GA-EP45-UD3P - Won't boot with 450FSB

[edge929]

Thanks for the tip Psycho. You'll be happy to know your idea indeed worked. As I type this, Orthos is running (has been for 15 mins now) at 533x7 with MCH Core at 1.34V, VDimm at 2.10 and MCH Reference at 0.830 and MCH/DRAM Reference at 1.20.

I wasn't happy about running 1.56 by any means but everytime I lowered it and changed nothing else I was the mayor of BSOD city. I didn't occur to me to raise the Ref voltage as I'm honestly not overly familiar with Ref voltages and how they pertain to the mainstream voltages such as Vcore, MCH Core and VDimm.

Will let Orthos run for another 1-2 hours and then I will try to get 533x8 completely stable, tighten my RAM timings and call it good.

[ghost707]

Bunch of damn tech junkies.
I am obviously in the right place

Edge929 has me beat in the build and overclock department.
I have been building systems for over 20 years (only built about a dozen - and maintained dozens more for various companies) and this is my third overclock system currently. I got lazy when I worked for Dell - and just bought pre-built - discount was pretty nice.
I still have a old 80286-20 board (with a whopping 2 meg! of memory) in a box around here somewhere. Posterity.

I would be interested in seeing what specs Edge929 has working.

[Psycho101]

The main thing to note about Ref volts is that they scale with VTT (CPU termination) As well as their %of VTT often forming a "sweet spot" for each configuration, it has been noted by some that the absolute value of each reference (mainly MCH Ref) is also important. For both refs settings of +2 to -3 of 0.760 @ 1.2VTT have been found to be useful. More often than not it seems that MCH ref is best set lower than default, but CPU ref could benefit from either an increase or decrease, with no discernible pattern.

1.34V is much nicer, and definately something that can be run 24/7 with no issues. You may even be able to remove that 120mm fan if you want to reduce noise a little. Of course you can't have too much cooling so if it's not bothering you, leave it be.

Aha! An ex Dell employee. Is there any chance that you know what Dell actually do to their systems to make them extremely slow from the moment they're switched on? I've worked on two different Dell systems (both those thin tower boxes, same height as a midi tower but 2/3 the width) and both were the same. Bought brand new, and slow as hell. I whisked them to my house and re-installed the OS from the backup disk (no plain Win XP disk included as usual) and still the same problem. The only way the issues were resolved was by using a generic OEM copy of XP with the system owners Product Key (thus making everything legal ofc). No more issues after that. Systems went from 30 sec to open IE to 2 sec.

Do post those settings when you get chance edge929, like I say, the more templates here the better!

[edge929]

Ask and ye shall receive. These are my current test settings, survived 1 hour of Orthos so far.

If I didn't list it, assume it's set to Auto. And yes, my RAM timings suck, not concerned with those right now.

*************************************
*************************************
Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3P (Rev. 1.1) - F7
E8400 C0
GSkill F2-8500CL5D-4GBPK 2x2GB
*************************************
*************************************
******************************
MB Intelligent Tweaker(M.I.T.) 
******************************
Robust Graphics Booster ..............: [Auto]
CPU Clock Ratio ......................: [7X]
x Fine CPU Clock Ratio................: +0.0
CPU Frequency ........................: 3.73GHz (533x7.0)
********** Clock Chip Control ********
>>>>>  Standard Clock Control
CPU Host Clock Control................: [Enabled]
x CPU Host Frequency(Mhz).............: [ 533]
PCI Express Frequency(Mhz)............: [102]
C.I.A.2...............................: [Disabled]
>>>>> Advanced Clock Control..........: [Press Enter] 
CPU Clock Drive.......................: [800mV]
PCI Express Clock Drive...............: [900mV]
CPU Clock Skew........................: [  0ps]
MCH Clock Skew........................: [  0ps]
******** DRAM Performance Control ********
Performance Enhance...................: [Standard]
Extreme Memory Profile(X.M.P.)........: [Auto]
(G)MCH Frequency Latch................: [Auto]
System Memory Multiplier (SPD)........: [2.00D]
Memory Frequency(Mhz).....1066.........: 1066
DRAM Timing Selectable (SPD)..........: [Manual]
>>>>> Standard Timing Control
x CAS Latency Time................5...: [5]
x tRCD ...........................5...: [   5]
x tRP.............................5...: [   5]
x tRAS...........................15...: [  15]
>>>>> Advanced Timing Control.........: [Press Enter] 
x tRRD............................4...: Auto
x tWTR............................4...: Auto
x tWR.............................13..: Auto
x tRFC...........................68...: Auto
x tRTP............................4...: Auto
x Command Rate (CMD) .............0...: 2
>>>>> Channel A Timing Settings.......: [Press Enter] 
x Static tRead Value..............11...: [ 10]
>>>>> Channel B Timing Settings.......: [Press Enter] 
x Static tRead Value..............11...: [ 10]
****** Motherboard Voltage Control ******
Voltage Types..........Normal...........Current
-----------------------------------------------
>>> CPU
Load-Line Calibration.................: [Disabled]
CPU Vcore..............1.27500V.......: [1.4000V] (CPUZ and HW Monitor both report 1.36 in Windows)
CPU Termination........1.200V.........: [1.380V]
CPU PLL................1.500V.........: [1.730V]
CPU Reference..........0.760V.........: [Auto]
>>> MCH/ICH
MCH Core...............1.100V.........: [1.340V]
MCH Reference..........0.760V.........: [0.834V]
MCH/DRAM Reference.....0.900V.........: [1.210V]
ICH I/O................1.500V.........: [1.570V]
ICH Core...............1.100V.........: [1.300V]
>>> DRAM
DRAM Voltage...........1.800V.........: [2.100V]
DRAM Termination.......0.900V.........: [Auto]
Channel A Reference....0.900V.........: [Auto]
Channel B Reference....0.900V.........: [Auto]

