Git 'R' Done!

I started the process just like any other overclocking I've done in the past. I started up by overclocking the processor in small steps with the processor at stock voltage. That worked out fine well above 3.6 GHz. I then chose to burn in the processor for a while at this setting, just so I could get a solid base for further overclocking.

Then I bumped the voltage up by 0.1 V and proceeded to push onwards. The next stop for me would be at 3.9 GHz at the relatively-lovely voltage of 1.45 V. This is the actual voltage. The ASUS P5K Premium undervolts just a tad (~ 0.01 V) but there is NO vdroop whatsoever. This setting passed through 12 hours of continous stress testing.

3.9 GHz!

7 hours Orthos stable

Do note that this was still done at the time when I was still running Orthos. Next, I would try to to hit the big 4.0 GHz! To get to 4 GHz , the processor needed a bump in vcore and that was all it took to hit the big 4.0!

I actually had this Orthos stable on the processor running at 4.0 GHz for about 12 hours. However, it was around this time that Chai pointed out the small flaw in Orthos - it only ran 8k FFT on the 'stock' Small FFT test whereas Prime95 would change the length every 15 minutes. Adamant that it made no real difference, I downloaded Prime95 v25.3 (which support dual-core processors) and fired up the Small FFT test (test# 1). Crushingly, it failed after a mere 2 minutes. All I can say is fudge.....

4.0 GHz!

28 hours stable at 3.95 GHz

After revising my methods interspersed with pleadings and exhortations to the CPU (I know some of you do it as well - come on already!), we finally "agreed" to settle for 3.95 GHz. I tried to hit 4.0 GHz again after this but no matter how much more voltage I gave it, the processor just would't be stable in Prime95 at 4.0 GHz.

It must be noted that one of my OCZ Reaper PC2-8000 HTC memory modules died not long after I started on this project and I had to rely on cheaper memory modules while I send the Reapers in for RMA. Could this be a contributing factor? I will retry once my Reapers get back.