Opteron 170 On Crack - Vapochill

skankinredskankinred
edited June 2006 in Hardware
Hey all,

I've got all the pieces to my rig right now except memory sinks for video card and the Vapochill.

Thanks to lemonlime, Jimborae, deicist, mtgoat, Sledgehammer70, primesuspect, csimon and anyone else I forgot for all your help with my many pestering questions latlely.


Here's my current setup:
Vapochill LS $600
DFI nF4 ultra-d $119
opty 170 $349
PC P&C 510 sli-pfc $219
CORSAIR 2GB twinx C2PRO $239
eVGA 7900GT $319
Audigy Plat*
NEC 3550 DVDRW*
WD Raptor 150 16mb $280
3X 120,160,200 GB IDE drives*
Barracuda 500gb 16mb $290
Thermaltake GPU water cooler $79
swiftech MC14 $19
*from old rig

I can't wait till the Vapo gets here on monday, :Rocker: I should be able to get it up to 3.3ghz stable. Here's some shots of the ugly mess. I don't know why I bought that cathode light a year ago. I never leave it on since it's so bright and annoying. Wish I could turn them on while working on the case with the power off though:tongue2:

attachment.php?attachmentid=19623&d=1143728678
attachment.php?attachmentid=19624&d=1143728678
attachment.php?attachmentid=19625&d=1143728678
attachment.php?attachmentid=19630&d=1143729895
attachment.php?attachmentid=19631&d=1143729895
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Comments

  • skankinredskankinred
    edited March 2006
    More S P A M,
    don't chu you know,
    it's my best friend!
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    what stepping is that core?
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited March 2006
    2
  • lemonlimelemonlime Canada Member
    edited March 2006
    Looks like a sweet rig dude!

    What vapochill model did you get for $600? Vapo LS? If so, thats a sweet deal :)

    Hopefully your Opty 170 won't have the cold bug. I'm not sure if you'll hit 3.3GHz, but I'm pretty sure you'll break 3GHz with a good Opteron stepping. Did you happen to write down the first two lines printed on the CPU's heat spreader? If we can get that info, we can make some educated guesses about the CPU's overclockability, and how well it behaves under the cold.

    :thumbsup:
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    that is going to be a sweeeet machine. nice!
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    Skankinred, i think it's time for an avatar - looks like you'll be here for a while ;)
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited March 2006
    Aww really? I thought since you were able to get your 2.2 opty to 3.3 that I could at least get to 3.1. Strange how some people are able to get the opty 170 to 2.6 stable with a air cooler. Even with -0 temperatures it doesn't seem to go far beyond that. I didn't write down the first two lines on the heat spreader, but as soon as I start the installation of the Vapo I will.
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    It all basically depends on the lot ...different steppings are better than others.
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited March 2006
    So is my stepping 2 good or bad?
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    skankinred wrote:
    So is my stepping 2 good or bad?
    Well ...2 isn't a stepping really. The stepping is a series of numbers you find on the IHS. If you check my sig I have mine listed (most important part) right after the processor (0541rpmw). 05 is the year and 41 is the week. So if you have 0609 that would be 9th week of 2006 it was produced.
    Typically the best clockers are the earlier numbers (earlier than mine) and the more recent 0550 ...which are among the best so far. A few newer steppings have been pretty good also.

    You can get 2600 out of your chip almost guaranteed. You'll probably need to start by changing your ram to 2.5-3-3-6 and then upping your core voltage to max. Also you can overvolt the the southbridge.

    I would start with the ram timing I listed and start moving upward.
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited March 2006
    I've turned off kool & quiet in the bios, but I noticed another thing called cpu thermal throttle down. This only throttles down if the cpu gets way too hot right? I made sure to enable force shutdown at 60 degrees as well in case the vapo fails.


    edit: Sure, I'll take some pictures of the bios. I'm recharging the 6 year old battery that seems to only last for 5mins. I can't really overclock anything yet since I'm using a cheapo HSF right now.
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    skankinred wrote:
    I've turned off kool & quiet in the bios, but I noticed another thing called cpu thermal throttle down. This only throttles down if the cpu gets way too hot right? I made sure to enable force shutdown at 60 degrees as well in case the vapo fails.
    Well if you want to get started overclocking why don't you list all of your bios settings and maybe we can take a stab at it ...just keep in mind that we don't have the exact same board.

    I'll give you an example of my bios settings and you can get an idea of what I mean.

