[Pilege21]

I want to overclock my processor from 3.1GHz (stock) to at least 3.6GHz. I have an ASUS M5A88-V motherboard that came with TurboV. Is this a good software to use since I don't know to much about the BIOS to do any changes there. Only went into the BIOS a few times but don't know to much with overclocking. I don't want to blow my system so I'm asking for some advice. Thank!

[waldojim]

Overclocking via software is never recommended. This leads to serious overvolting of your cpu, likely damaging it, and to system instabilities. Your best bet, is to hit up Google, find a guide for your motherboard, and read up on how to over clock correctly.

I am not saying you shouldn't ask for help, but you really need to read up on the basics, and understand how the process works, what results you can expect, and determine weather or not your system is ready for this before you do it. 3.1 to 3.6 isn't a huge jump by any means, but it is more than enough to do damage if not done correctly.

What kind of cooling do you have for your processor?
What kind of power supply do you have?
What model processor?
What are the end results you are looking for (apart from just the clock speed)?

[LiveBrianD]

I tried gigabyte's software on my i5 750 and the idle temps went from 30C to 60C (and I was just overclocking from 2.66GHz to 2.8GHz!). Definitely avoid the motherboard's software.

Fyi, just to give some idea:
I overclocked that 2.66GHz CPU (which uses 1.064V under load according to CPU-Z at stock speed) to 3.36GHz by setting 1.2V in the bios (reported as more like 1.1V by CPU-Z), and with a cooler master tx3 load temps were 60C (however, the fan was louder than I'd like under full load). However, DO NOT DO ANYTHING IF YOU ARE NOT SURE OF WHAT YOU ARE DOING!!! You can damage the CPU that way (though most likely safeguards will kick in before you actually kill anything).

[Rommel]

Pilege21, on 06 April 2012 - 05:21 PM, said:

I want to overclock my processor from 3.1GHz (stock) to at least 3.6GHz. I have an ASUS M5A88-V motherboard that came with TurboV. Is this a good software to use since I don't know to much about the BIOS to do any changes there. Only went into the BIOS a few times but don't know to much with overclocking. I don't want to blow my system so I'm asking for some advice. Thank!

Sounds like you have an AMD CPU.
Mine is also stock 3.1.

I am going to go against the advice given so far being I've used some of turboV's features and only had positive results.

Do keep in mind my case has great air flow and my after market CPU cooler does an excellent job.

By temps stay well in safe limits when OCed and stressed.
And waldojim's advice is dead on to read about before you start.
It was the same advice given to me when I first asked.
And as Brian said in his red text, I strongly agree with that.

OK,

As far as TurboV is concerned, I've only used it to increase my CPU multiplier.

Under the CPU ratio tab, you'll see your cores and you can slide them up to increase this value which will increase the HZ of your CPU.
Note in the picture it shows your new cpu value under it as you adjust it.

Nibble at this and check your temps as you go.
Remember to check your temp before you start.

I use BIOS now for my OCing but this is a simple way to get more out of your CPU.

This post has been edited by Rommel: 06 April 2012 - 08:30 PM

[Pilege21]

I have the AMD 8120 and with the stock cooler. My system runs at 28c at idle and/or doing simple things like surfing and chatting. I have a 730W power supply. I'm more of just looking to get a little more power out of this CPU.

[coastie65]

I have used the UEFI OC utility with no no adverse effects and took mine from 3.4 to 4.4, with very little change in temps ( 2 - 4 C rise ).

[Rommel]

Pilege21, on 06 April 2012 - 09:09 PM, said:

I have the AMD 8120 and with the stock cooler. My system runs at 28c at idle and/or doing simple things like surfing and chatting. I have a 730W power supply. I'm more of just looking to get a little more power out of this CPU.

28c is a great number.

If you are looking for a modest gain, try TurboV as suggested.
( I still have my asus pc, soon to go back into service )

I'm currently using an MSI board but if I remeber correctly, whatever you adjust your multiplier to, you'll need need to do it again each time you start your PC.

Use Asus probe and monitor your cpu voltage before you start and after each adjustment.
I bet your voltage will not change going from 3.1 to 3.6 or possibly higher.