[ghost707]

Originally Posted by Psycho101

The main thing to note about Ref volts is that they scale with VTT (CPU termination) As well as their %of VTT often forming a "sweet spot" for each configuration, it has been noted by some that the absolute value of each reference (mainly MCH Ref) is also important. For both refs settings of +2 to -3 of 0.760 @ 1.2VTT have been found to be useful. More often than not it seems that MCH ref is best set lower than default, but CPU ref could benefit from either an increase or decrease, with no discernible pattern.

1.34V is much nicer, and definately something that can be run 24/7 with no issues. You may even be able to remove that 120mm fan if you want to reduce noise a little. Of course you can't have too much cooling so if it's not bothering you, leave it be.

Aha! An ex Dell employee. Is there any chance that you know what Dell actually do to their systems to make them extremely slow from the moment they're switched on? I've worked on two different Dell systems (both those thin tower boxes, same height as a midi tower but 2/3 the width) and both were the same. Bought brand new, and slow as hell. I whisked them to my house and re-installed the OS from the backup disk (no plain Win XP disk included as usual) and still the same problem. The only way the issues were resolved was by using a generic OEM copy of XP with the system owners Product Key (thus making everything legal ofc). No more issues after that. Systems went from 30 sec to open IE to 2 sec.

Edit to add: I only worked there for about a year.
Sorry Psycho,
I was working for Dell waaaaay back in the day when we were telling customers to tap on their brand new Western Digital 1GB hard drives so that they would spin up and boot. This was also back when Win95 was coming out and the guys on the factory floor were throwing in video drivers for Win 3.1 - which the customers would load - quickly hosing their systems. Nightmares.

Dell was going for compatibility above all else - hence slow machines.
They were more interested in speeding up production than speeding up computers.

[devoh]

Originally Posted by D-an-W

Don't do it devoh! profJim will be challenging you to a 72hr Prime off!!!

48 hrs stable with all three types of Prinme95 and IBT's going... Now onto the OCCT!! I know profJim is shedding a tear of joy!!

-devoh

[BoombasticSloth]

Well, I must say, Edge, you certainly are using a different approach in your bios settings to achieve stability. But it is working for you so one can't really knock it. While it may appear "madness" by some others that have been able to work with lower mch core values, there may be some "method" to it. Further to Psycho's suggestion, you might want to experiment with other combinations in your bios settings by lowering your vtt. Some have felt that a (begin edit)vtt value of no more than 0.05-0.10v (end edit) below vcore is recommended, but I only feel this may be more geared to higher vcore levels, which just happens to be where you are at. With a lower vtt, you might be able to lower your mch ref and cpu ref. In turn it might work in concert with a lower mch core.

Good luck and welcome to the forum.

[creamsoda]

The main thing to note about Ref volts is that they scale with VTT (CPU termination) As well as their %of VTT often forming a "sweet spot" for each configuration, it has been noted by some that the absolute value of each reference (mainly MCH Ref) is also important. For both refs settings of +2 to -3 of 0.760 @ 1.2VTT have been found to be useful. More often than not it seems that MCH ref is best set lower than default, but CPU ref could benefit from either an increase or decrease, with no discernible pattern.

This piece of information is the KEY to overclocking past 400fsb on these Gigabyte motherboards. If more people knew about this, there would be MUCH less threads in this forum from newbies.

I am glad you posted that piece of info. Most ppl get stuck at 400fsb, and they start to believe that they have a "400 fsb wall", but they don't realize how easy it is to fix by adjusting the mch reference.

I'm amazed at how your OC'ing strategy is so similar to mine! o_o

[Lsdmeasap]

See the link in my signature for some info/images/examples of how to set your MCH Ref, for sure this is a great part in finding stability at high clocks with P45.

[D-an-W]

I am about 1/3 of the way through the tests and really don't think this is going to be the key to 550x8 for me.

LSD, when you had a play with this RAM did you pick up any tips that might stabilise Prime Large for me?