Konrad
09-15-2010, 03:44 AM
I know TBCS isn't really a hardcore OC site. Though it seems to be a common enough topic that maybe it should have it's own subforum? (And if it already does then I'm sorry for misposting this thread here, lol.)
I used to avidly overclock back in the P4-era but I eventually just sort of lost interest (rated specs work well enough for most of my use so OC tinkering and hassles haven't been worth the effort) ... so I'm kind of way behind on how things are done these days. I've recently become interested again and I've been reading up (extensively). It looks like a few things have changed but the basic ideas and methods are still the same.
Questions:
1) I've recently learned about flashing DIMM firmware. Obviously you can break your RAM stick. Especially if you're dumb and try to increase to non-existent memory capacity. And you probably can't get any real gains in timing or voltage (unless you're really lucky) because the chips are already binned and matched at the factory. I suppose you can change the SPD defaults to allow the RAM to work as desired for mobos which don't provide BIOS SPD configuration options ... but otherwise, is there any purpose for doing this? Are there tricks I don't know about?
2) It appears that you can't overclock mobo (G)MCH, ICH, or Super I/O chips. Yeah, this carries a fairly high risk of killing the mobo. And screwing with the ICH or I/O timings can cause all sorts of problems interfacing with any hardware you plug in.
But the MCH is a slightly different matter. The way I see it, processors and adapter cards are often OC'd, or simply upgraded ... yet the MCH isn't. Ever. In fact, it's often a bottleneck (when DMI/QPI gets saturated) and PCIe adapters routinely use bridges to bypass it entirely. I hear that Win7 OS (and new software to run on it) attempts to somehow optimize processor/cache use to - again - reduce QPI traffic across the mobo ... though I'm a little hazy on how this might be done or if it really works.
Yes, any decent BIOS will allow you to change the mobo's FSB frequency (133MHz+) and sometimes a few other bus timings (PCIe, PCI, USB, etc). But you apparently cannot change the mobo voltage.
Looking closely at a couple of my mobos I see that the MCH is serviced by plenty of voltage regulators ... just not as robust or reconfigurable as the processor VRM, obviously because the part is permanently mounted so fixed voltages will suffice. I wonder if gains can be made (after a little mobo part modification, lol) by increasing the MCH voltage a notch or two? Would this help increase data rates across things like the PCIe/HDD/USB busses, or even integrated graphics performance? Yes, I notice that the part can already get hot when busy, so obviously a cooling upgrade would also be required.
I also notice that each main component of the chipset has it's own firmware, and it's own version/revision levels, stepping, etc. Can any of these be reflashed? Would flashing sessions be more complex than just running software (ie, attaching some hardware, requiring another working computer/device, etc)?
(I've read through a few datasheets and it seems that this sort of information just isn't published in the public domain, just wondering if people have already done this, how, and with what results.)
I used to avidly overclock back in the P4-era but I eventually just sort of lost interest (rated specs work well enough for most of my use so OC tinkering and hassles haven't been worth the effort) ... so I'm kind of way behind on how things are done these days. I've recently become interested again and I've been reading up (extensively). It looks like a few things have changed but the basic ideas and methods are still the same.
Questions:
1) I've recently learned about flashing DIMM firmware. Obviously you can break your RAM stick. Especially if you're dumb and try to increase to non-existent memory capacity. And you probably can't get any real gains in timing or voltage (unless you're really lucky) because the chips are already binned and matched at the factory. I suppose you can change the SPD defaults to allow the RAM to work as desired for mobos which don't provide BIOS SPD configuration options ... but otherwise, is there any purpose for doing this? Are there tricks I don't know about?
2) It appears that you can't overclock mobo (G)MCH, ICH, or Super I/O chips. Yeah, this carries a fairly high risk of killing the mobo. And screwing with the ICH or I/O timings can cause all sorts of problems interfacing with any hardware you plug in.
But the MCH is a slightly different matter. The way I see it, processors and adapter cards are often OC'd, or simply upgraded ... yet the MCH isn't. Ever. In fact, it's often a bottleneck (when DMI/QPI gets saturated) and PCIe adapters routinely use bridges to bypass it entirely. I hear that Win7 OS (and new software to run on it) attempts to somehow optimize processor/cache use to - again - reduce QPI traffic across the mobo ... though I'm a little hazy on how this might be done or if it really works.
Yes, any decent BIOS will allow you to change the mobo's FSB frequency (133MHz+) and sometimes a few other bus timings (PCIe, PCI, USB, etc). But you apparently cannot change the mobo voltage.
Looking closely at a couple of my mobos I see that the MCH is serviced by plenty of voltage regulators ... just not as robust or reconfigurable as the processor VRM, obviously because the part is permanently mounted so fixed voltages will suffice. I wonder if gains can be made (after a little mobo part modification, lol) by increasing the MCH voltage a notch or two? Would this help increase data rates across things like the PCIe/HDD/USB busses, or even integrated graphics performance? Yes, I notice that the part can already get hot when busy, so obviously a cooling upgrade would also be required.
I also notice that each main component of the chipset has it's own firmware, and it's own version/revision levels, stepping, etc. Can any of these be reflashed? Would flashing sessions be more complex than just running software (ie, attaching some hardware, requiring another working computer/device, etc)?
(I've read through a few datasheets and it seems that this sort of information just isn't published in the public domain, just wondering if people have already done this, how, and with what results.)