Once you feel more comfortable with your OC and your values are good and your pc is stable.
You should OC in BIOS so your adjustment is permanent untill you, not a restart changes things.

Being a simple gain is all you want, adjusting your multiplier is the way to go.

[Pilege21]

I read some things about overclocking and tried the Turbo V. I think my computer doesn't like it, since I turned my computer back on and don't get a display until the welcome screen pops up. I have my PC plugged into a 32" LG TV. I plugged a small monitor into the VGA port on my video card and all the video started working. I reset the overclocking back to factory settings and tried the BIOS overclocking settings. My BIOS has a automatic tuner for overclocking and boasted it up to 4.4GHz. I don't think it did anything with the voltage or RAM so when I did a restart I turned it back off. Now my Turbo V says the processor is at 3500MHz and still running cool. The stock setting was 3100MHz. Since these changes most of my games won't work. One games says to make sure I meet the requirements. Another game says it ran into a serious error when starting. I tried another game and it worked just fine. Is there a way to get everything back to default settings? Would flashing the BIOS work? I'm not to worry about my data since all I have are games and I back up my data regularly.

[waldojim]

Pilege21, on 06 April 2012 - 09:09 PM, said:

I have the AMD 8120 and with the stock cooler. My system runs at 28c at idle and/or doing simple things like surfing and chatting. I have a 730W power supply. I'm more of just looking to get a little more power out of this CPU.

That 8120 is a power hog from the outset. Anandtech had a recent article on several of the new boards' OCing abilities, and found that sucker to run hotter than a 6 core Phenom by well over 10C - using liquid cooling!

Step one for you, is going to be a new CPU cooler. There isn't any way around that.

[Rommel]

Pilege21, on 07 April 2012 - 10:45 AM, said:

I read some things about overclocking and tried the Turbo V. I think my computer doesn't like it, since I turned my computer back on and don't get a display until the welcome screen pops up. I have my PC plugged into a 32" LG TV. I plugged a small monitor into the VGA port on my video card and all the video started working. I reset the overclocking back to factory settings and tried the BIOS overclocking settings. My BIOS has a automatic tuner for overclocking and boasted it up to 4.4GHz. I don't think it did anything with the voltage or RAM so when I did a restart I turned it back off. Now my Turbo V says the processor is at 3500MHz and still running cool. The stock setting was 3100MHz. Since these changes most of my games won't work. One games says to make sure I meet the requirements. Another game says it ran into a serious error when starting. I tried another game and it worked just fine. Is there a way to get everything back to default settings? Would flashing the BIOS work? I'm not to worry about my data since all I have are games and I back up my data regularly.

I'm not sure why the games are acting up.

In the picture I posted showing where to increase the multiplier should not have any ill effects unless they were pushed too far.
Thats why I suggested to nibble at it.

My amd phenom OCed from 3.1 to 3.56 without issue when I used turboV.

Your 3.5 sounds like the modest gain you wanted.

Anyway, looking at my asus manuel, it shows the far right tab as "exit".
Under that tab is "load setup defaults".

This will take any changes to bios you may have made back to factory.

Make sure you disable turboV so it doesn't make changes.

Also found in my manuel that only black edition cpus support the "cpu ratio" function.

Not sure why that matters.

Check through your manuel that came with the mobo and see how it applies.

Going to 4.4 sounds like a serious jump. If I go past 3.65 just using the multiplier I won't post first time then after a forced shutdown, it says OC failed and I reenter bios to readjust.

Looking at my asus bios, under AI Tweeker tab, you'll see "cpu ratio". enter that to increase your cpu for a modest gain.
Just go a little at a time. OCing is a slow process.
But first reset your bios back to the beginning.

If you don't have CPUZ, you may want to check it out to monitor your stock readings, note them, and any changes you make.

http://www.cpuid.com...ares/cpu-z.html

This post has been edited by Rommel: 07 April 2012 - 01:18 PM

[LiveBrianD]

Pilege21, on 06 April 2012 - 09:09 PM, said:

I have the AMD 8120 and with the stock cooler. My system runs at 28c at idle and/or doing simple things like surfing and chatting. I have a 730W power supply. I'm more of just looking to get a little more power out of this CPU.

