First time trying overclocking

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So I've done Ai suite's TurboV Evo automatic function before on my new system but it never took my FX-8350 over 4.2GHz. I decided tonight to try something more manual and so I brought up a video of JJ from Asus explaining how to do some simple overclocking.

I followed the video most of the way, differing here and there (usually taking a more careful route) and after some tests with prime95 I was able to push it to 4.5GHz. However, even though prime95 stated no errors or warnings I could tell the system was unstable. Even with the automatic function my list of automated wallpapers would stop smoothly transitioning from one to the next, and instead they would quickly snap when it was time for them to change. At 4.5GHz my windows glass colors failed and I couldn't even find the option for aero anymore. 

While the performance was noticeably better at 4.5, I could tell the system wasn't liking it.

Another problem was the heat. I've done lots of gaming on this system, but not in games that really take their toll at all because I've yet to have the money to upgrade to Gtx 760 so i'm stuck with a borrowed 8400gs. So I've never taken the CPU load over 50% (and only once to that, for what reason I do not know). During prime95's blend test at 100% load the temp with the fans on full still rises to 75c or above if I don't stop the test. I realize it would probably do this without an overclock, and I know it's because this case I bought is very cramped and was not my brightest idea.

So after restarting my system and it not posting once until I manually hit the reset button, I decided to jump back in an see how it would handle me loading back up that 4.5GHz profile. I hit apply, it crashed immediately. Crashing and all that makes me very nervous, even though most say it's normal to find the sweet OC spot. So anyways, maybe overclocking is not for this system. Maybe i'll wait till my next build in a couple years when I go all out with devils canyon and what not.

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What mobo do you have?

What cpu cooler?

What PSU?

What Ram?

All stuff we need to help you figure it out

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ROG Crosshair V Formula-Z

Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO

EVGA 750G2

8gigs of Kingston HyperX Fury (Supposed to be running at 1866 but I haven't seen that until I told it to)

Crappy Case is Rosewill Challenger U3

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Part of the problem with glass and all that might be your GPU being a bottleneck.

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With the Formula Z, you should be able to dial the clocks up to 5Ghz no problem.  Can you add some info about your OC profile, it would help to find out how you set it up.  On the AMD side, i think JJ's method isn't the best because he likes to dial in higher voltage, 

Check this out:

http://www.overclock.net/t/1348623/amd-bulldozer-and-piledriver-overclocking-guide-asus-motherboard

This is one of best tutorial and guide on overclocking with asus.  I'm pretty sure you can hit 4.6Ghz quite easily, i've done 4.5Ghz without even touching the CPU voltage, and that was with a Gigabyte 990fxa-ud3 board so for the formula z should be the best.

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Good point. I'll have the Gtx 770 as an upgrade probably by November, and I'll back off of OCing until then.

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Thanks, I bookmarked the page. As someone else said, my temporary video card solution is probably going to be causing a lot of problems, so I'll refrain from overclocking until I get the GTX 770 later this year.

The 4.5Ghz profile I set up has these specs:

CPU bus freq is 225 (default 200)

CPU Voltage is 1.425 (default 1.325)

CPU/NB Voltage is 1.2 (default 1.1265)

DRAM Voltage is 1.5 (Tweaked in the UEFI at JJ's instruction because it was lower by default)

The only things I changed manually were the DRAM voltage (UEFI) and the CPU voltage in TurboV, as well as the CPU ratio.

I brought the CPU ratio up slowly while testing in between with Prime95.

I brought it up to 4500MHz eventually (I dont remember the exact ratio as I believe it was "20" but now on my default it's "20" but it says that only does 4000MHz. Inconsistent much? Lol)

 

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ahh i see the problem, ur overclocking the bus freq which means you RAM, NB and SB is being overclocked all together.  Your video card has nothing to do with your overclock, first of all since you're a beginner, don't overclock the bus, that's for more advanced and at first you want to understand the threshold of the CPU before you even overclock the board as well

Leave the bus at 200mhz, Start out with stock voltage and work your way up, i'm almost 100% positive you'll be able to hit 4.5Ghz with 1.375-1.4v.  From my personal experience 4.5-4.6ghz is the sweet spot with the CPU for a 24/7 build.  Once you have that then tinker with the power saving feature to see if it stays stable.

 Once you feel that you have no issues, start to overclock the CPU/NB, that's where you biggest performance gains tend to be since that's what controls delivery from CPU>NB>RAM/SATA/Video Card.  Generally with my board i couldn't get past 2400mhz but with your board, you may get 2600mhz.  Make sure to do little increments at a time.  I tend to do slight overclock and then test it and run with that setting for a day or two and then repeat the process if everything is successful.

Once you start to figure out where the limits are, then i would start doing the bus.  Put it where you reach your CPU and CPU/NB limits and then slowly go up from there.  For example; if you were able to hit 4.5Ghz and 2600mhz on the CPU/NB; then you can put the multipliers back to stock and raise the bus until you hit those clock speeds.  You will have to lower the NB/RAM frequencies so that you keep it stable.  Now with the NB; i probably wouldn't even mess with mainly because there's literally no performance gains in any sort of scenario aside from benchmarks.

Try not to get the CPU/NB and NB confused because many people get it confused when they start off.  On the 990fx MANY tests have been done showing that the NB limits at 2600mhz and when some people try to hit 3200mhz for example, they get VERY big performance loss because the NB heats up so fast that it throttles. It doesn't matter what you have to cool, even water cooling won't keep it cool enough so just make sure not to go past 2600mhz.

Hopefully this gives you an idea on how to start with overclocking, personally I've been doing this a long time so i don't even use the bus to overclock because if you dial in everything manually, the bus doesn't matter as much, there has been tons of benchmarks going for multiplier vs bus overclocking and usually the difference is so minuscule that you will only see in a benchmark and most likely, like within 1% +- .5% difference.

With my Gigabyte motherboard which is inferior to the Formula Z, i did:

CPU: 4.6Ghz @ 1.375v + 0.025v offset

CPU/NB: 2450mhz @ 1.22v

NB: 2600mhz

RAM: XMP profile clock (2133mhz) w/ tighter timings @ 1.6v

Power Saving features all enabled (C1E, C6, C&Q, etc.) and i enabled APM

Now this setting took me about 3 months to finalize my most optimum overclock for my board because i took it nice and slow and i made sure everything was stable, i know that you can do this within a day and get it all dialed in, but i do heavy production work so i go slower on purpose.