3770k @ 4.5Ghz on Z77X-DS3 - Beginners Guide!

[newskin]

Hello all, I'm a new member and have just gone through the process of setting up a new i7 build. This forum (and others) were a great resource so I feel a little payback is in order. I just thought I would summarise what I did in case it helps anyone in a similar position - must have done at least 20hrs reading over the last week or so and this is the condensed version of that. I have included links to all threads that I found helpful at the end.

I have had a trusty Q6600 @3Ghz for about 5 years now and felt it was about time for an upgrade. Not looked into OC'ing at all since the days of locked multipliers, so it was a steep curve. I kept my old PSU (HX520) and case (P182) but stripped out pretty much everything else. I went with:

Intel 3770K
Gigabyte z77x-D3H
OCZ Vertex 3 120GB
16GB Corsair Vengeance LP
2TB WD Green
Arctic Cooling i30


I am not a big overclocker so my objective was 4.5GHZ as a 24/7 overclock. Also, I like my machine to run quiet!


3770K Overclocking

I went with the i7 as i do a lot of encoding - it seems there is very little performance boost over the i5 for gamers who are perhaps best served with the much cheaper i5. For OC'ing i doubt it makes much difference settings wise though.

I wanted to achieve an overclock without too many volts. My initial limit was going to be about 1.28v until I came across offset (or Dynamic VID if you're gigabyte). By setting a DVID of 0.025 and then only changing the turbo multipliers to 45, it was mission accomplished. To do this navigate to Advanced CPU Core, change all turbo multipliers to 45, set max turbo power to 220Watt (Not exactly sure on this but looked at some graphs and saw a 4.7ghz pulling about 225W).

There were a couple of snags - to activate DVID you have to change the core voltage from AUTO to NORMAL. Settings are under Advanced Voltage/CPU Core Voltage. First type 'nor' in the vcore value and it should change to NORMAL, allowing DVID edit. Then set DVID. Also, I found that my overclock would get stuck at 4500 in windows and not downclock quick enough, so I went back into Advanced Voltage settings and turned all memory saving functions (CIE, EIST,c3/c6 etc) from auto to ENABLE and LLC (found under 3D Power Settings) to HIGH.

As a result I idle around 1600 @ 1.00v most of the time when web browsing etc but go up to 4500 @1.27v running prime. Temperature wise, idle is around 25-30C and prime stress maxes at about 75C . Ambient temps are pretty cool in the UK at the moment so I will have to revisit in the summer!

i30 Peformance

Something that I did a lot of research on was CPU coolers - I wanted one that was quiet but effective and that fit my case! I gambled on the i30 having read some pretty average reviews after i bought it (was seconds away from a DarkRock Pro 2). So far, I happy with the i30. It's very quiet even under load, quieter perhaps than my old Freezer 7. Space wise, it's big but I had 1CM or so to spare in the Antec p182. It does cover a RAM slot, not sure i could even get my low profile stuff under there, but i didn't try as I am only using two slots.

Vertex SSD

I nearly didn't get one of these, so glad I did. Was considering using a 60GB as intel smartstart for a cheap option but so glad O went for a slightly larger drive and ran it as boot. The thing is lightning quick, way quieter than my old RAID0 7200K setup too

Anyways, if you're in a similar position hope this was of some use. These links were really good for my research:

Z77X-UD3H - Offset overclocking? (high vcore compared to standard oc)gigabyte/49739-z77x-ud3h-offset-overclocking-high-vcore-compared-standard-oc.html

http://club.myce.com/f184/easy-overclocking-guide-intel-sandy-bridge-ivy-bridge-cpus-329214/http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2248692

http://forum.overclock3d.net/showthread.php?t=38867


http://www.overclock.net/t/1324395/3770k-multiplier-oc-vs-turbo-oc


http://www.overclock.net/t/1340128/i7-3770k-4-5ghz-using-offset-voltage-mode-but-idle-voltage-is-larger-than-full-load-voltage


http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1580607

[boondocks]

Welcome to the forum. Always glad to see another happy Gigabyte owner.
Glad you were able to get your overclock going.