What power supply is it? Also, if you use something like Prime95 or OCCT, what are the CPU temps? (the core temps, that is)

Also, I think coastie is using the asus motherboard software. I'm not sure how well their software works, but gigabyte's is definitely not that good, and motherboard overclocking software is generally not known to be all that great.

Also, I took the CPU, which was at 1.064V 2.66GHz, to 2.88GHz with 1.04V. I probably could've taken the voltage even lower. Also, for instance, I used 1.1V in the bios for 3.36GHz, and the system went through post just fine, but BSOD'd at the Starting Windows screen. With 1.17V set there, it passed several rounds of high torture IntelBurnTest without a problem. The stock voltages are more than are actually necessary, so yes, as Rommel said, you can stick with those or increase them just a bit while still hitting your target frequency. Also, should you change a setting so that the system won't post, remove the cmos battery (it's a little coin battery near the PCIe x16 slot) for a minute or two, and then try again. (By the way, that clears all bios settings. It's a good idea to write them down.)

[LiveBrianD]

waldojim, on 07 April 2012 - 01:11 PM, said:

Pilege21, on 06 April 2012 - 09:09 PM, said:

I have the AMD 8120 and with the stock cooler. My system runs at 28c at idle and/or doing simple things like surfing and chatting. I have a 730W power supply. I'm more of just looking to get a little more power out of this CPU.

That 8120 is a power hog from the outset. Anandtech had a recent article on several of the new boards' OCing abilities, and found that sucker to run hotter than a 6 core Phenom by well over 10C - using liquid cooling!

Step one for you, is going to be a new CPU cooler. There isn't any way around that.

Fyi, something like a cooler master 212 should work well (as long as it'll fit in your case). I have a tx3 (92mm, the 212 is 120mm) and that works well enough for me, though my i5 is 95W and your FX-8120 is 125W (I think).

[LiveBrianD]

Pilege21, on 07 April 2012 - 10:45 AM, said:

I read some things about overclocking and tried the Turbo V. I think my computer doesn't like it, since I turned my computer back on and don't get a display until the welcome screen pops up. I have my PC plugged into a 32" LG TV. I plugged a small monitor into the VGA port on my video card and all the video started working. I reset the overclocking back to factory settings and tried the BIOS overclocking settings. My BIOS has a automatic tuner for overclocking and boasted it up to 4.4GHz. I don't think it did anything with the voltage or RAM so when I did a restart I turned it back off. Now my Turbo V says the processor is at 3500MHz and still running cool. The stock setting was 3100MHz. Since these changes most of my games won't work. One games says to make sure I meet the requirements. Another game says it ran into a serious error when starting. I tried another game and it worked just fine. Is there a way to get everything back to default settings? Would flashing the BIOS work? I'm not to worry about my data since all I have are games and I back up my data regularly.

Perhaps you didn't use enough voltage, and thus you're getting some miscalculations (even though the system seems stable). Use IntelBurnTest with high torture to see if it's really stable. Also, use hwmonitor to watch the temps. Don't let the cores get above 70C (I prefer to keep them to 60C). To get everything back to the default, go into the bios, and load the defaults. If you used the asus software, also change that to the default.

[waldojim]

Rommel, on 07 April 2012 - 01:16 PM, said:

Pilege21, on 07 April 2012 - 10:45 AM, said:

I read some things about overclocking and tried the Turbo V. I think my computer doesn't like it, since I turned my computer back on and don't get a display until the welcome screen pops up. I have my PC plugged into a 32" LG TV. I plugged a small monitor into the VGA port on my video card and all the video started working. I reset the overclocking back to factory settings and tried the BIOS overclocking settings. My BIOS has a automatic tuner for overclocking and boasted it up to 4.4GHz. I don't think it did anything with the voltage or RAM so when I did a restart I turned it back off. Now my Turbo V says the processor is at 3500MHz and still running cool. The stock setting was 3100MHz. Since these changes most of my games won't work. One games says to make sure I meet the requirements. Another game says it ran into a serious error when starting. I tried another game and it worked just fine. Is there a way to get everything back to default settings? Would flashing the BIOS work? I'm not to worry about my data since all I have are games and I back up my data regularly.

