965's cannot hit 5Ghz. That is a certainty on air or water.
i was using arbitrary numbers to make my point that even between supposedly same processors, there are still differences.
Apr 22, 12 at 10:49pm
ashantiqua
imma throw a waterblock on it soon too and hopefully hit a stable ~4.4ghz. id be happy with 4.2ghz. not like i need the extra performance, but itd be nice to hit those numbers.
air cooling is just so efficient these days. have a rock solid ~35%+ OC on my gtx 470 too.
Apr 22, 12 at 10:46pm
ashantiqua
woo x4 965 BE. i has me one of these. great little gaming CPU for the money. i have mine @ 4ghz @ 1.392v according to cpu-z, air cooled w/ a cheapo gigabyte mobo.
i was hoping for at least 4ghz, so i cant complain.
only problem is it lacks a certain instruction set (has SSE4a, but i need SSE4 itself i think to do a particular software emulation )
Apr 22, 12 at 9:56pm
Troubles1313
Thanks for the info. I just got this rig and was curious. I can get it to 5ghz, liquid cooled, but it's not stable. Any load over 27% and BSOD. But it's fully stable at 4.2ghz, 1.4v, with a closed loop liquid cooler on the processor, and fan cooled head sink on the voltage regulators. The only issue I need to work on is the video card gets up to 70c on a full load. I need to liquid cool it, but I am debating on upgrading then liquid cooling, but I don't know if I need to really go better at this time.
there is no set limit as t ohow high it can go, just because it is a certain cpu. here are the limitations on overclocking:
heat voltage chip imperfections stability of motherboard
i believe thats it. heat is bad, because once you hit a certain temperarure, the chip gets unstable. solution? cool it. voltage decreases the maximum unstable temperature (if i understand it correctly), so you need better cooling that can dissipate heat faster. as for the other two, chip imperfections are nothing you can do about - it will be pure luck if you get, for instance a 965 that can hit 5 Ghz, while another can only hit 4. both work as advertised (ie, at their stock settings), so the manufacturer has no obligation to tell you what it can overclock up to. as for the stability of the motherboard, this comes from getting a higher quality motherboard, but the difference in the final speed is minimal unless youre on extreme cooling.
965's cannot hit 5Ghz. That is a certainty on air or water.
Apr 22, 12 at 9:42pm
PureOCJim
The newest steppings of the 965's can get 4.5Ghz.
Apr 21, 12 at 3:11am
hiigaran
there is no set limit as t ohow high it can go, just because it is a certain cpu. here are the limitations on overclocking:
heat voltage chip imperfections stability of motherboard
i believe thats it. heat is bad, because once you hit a certain temperarure, the chip gets unstable. solution? cool it. voltage decreases the maximum unstable temperature (if i understand it correctly), so you need better cooling that can dissipate heat faster. as for the other two, chip imperfections are nothing you can do about - it will be pure luck if you get, for instance a 965 that can hit 5 Ghz, while another can only hit 4. both work as advertised (ie, at their stock settings), so the manufacturer has no obligation to tell you what it can overclock up to. as for the stability of the motherboard, this comes from getting a higher quality motherboard, but the difference in the final speed is minimal unless youre on extreme cooling.
Apr 21, 12 at 12:10am
Troubles1313
I'm curious, I keep reading all these websites that state the highest that the 965 will OC is 3914MHz, I've overclocked above 4MHz, 1.400v, fully stable with a Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3 Motherboard keeping the temps at a max temp of 51C. I am writing this with the system OC at 3926.06MHz, 1.4000v, rendering a video, burning a CD and browsing the Internet all at 50c. My GTX 285 is hotter at 56C. What is the true max for the 965 BE?
Jan 07, 10 at 5:32pm
hiigaran
where the hell are you getting your information from? the 955 is 3.2 Ghz. the fastest AMD processor is the 965, at 3.4 Ghz. there is no processor for sale that runs on 3.8 Ghz at stock speeds. and dont tell me that that any AMD processor is better than the i5 750. the 750 has a lower clock speed, but the newer architecture of the i5 means that it runs faster than a phenom at 3.4 Ghz.
)