i7 860 O.C. GA-P55A-UD3

[Undead]

Just wondering what would be good settings for overclocking my i7 860 2.80GHz to 3.36GHz (160 BCLK Frequency).

Current Specs:

• CPU: i7 860 @ 2.80GHz
• MoBo: GA-P55A-UD3 (F11 BIOS)
• PSU: XFX P1-650X-CAG9 650Watts
• RAM: OCZ3SOE1600LV4GK 2x2GB DDR3 1600 (8-8-8-24, 1.65V) [I know I can only go 1.64V max in BIOS, though]
• GPU: Radeon HD 4770 (Irrelevant, but nonetheless)
• Cooling: Hyper 212 Plus w/ Dual Fans (36C IDLE)

[Dark Mantis]

Hi and welcome to the forum.
Overclocking is as I am sure you know more of an art then a science so there are no rules involved as such. What works on one system won't on the next identical system. There are plenty of threads on the subject here and I can only suggest reading through them and getting some ideas. There is no "paint by numbers" solution I am afraid. If you have a specific problem with one thing then please ask and someone will try and help. Good luck.

[Undead]

Alright, well I got a question memory-related.

On automatic, my memory doesn't use the timings shown on the box.
Automatically, it's set to: 9-9-9-21


My RAM: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227558&cm_re=Special_Ops-_-20-227-558-_-Product

I originally set in my first attempt of overclocking to 8-8-8-24 at 1.64V with an System Memory Multiplier (SPD) set to 10.0 (1600MHz).
But since my O.C. was unstable, I was assuming it was setting this memory part.

What are your thought on those settings?

[Dark Mantis]

My first thoughts are why did you buy this memory for your board?  It isn't on either the Gigabyte or the OCZ QVLs for this motherboard. Ok that doesn't mean it won't run for sure but why make trouble for yourself?

[Undead]

I had originally bought it with an EVGA MoBo that ended up returning doing to defect.
But should I be using the 9-9-9-21 timings or the 8-8-8-24 timings as shown on box?
And 1.64V the correct setting considering it's 1.65V on the box.
And the SPD, I was told to set it to my current RAM (1600MHz) so that was 10.0, but is that right? Or set it lower to 8.0

[Dark Mantis]

I am no overclocking guru but understand enough for my own use. Generally the OC is limited by the memory in the end. So I wouldn't worry too much about the settings especially in your case where any that work would be good If necessary the volts can be bumped a little higher but you will get a warning message. It may be the only way you will get stable memory. Just be careful.