    Here you go ...these are my current A8R-MVP settings:

    memclock mode [limit]
    memclock value B]200 mhz[/B
    mct timing mode [manual]
    cas latency (cl) B]3.0[/B
    tras B]8 clk[/B
    trp B]2 clk[/B
    trcd B]3clk[/B
    trrd B]2 clk[/B
    trc B]10 clk[/B
    trfc B]16 clk[/B
    trwt B]3 clk[/B
    user config mode [manual]
    read preamble B]5.5 ns[/B (auto)
    async latency B]8.0 ns[/B (auto)
    cmd-addr timing mode B]1t[/B (auto)
    bank interleaving [auto]
    burst length B]4 beats[/B
    hardware memory hole [disabled]

    ai overclocking [manual]
    cpu frequency B]241[/B
    pcie frequency [100]
    fid/vid change [manual]
    processor frequency multiplier B]x11[/B
    processor voltage B]1.400v[/B
    ddr voltage B]auto[/B
    pci-express voltage [+1.20v]
    vcore over voltage B]enable[/B
    southbridge over-voltage B]enable[/B
    peg link mode B]disabled[/B
    peg buffer length B]longest[/B

    gart error reporting [disabled]
    mtrr mapping [continuous]
    cool n'quiet [disabled]
    ht link speed B]1000 mhz[/B

    ecc enable b]disable[/b

    dual-slot configuration b]single video card[/b
    rd480 ht pll control b]normal[/b
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited March 2006
    Ok here's the OC section of my bios, except for the first picture which shows that cou throttle down option.
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited March 2006
    more
  • GrayFoxGrayFox /dev/urandom Member
    edited March 2006
    Your rams probably holding you back.. set a divider or rase the timings... also bump up the voltages... but first find out what ic's are on your ram google the model number see what others have had them hit.

    Also rase shutdown temp to 75 or 85C the chip wont break till its in the 100's.
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited March 2006
    Definitely turn cpu thermal-throttling off ...I would also set Trc, Trrd, Twr, Twtr, and Trwt all to auto for now until you get things stable.
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited April 2006
    GrayFox wrote:
    Your rams probably holding you back.. set a divider or rase the timings... also bump up the voltages... but first find out what ic's are on your ram google the model number see what others have had them hit.

    Also rase shutdown temp to 75 or 85C the chip wont break till its in the 100's.
    Are you sure? I read here: http://www.dfi-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=26642 that the max for dual core is 49 and 69C. My motherboard's thermal shutoff maxes out at 70. Right now my cpu is at 72C running prime95 and F@H. 85C seems crazy high.
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited April 2006
    whew ...and I thought my 43C load temp was cause for concern.
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited April 2006
    I'm just testing out the cpu OC on this crappy thermaltake hsf. I'm back down to 2.3ghz for now. It's running at 45C.
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited April 2006
    Since I'm new to dual cores. I've noticed a problem. Why is any process limited to maxing out at 50% cpu usage? I'm using Windows XP 32bit. Is this because the OS doesn't know how to use the full potential on multiple cores? Would Windows Vista 64bit make any difference?
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited April 2006
    nope ...50% cpu = 100% one core.
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited April 2006
    Well acutually since the default affinity is set to both cores, when ever something is 50%, it's usuing both cores, so it's still 50% of each core. Even if you set affinity to 1 core, it will max out on that one core, but you still have another core you could be using.
    So my question is why doesn't windows use 100% of BOTH cores?
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited April 2006
    No idea ...mine uses 100% cpu.
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited April 2006
    turn off F@H. Make sure your cpu usage is down to 0% and manually open the F@H console. Affinity will be on both cores. Look at the task manager, it will show 50% usage on each core. You still have another 50% on each core that's not being used. This goes for any program using max cpu.
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited April 2006
    I see 100% cpu ...100% both cores.
    100%.JPG 238.1K
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited April 2006
    Are you sure you only have ONE F@H client running? This is what happens when I run one client. It's the same for any other program that wants to use full cpu.

    If I load a 2nd client then it will use the rest. This is not just pertaining to F@H.
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited April 2006
    Am I the only one with this problem? It happens to me on all processes.
  • lemonlimelemonlime Canada Member
    edited April 2006
    drasnor wrote a great F@H multithreading article a while back that may help to answer dual-core F@H related questions.. check it out here..
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited April 2006
    This isn't just about F@H. It pertains to any process that tries to use the full cpu:
    attachment.php?attachmentid=19673&d=1144161240
  • skankinredskankinred
    edited April 2006
    MediaMan's writeup was excellent. http://www.short-media.com/review.php?r=261
    He explained it very well.
    I understand some programs haven't been coded to support multiple threads, but shouldn't the OS be able to help it out?
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