eye on everything, ran a few tests and all seems fine...

For now I'm dead chuffed as I'd say i squeezed 5%-10% more out of my rig.... when i get some time i'll do a pre and post test and send them on....