Asus P5qc + Q6600

[alcOre]

Hi,

 

Complete nub here. Friend was trying to help me OC my new mobo/cpu, but I can barely barely overclock it before I can't even post. He says I should be able to get much higher numbers and still be stable.

 

Motherboard : Asus P5QC

CPU : Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 Family 6 Model F Stepping B Revision G0

Memory : 1 GB DDR2 Kingston KVR667D2

Power Supply : 500W

CPU Cooler : OCZ Vanquisher

 

The default CPU Frequency is 266. I can't go above 280. Anything higher than that and my computer won't even post. It won't even display my video card bios/rom. I have to restart my computer twice so that it resets it so I can change my frequency back to 280. At 280 CPU Frequency, my CPU temp is 20 and system temp is 25 (idle.) I'm confused. I see lots of people getting much much higher settings without any problem. My friend said even with the stock cpu cooler I should be able to get it higher than 280.

 

Any help would be appreciated. I built this system with video transcoding in mind, and would like to squeeze out more performance from the Q6600, which my friend said is a great cost-effective cpu for overclocking. Any insight as to why I'm not able to go any higher than 280 would be much appreciated. Maybe I should purchase a better motherboard? I don't think that's it though since I have read topics with people oc'ing using the P5QC and the Q6600.

Edited December 9, 2008 by alcOre

[cjloki]

chances are it's the 667 ram that's holding you back. the motherboard needs either ddr2 1066 ram or ddr3 1333 in order to acheive the 1333 frontside bus speed. with the setup you have now you are stuck at 1066 fsb and that's why you can't get higher clocks. ddr3 1333 is very cheap on newegg right now and will be slightly more tolerant of higher overclocks than ddr2 1066

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList....8PC3%2010666%29

here is a link for the ddr2 1066 in case you decide to go that way

http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.as...=Desktop-Memory

but you're not alone if you look at my signature you'll see my workhorse has hit the same wall but i'm ok with it as is.

if you do your research and shop you will get those clocks up there with the other guys

here is a helpful link for overclocking

http://forums.overclockersclub.com/index.php?showtopic=71656

this is your mobo from asustek website,,,,,take care to read the memory installation instructions...!!

http://usa.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3&amp...amp;modelmenu=2

hang in there mister and welcome to occ....cj

Edited December 9, 2008 by cjloki

[Fight Game]

overclocking will get you a little bit more, but one huge thing you could do with this sytem that would get you alot more performance, is add more than 1gb ram. Get atleast 2gb. Or 4gb if you have a 64 bit os.

 

sorry, I know this doesn't answer your question, but cj probably already nailed that.

[alcOre]

Yah I'm definately getting more ram and faster ram. The 1gb ddr 667 mhz was temporary. I built the system and was just trying to replace the mobo/cpu on my old system and stay at around $300 for the upgrade. Unfortunately for some reason i thought my old system had ddr2 but when i got home it was ddr1. so this ram is temporary. anyways, i found the problem in another thread. its related to the ram, but not the speed. apparently the asus p5q series run the ram at its lowest possible voltage. I looked up the specs for the ram I currently have and found the correct voltage for it. i set the ram manually to that voltage in bios and viola, i was able to get higher speeds. im currently running my q6600 at ~3.4Ghz. ran prime95 for about an hour at 58-59 degrees. seems ok to me. I dont want to go any higher without getting better ram with some heatsinks for the ram. anyways, thanks both of you for the quick response. I was surprised to see a response that fast.

 

ps...even if i stay at 1 gb i'd be fine. im strictly using my desktop for high def video transcoding. this system is a HUGE upgrade from my old amd athlon 64. did an encode from 1920x1080 to 1280x720 yesterday at stock cpu settings. my amd was doing about 1.5 fps transcoding. the q6600 with stock settings was at 7.6. im anxious to find out what it will do now that its oc'd by 1Ghz.

[Waco]

chances are it's the 667 ram that's holding you back. the motherboard needs either ddr2 1066 ram or ddr3 1333 in order to acheive the 1333 frontside bus speed.

Nononono!

 

You can do 1600 FSB on regular DDR2-800! All it requires is setting the memory dividers up properly! DDR2-1066 is good up to 533 FSB, which he surely isn't going to get anywhere near with his Q6600 and that board (533 * 9 = 4.8 GHz). Even DDR2-800 is more than enough for 90% of the Q6600 overclocks out there.

 

He can do 333 FSB with the memory dividers set properly before he's even OC'ing his memory at all.

[cjloki]

right on...well good luck with that and don't take my word for it get other ideas and do your homework...take care....!!

Edited December 9, 2008 by cjloki

[alcOre]

yah, when I get my actual ram im gonna post my specs and ask for more advice on hwo to setup the ram correctly as well. im afraid right now its not at its optimal, but im not that worried about it since the ram is temporary.