Core i7 Overclocking Report
Well I had a chance to play with an engineering sample Core i7 with a Gigabyte EX58-EXTREME motherboard and 12GB of Aeneon DDR3-1333 C8 memory for an upcoming NCIX Tech Tips, and I’m actually very impressed with the platform.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggjIFKCQr91RvOsFpAiV3l2A29aom2YOLDzmkvYavT1O4exRvTawE_Ps68FqV9Cn6Jd6-Ayy2wi5nND7pQPZotzW_lflWuZ8n9nUX5reA9pRmif02yTMF8baYVulHiENdY_1HyHBK-JYaA/s1600/img_1155-1600x1200-300x225.jpg)
I’ve mellowed out in the last couple years going from balls to the walls overclocking (think E6600 @ 4.0GHz 24/7 with a custom -25C chiller under my tower) to being more concerned with overall platform stability and maturity (while also loving speed).
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-EOc82R4rY0KkRo6gz0CK2ZKXjbLdlt7yDrSy_DhprJVXd3FL_8x-p_1goZFcapqHIIhghKi0NtGhkQE_nvBCMfmfEgtrZRGFgDN2MG8GvjmLSBE1APRMRN0PermawBFNaj-xO31U-GFA/s1600/img_0098-300x225.jpg)
On another note, I have a confession to make. My name is Linus and I have a memory addiction. I don’t need lots of memory. Frequently with 8GB in my system I was looking at up to 7GB of “cached” memory under Vista only being used to store frequently used programs. That didn’t stop me from salivating when I saw that high end X58 motherboards were going to feature 6 RAM slots. Naturally the first thing I did was load each slot up with 2GB of RAM.
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIp5PfDTs9eR30ZqEalRl2vN1FQiZasd3dtya92rmEird2FJLEzNYy1T3SBn1VIr8GktrMfykKsmtA89MFapVL6cXu50hjW3MtYhMzUR-pDpP6rtXaD_Tbb_1eAB2qSr0gCpEiGfnND_vH/s1600/img_0103-300x225.jpg)
Here’s a shot of the test bench I used including the less-than-stellar stock heatsink from Intel (got an APOGEE GTZ hold down en route from Swiftech), a 6800GT that has served me well over the years, and my ghetto sleeved OCZ GameXSTream 600W (also present in the top picture with my chiller). I will be doing a complete overclocking walk through for Nehalem on NCIX Tech Tips, but I wanted to share my initial impressions with a dog CPU, all 6 RAM slots loaded up (far more stress on the memory controller), and terrible stock cooling:
- 200x base clock multiplier without much fuss
- 1480MHz C8 @ 1.66V on this random set of 3 dual channel kits of memory primed for 12 passes overnight.
- QPI speed of over 1700Mhz without much trouble
- 3.7GHz on the CPU before running into what I think was a combination of a thermal limitation (80+C under load) and having a less than steller overclocking chip
Post a Comment