I'm not sure why the games are acting up.

In the picture I posted showing where to increase the multiplier should not have any ill effects unless they were pushed too far.
Thats why I suggested to nibble at it.

My amd phenom OCed from 3.1 to 3.56 without issue when I used turboV.

Your 3.5 sounds like the modest gain you wanted.

Anyway, looking at my asus manuel, it shows the far right tab as "exit".
Under that tab is "load setup defaults".

This will take any changes to bios you may have made back to factory.

Make sure you disable turboV so it doesn't make changes.

Also found in my manuel that only black edition cpus support the "cpu ratio" function.

Not sure why that matters.

Check through your manuel that came with the mobo and see how it applies.

Going to 4.4 sounds like a serious jump. If I go past 3.65 just using the multiplier I won't post first time then after a forced shutdown, it says OC failed and I reenter bios to readjust.

Looking at my asus bios, under AI Tweeker tab, you'll see "cpu ratio". enter that to increase your cpu for a modest gain.
Just go a little at a time. OCing is a slow process.
But first reset your bios back to the beginning.

If you don't have CPUZ, you may want to check it out to monitor your stock readings, note them, and any changes you make.

http://www.cpuid.com...ares/cpu-z.html

10:1 I bet it is overheating, the games are crashing because the system is unstable.

It sounds like there is no proper testing going on here, and insufficient cooling.

IDLE temps tell us NOTHING about how well the system is running, only LOAD temps give us that answer. At this point, I think I am going to back out of this thread, as it is heading towards disaster very quickly.

[waldojim]

LiveBrianD, on 07 April 2012 - 02:13 PM, said:

waldojim, on 07 April 2012 - 01:11 PM, said:

Pilege21, on 06 April 2012 - 09:09 PM, said:

I have the AMD 8120 and with the stock cooler. My system runs at 28c at idle and/or doing simple things like surfing and chatting. I have a 730W power supply. I'm more of just looking to get a little more power out of this CPU.

That 8120 is a power hog from the outset. Anandtech had a recent article on several of the new boards' OCing abilities, and found that sucker to run hotter than a 6 core Phenom by well over 10C - using liquid cooling!

Step one for you, is going to be a new CPU cooler. There isn't any way around that.

Fyi, something like a cooler master 212 should work well (as long as it'll fit in your case). I have a tx3 (92mm, the 212 is 120mm) and that works well enough for me, though my i5 is 95W and your FX-8120 is 125W (I think).

That is 125Watt TDP STOCK. Overclocking immediately changes that. Expect closer to 140 or 150.

[coastie65]

waldojim, on 07 April 2012 - 05:43 PM, said:

Rommel, on 07 April 2012 - 01:16 PM, said:

Pilege21, on 07 April 2012 - 10:45 AM, said:

I read some things about overclocking and tried the Turbo V. I think my computer doesn't like it, since I turned my computer back on and don't get a display until the welcome screen pops up. I have my PC plugged into a 32" LG TV. I plugged a small monitor into the VGA port on my video card and all the video started working. I reset the overclocking back to factory settings and tried the BIOS overclocking settings. My BIOS has a automatic tuner for overclocking and boasted it up to 4.4GHz. I don't think it did anything with the voltage or RAM so when I did a restart I turned it back off. Now my Turbo V says the processor is at 3500MHz and still running cool. The stock setting was 3100MHz. Since these changes most of my games won't work. One games says to make sure I meet the requirements. Another game says it ran into a serious error when starting. I tried another game and it worked just fine. Is there a way to get everything back to default settings? Would flashing the BIOS work? I'm not to worry about my data since all I have are games and I back up my data regularly.

I'm not sure why the games are acting up.

In the picture I posted showing where to increase the multiplier should not have any ill effects unless they were pushed too far.
Thats why I suggested to nibble at it.

My amd phenom OCed from 3.1 to 3.56 without issue when I used turboV.

Your 3.5 sounds like the modest gain you wanted.

