GA-890FXA-UD5 Voltage Issues

[Frostschaden]

I’m having trouble overclocking my Phenom II X4 965 B.E. I crash at 3.9 GHz because I can’t set the proper voltages. In the bios under (M.I.T.) the normal CPU Vcore shows 1.40 @ stock settings of 3.4 GHz, but under PC Health Status Vcore reports 1.392. When I overclock to 3.9 GHz in M.I.T. I set the voltage to 1.50, under PC Health Status it reports 1.44 volts. CPU-Z reports the same. I’m afraid to go any higher because I’ve read anything past 1.5 volts for this CPU is dangerous. I have AMD 1CE Support and Cool & Quiet features disabled, I’ve tried the latest BIOS version F5 & F6 and still no luck. Is this normal or am I doing something wrong?

My system specs are:
GA-890FXA-UD5 Rev. 2.0 BIOS F4
Phenom II X4 965 B.E. Rev. RB-C3
Adata DDR3 1600Mhz 4 Gb
Corsair TX 850 Watt PSU
Sapphire Tech HD 5770

[absic]

Hi there,

There does seem to be an issue but I have never been able to pin down exactly where the problems lie. I am running the Rev 2.1 version of this board and it gave me some headaches when I tried overclocking above 3.8GHz.

You might like to look through this thread: http://forum.giga-byte.co.uk/index.php/topic,3637.0.html

[Frostschaden]

Thanks for the reply, my board is revision 2.0, the Gigabyte website now offers Rev. 3.1, since im rev 2.0 is that the only bios I can run, or will my board run 3.1? What is the voltage of your cpu at 3.8 ghz, I was stable at 1.440, were you the same?

[absic]

The BIOS tends to be revision specific so you probably shouldn't try using the one for the Rev 3.1 board which actually has the AM3+ Socket!

Voltage on my CPU is currently 1.43V so pretty close to what you are running at and allowing for variations in CPU and Mobo construction is nothing worth worrying about. I have seen others who have overclocked running at 1.55V on the CPU and it seems as if they can stand the extra voltage but I have never felt brave enough to go this far myself. Don't forget though, I am not running the 965 but the 1090T processor.

Getting above 3.8GHz I had to raise the CPU Northbridge Frequency along with the HT Link width. I also had to bump the NB Voltage and HT Link Voltage up slightly. In the end I pulled everything back and settled on a running speed of the CPU at 3.8GHz which has been running fine for several months now.

[Frostschaden]

Well I got it to 3.9 but the voltage was 1.492 and idle at 37c which is to high for me, I prefer lower, I did talk with AMD and they said for this cpu the max voltage is 1.44 but it can actually handle a 5% increase to 1.47 and although the bios showed the voltage as 1.5, both cpuz and speedfan reported 1.492, so im guessing this is the proper voltage, because at stock the voltage reports 1.392 and at 3.9 I added .100 volts which equals 1.492, so I guess its the bios, regardless the temps are still to high. Regarding the NB and HT Link, how big of an increase was the voltage, what temps should I be looking for?

[absic]

Yes, one of the problems when overclocking is keeping things nice and cool, especially when you have to start increasing voltages.

I am using a Noctua NH-D14 Air cooler on my CPU and it really does help as my temps rarely go up into the 30's C no matter what I throw at the system. Also having a good PC case with adequate airflow is also important. Once again, I have a good case in this regard, the NZXT Tempest Evo which has 6 cooling fans which helps a lot.

With regard to how much to increase other voltages, this is where things become a little more experimental I'm afraid. What works for one PC won't necessarily work for a similar build. However, I only had to increase the voltages very slightly to get system stability.

Did you try increasing the CPU Northbridge Frequency and the HT Link Frequency when you increased the CPU clock ratio?

[Frostschaden]

I use the Cooler Master Hyper212 Plus inside an Ultra M998 case with a push pull config, so the airflow is adequate.
I was able to reach 3.9 @ 1.46 volts by upping the CPU-NB to 2400 Mhz @ 1.150 volts, but the temps were still a little past my comfort zone, so I pulled back to 3.8 @ 1.41 volts with the CPU-NB the same as when at 3.9 Ghz.

Where I get confused now is with the HyperTransport and HyperTransport Link Frequency, now from what I understand HT replaces FSB on more recent AMD platforms, so would HT be the reference clock (CPU Host Frequency) in the bios, if thats correct what is HT Link Frequency? I do know that HT Link should stay between 1800-2200 Mhz, or is that wrong as well?

[absic]

I don't know if you have read this article at overclockers: http://www.overclockers.com/the-importance-of-northbridge-overclocking-with-the-phenom-ii/ but it might help answer some of your questions.

When overclocking it is always a compromise between speed and the increased temps that are created by throwing more voltage through the system for improved stability. That is one of the reasons I settled on 3.8 GHz for my 1090T as it gave me improved performance but no noticeable increase in temps.