When Overclocks go bad! GA-Z77X-D3H and tales of woe!

[junkville]

Hi, had a bit of a nerve wracking weekend, so hottailed it to google to see if there was anyone out there who might have a clue where i went wrong...

In summary, this weekend i tried to overclock my pc. It didnt go well. So first things first, here's what i've got!

Gigabyte Z77X-D3H - Rev 1.0 (Intel Ivy Bridge Core i5-3570K CPU @ 3.40GHz)
Motherboard firmware - f15
enermax ETS-T40 cooler
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit SP1
12.0 GB Dual-Channel DDR3 @ 667MHz (9-9-9-24) (Corsair Vengeance CMZ16GX3M4A1600C9)
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 660
Hard Drives
119GB SAMSUNG SSD 830 Series (SSD)
932GB Seagate ST1000DM005 HD103SJ (SATA)
OCZ ZS Series 550W '80 Plus Bronze

I put this system together in september, and its been running great since. Knowing that it was stable, i thought it was finally time to bite the bullet and do my first overclock.

1) Installed a cooler, ran a few stress tests, temps were great (before: 69 degress under load, after: 44 degress). Onto step 2!
2) Using 3d bios set the CPU multiplier to 43 (4.3ghz overclock)
My understanding was that the bios would automatically adjust everything else. Idiot proof! Temps were fine, about 55 degress...
3)...then my pc just completely shut down.
4) Dialled back the overclocks, 4.2ghz, 4.1, 4.0...all would crash within a short period of time.
5) decided to use the Easy tune 6 app helpfully provided by gigabyte themselves. This was a bad idea.
6) Machine restarted to apply changes, then failed to boot at all. Totally nuked. Turning on power results in power led flashing for half a second and then everything shutting down.
7) Cry a little
8) Unplug EVERYTHING, reset CMOS with screwdriver, load optimised defaults, decide to call it a day and forget about overclocking
9) next day, machine fails to boot again. Unplug, power down, reset cmos, load optimised defaults. It works! Problem solved
10) today switched on, AGAIN failed to power up. Open case, reset cmos, load optimised defaults, log onto forums here.

In summary - HELP! Dont really know what i've done wrong. I've not used any 3rd party tools or software, and now everythings a lot worse than before.

Initial thoughts were the overclock and graphics card were draining too much power, but now that i've reverted to factory settings, that cant be the case.
Upgrading the firmware also isnt an option, as i tried f16 and f17 before, and computer would post but not boot into windows.

So if anyone has any thoughts or suggestions i'd be very appreciative. Feels like i've shot myself in the foot here!
Thanks and apologies if this is all overwhelmingly NOOBish

[wazza300]

i would take out the motherboard/cmos battery,leave it out a good 30minutes then put back in and powerup the pc,once in the bios load optimised defaults

then read this 4.5ghz oc guide if you need help with settings,keep all voltages the same but just set 4.4x or 4.2x cpu multi for 4.4ghz or 4.2ghz or go for 4.5ghz if you wish,enter your own ram speed/timings as they will be different

Gigabyte z77x up4 th & z77x up5 th Overclock/Settings Guide

post back if you need any help

[junkville]

thanks Wazza! Probably not going to do any more on this tonight, need to settle my nerves for a bit first :)

i would take out the motherboard/cmos battery,leave it out a good 30minutes then put back in and powerup the pc,once in the bios load optimised defaults

then read this 4.5ghz oc guide if you need help with settings,keep all voltages the same but just set 4.4x or 4.2x cpu multi for 4.4ghz or 4.2ghz or go for 4.5ghz if you wish,enter your own ram speed/timings as they will be different

Gigabyte z77x up4 th & z77x up5 th Overclock/Settings Guide

post back if you need any help

[wazza300]

shorting the pins to clear cmos doesnt always clear it fully,so the best method is leave the battery out,its probably still corrupted hence why its freezing/crashing ect

[junkville]

thats interesting - that didnt come up in any of my rummaging around for info...

shorting the pins to clear cmos doesnt always clear it fully,so the best method is leave the battery out,its probably still corrupted hence why its freezing/crashing ect