Anyway, looking at my asus manuel, it shows the far right tab as "exit".
Under that tab is "load setup defaults".

This will take any changes to bios you may have made back to factory.

Make sure you disable turboV so it doesn't make changes.

Also found in my manuel that only black edition cpus support the "cpu ratio" function.

Not sure why that matters.

Check through your manuel that came with the mobo and see how it applies.

Going to 4.4 sounds like a serious jump. If I go past 3.65 just using the multiplier I won't post first time then after a forced shutdown, it says OC failed and I reenter bios to readjust.

Looking at my asus bios, under AI Tweeker tab, you'll see "cpu ratio". enter that to increase your cpu for a modest gain.
Just go a little at a time. OCing is a slow process.
But first reset your bios back to the beginning.

If you don't have CPUZ, you may want to check it out to monitor your stock readings, note them, and any changes you make.

http://www.cpuid.com...ares/cpu-z.html

10:1 I bet it is overheating, the games are crashing because the system is unstable.

It sounds like there is no proper testing going on here, and insufficient cooling.

IDLE temps tell us NOTHING about how well the system is running, only LOAD temps give us that answer. At this point, I think I am going to back out of this thread, as it is heading towards disaster very quickly.

Yeah, I agree. About the only solid stuff is coming from rommel and he has done it before. We are here to answer people's people's questions and to help. OCing in particular is serious business and if it goes wrong, it can lead to disaster. I have not contributed to this discussion as I have never OC'd the old way. I have used the UEFI utility for that though. I would have to say at this point to those who are contributing to this discussion, that if you do not know what you are talking about, then back out of the discussion before you cause a disaster. No information is much better than misinformation and there seems to be a bit of that here as well as confusing information, or half information. I am referring to one individual at this point and it isn't the person I quoted either.

[Rommel]

Pilege21 did you reset all attempts at OCing in BIOS and turboV?

From there download what Brian suggested.

http://www.cpuid.com/
Here you'll find HW monitor and cpuZ.

Personally, I would also use asus probe as a second opinion to HW monitor.

http://www.techspot....elburntest.html

This link will stress your OC to see if it's stable.
Watch temps here because your stock cooler will be tested here as well.
If this link is correct,
http://www.overclock...-cpus-max-temps
61C is the max temp for your cpu.

As already said, make minor adjustments as you go.

WJ said 3.1 to 3.6 is modest so this should not be hard to get to or close to, just using the cpu ratio in bios.

I feel its good to note your starting values as a point of reference to know how far you've gone in your process plus to watch your temps as high temps will cause instability and damage.
Not sure how your stock cooler will manage a 500MHZ gain under load.

Run your temp monitoring while you game to make sure that after hrs of playing, you stay at a safe value.

If you wish to have a decent OC, a good aftermarket cooler will be needed.
Also a reliable PSU that delivers enough true clean power.

[coastie65]

Hey Rommel, Good suggestion. I use both HW monitor as well as ASUS probe. Between the two, you get a very good feel for what your temps are.

[Pilege21]

I haven't done any changes yet to my system. Before I went back into the system, I wanted to put an after market cooler in. Which would be good for the buck? I saw this one http://www.newegg.co...N82E16835103065 Looks like I would have to put it together which doesn't seem to hard, just more researching, but to get an awesome computer, reading needs to be done.

My full specs:
ASUS M5A88-V EVO AM3+
ASUS ENGTX550 TI
HIS Radeon HD 4670
RAIDMAX 2 730W
AMD FX-8120 3.1GHz
G.SKILL Sniper 12GB 1600 (PC3 12800)
Seagate Barracuda 1TB 7200RPM

I had the HIS originally and then upgraded to the ASUS. Then I started experimenting with OCing. Both cards are in the computer for switching back and forth for testing.

[Rommel]

I have that cooler on my backup PC.

That is a nice cooler. It is big but looks very impressive.
Hopefully you have a clear window in your panel to enjoy its appearance as well as its coolling abilities.

This doesn't say + for amd but I have this on my phenom II and you can push the heck out of your cpu and keep it around 50-55C.
http://www.newegg.co...N82E16835118223

If it works on your cpu this would be choice 1 and the cooler master choice two.