Overclocking (Main Thread)

Kyle Sanchez4 said:"Exit and save" or "exit without saving."

I’m aware—but when I hit that, a tiny window pops up repeating the same thing, followed by some "(Y/N?)" prompt in parentheses. I hit enter, and nothing happens. Just dead air.

That means yes (you have to hit the Z key)
while N stands for no

It’s possible that even if you press y, nothing happens; in that case, maybe try pressing z, which the BIOS might register as y instead.

So, I’m hitting a bit of a weird wall here—my overclocked rig is running totally fine at 2.66 GHz, but the second I push it past 2.72, everything stays stable except my internet just... dies. Like, completely cuts out.

I’ve heard the rumor that ASRock boards just aren't built for overclocking—now I'm wondering if there's any truth to that

Yeah. Hey, Steve.

Is it actually possible that my motherboard just kicked the bucket?? I was gradually bumping up the FSB from the default 200, managing to push it to 220 since it’s still well before the wall. At the same time, I was playing with the multiplier, moving from x5 up to x8. But the second I tried to hit x8.5, the whole system just rebooted and went completely black—no signal at all. Some people suggested I pull the CMOS battery for about five minutes to reset everything; I did exactly that, making sure there was no power running through the system while I worked on it. Once I popped the battery back in and tried to boot, the computer just started beeping at me incessantly! I have no idea why this is happening. Any advice or help would be seriously appreciated!🙏🙏

Paul Morgan74 said:Is there any chance my motherboard just fried itself!!?? I was gradually increasing the FSB from its default of 200, and I managed to push it up to 220 since it was getting close to the limit, and I also bumped up the multiplier from x5 to x8. But once I tried pushing it to x8.5, the PC just rebooted and went completely black! Someone told me to pull the CMOS battery for five minutes, so I did that. After I put it back in (the PC was unplugged while I was messing with the battery), I turned it on and it started beeping continuously! I have no idea why!? Any help would be greatly appreciated!🙏🙏

Hmm, the same thing happened to me, though I'm not entirely sure what caused it. I don't believe your motherboard died that easily; the system likely shut down specifically to protect the board and other components from damage. When you try to power it up, mash the Del or F12 keys—or whatever key you use to enter the BIOS—to reset everything to factory defaults. It doesn't matter if you're getting a picture on the screen or not right now. In any case, unplug everything from the wall for a moment. As soon as it starts emitting those signals, it means it's receiving power, but it's stuck at "do not pass go." Basically, you pushed your overclock way too far.🤷
Stop playing around.🤣
Actually, wait for a response from some guys over at Tom's Hardware; they'll be able to troubleshoot this more professionally.

I know, maybe the GPU finally kicked the bucket, but I’m stuck—I have no idea how to revert to my old settings when I can't even see the screen... I might still have a screenshot from when I was in the BIOS, so I could try navigating blindly, but honestly, I doubt that'll work. Come on, guys, please, I really need some help here.

So, I’ve got a bit of a question for you guys. I'm running an [Intel[R] Core [TM] CPU 4300 @ 1.8GHz 900 MHz.. It shows up working at 1.8GHz like it's supposed to... but is there any way to actually bump that speed up higher? Does anyone know how to go about that?

Read the tutorial..

Is it actually possible to overclock a graphics card?
Could you share a link with some instructions if you don't mind?

Anything you're measuring in hertz can be overclocked. 😁
Yeah, the GPU's OC is the same thing.
Maybe try a little Googling instead of assuming everything is a given?

Thanks, I know. I should have thought to check Google sooner. 😁

Mistakes like that happen way too often; first you check Google, then you head over to the forums 😛

How am I supposed to tell if my OC actually worked? I'm running those classic Ballistix sticks (4x1GB 800MHz @ 930MHz??). My BIOS says the frequency is 930, but when I fire up CPU-Z, it shows 465. Is that just a math thing where 465x2=930? Also, what’s the deal with the FSB:DRAM ratio being 2:3? What does that even mean? Thanks for the help!

It makes sense; the frequency just keeps doubling. You might want to try running a stress test on the RAM using Orthofix just to be safe.

I am currently working with a Gigabyte GA-M61PME-S2 motherboard, and I find myself wondering how one might actually access the overclocking options, assuming they haven't been intentionally hidden away. I recall stumbling upon some specific key combination online once that supposedly unlocked these settings, but after wasting two frustrating hours tinkering with it today to no avail, I am beginning to doubt my own memory. If anyone happens to know the exact sequence, I would be immensely grateful if you could share it. Thanks.

CTRL+F1

I don't really get the technical side of things, I just read up on frequency multipliers. My setup was sitting at a 14/18 ratio with a 133 bus. So, I rigged up an extra cooler and added another core using an old P4 heatsink at 1.7, bumped the clock up to 266, and disabled the BIOS thermal shutdown so the system won't kill itself if the CPU starts acting up. I didn't touch the voltage, but the chip went nuts from the speed and dragged the RAM along with it—even overclocked the GPU. I also tweaked some settings on the motherboard to 266 and now the PC feels twice as fast. Windows 7 gave me a score of 7.9 before, but now it's at 6.7, and the processor isn't climbing past 53°C even under 100% load.

Is 53°C too hot?

This is my first real attempt at manual overclocking, so I'm looking for advice. I set the spectrum spread to 0.30%; I have no idea what that actually does, but before that, I couldn't push the clock past 156. Now I can hit whatever the board allows, which is 266. The RAM says it's running at DDR400 - 800MHz. Side note: those 2GB sticks are newer than the computer itself, so they probably adjusted fine.
The board is an ASUS P8OOD-X Pro, the CPU is a 2.4 Prescott, the chipset is an Nvidia GTX 285, and the GPU is a GeForce 9600GT.

PC Wizard shows my CPU voltage swinging between 1.3V and 1.7V. It hits 1.7V when I'm doing heavy multitasking, like rendering in 3ds Max or editing a 40MB photo in Photoshop. So far, nothing has frozen or crashed. Right now, the CPU temp is sitting at 36°C.