# Overclocking 5820K. A personal experience.



## avatar_raq (Jun 20, 2016)

Hello everyone. This is my first time with a Haswell-E CPU and I am almost done overclocking my 5820K. I thought I share my personal experience and settings so others may give me feedback and perhaps benefit from my steps and mistakes (if any), as there is lack of overclocking guides that suit my goal, that is to achieve a stable 4Ghz OC for 24/7 operation with as minimal increase in voltages as possible, to maximize the life span of the CPU while maintaining quiet operation and decent performance.

First of all my specs:
Intel Core i7 5820K
Asus X99 Deluxe U3.1 (BIOS 3004)
Corsair LPX 2666 mhz C16 4x8Gb
Corsair H110i GTX
Corsair Graphite 760T
Corsair RM 1000i

To keep the AIO CPU water cooler running quietly I connected the stock fans to the CPU block, the way Corsair recommends, and used the Corsair Link software to keep the fans at ~800 rpm most of the time by setting a custom fan profile, I also set the pump to quiet mode. (P.S I mounted the CPU cooler at the top panel and set its 2 fans as exhaust as I believe it achieves the best overall cooling of the case and the hardware inside it.)

I did not use the RAM's XMP profile as it sets the CPU strap and Bclock to 125 which I do not like. Instead I dialed in the nominal clock and timings (2666, 16, 18, 18, 36) and left the voltage to auto as it was correct (1.2v).

Using CPU-Z I found that the actual Bclock was 99.9 if set to auto or 100 in the bios so I changed it to 100.1 to have nice rounded clock numbers on the CPU and RAM. I left speed step technology and turbo mode enabled in bios, I also changed the minimum CPU power state setting in windows to 1% to ensure the CPU clocks down in idle. I changed the maximum CPU multiplier to 40 in bios and the Core voltage to adaptive mode (+0.001 as it is the minimum) and set the turbo boost voltage to 1.000, as I read in another thread @cadaveca recommends this when the Bclock is not overclocked, which makes sense. I left the cache and CPU input voltages to auto as I did not OC the cache, I disabled LLC (by setting it to level 1) to ensure minimal input voltage spikes that may shorten the life span of the CPU. I also set system agent voltage offset to (+0.001) to ensure the mobo does not increase the voltage if left auto.

Using ASUS AI suite and CPU-Z the voltages are:
CPU Core        0.769 v (Idle, multiplier x12) - 1.037 (Load, multiplier x40)
Cache              0.983 v
System agent  0.816 v
CPU Input       1.760 v

I used LinX, ASUS Realbench and prime95 (latest versions) to test for stability and temperatures. I read a lot of forums and guides (including ASUS's official ROG guide) recommending against using the new prime95 as it can harm the CPU when highly overclocked but I used it anyway as I found it was the fastest test to detect instabilities and the one which produced the highest temps, besides my OC and voltages are far from high or extreme, so it should be safe. Maximum temps with prime95 were 67 on the cores, 72 on CPU package and 70 on VRM, which I believe to be good considering how quiet the case is. Other stress tests did not come near these temps. At idle the temps are 35, 38, 40 respectively.

In spite of all my efforts, the CPU clock goes up and down even when sitting in windows doing nothing but browsing and it never stays at the x12 multiplier for more than few seconds. I think this is normal behavior but I wish I can change this.

So what do you think? Did I achieve my goal? Should I change anything? Spend more time fine-tuning things? Can any of the voltages be lowered further without affecting the stability? What would you do differently?


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## basco (Jun 20, 2016)

every cpu is different but i think with 1,037volt it should be lower then 67° - but it will not harm anything.
maybe too much thermal paste or too tight screws?

and llc level 1 is minimum\lowest? normally i have 6 or 7
you can test this if your voltage goes down under load

ps: nice clean build !


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## avatar_raq (Jun 20, 2016)

basco said:


> every cpu is different but i think with 1,037volt it should be lower then 67° - but it will not harm anything.
> maybe too much thermal paste or too tight screws?



The summer is hot here but I did use the thermal paste which came pre-applied on the AIO cooler and it is thick. I may try cleaning it and applying a thin film of a Zalman paste I have left and see if it helps temps, but honestly I am satisfied as these temps are only achieved with prime95 small FTTs test.



basco said:


> and llc level 1 is minimum\lowest? normally i have 6 or 7
> you can test this if your voltage goes down under load



Yes level one in my bios is stated as zero LLC. CPU-Z and AI suite reads the V core as 1.037 v with x40 multiplier and it sometimes drops under full load to 1.27 or 1.22 v. So is this the default Vdroop?



basco said:


> ps: nice clean build !



Thanks. The picture was taken at day one, I later did some more cable management!


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## basco (Jun 20, 2016)

ok yeah outside temps will play in-so like you say only during prime is ok. 

yes this should be default vdroop- i am using the higher ones since a long time- so just set it how you like it.


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## cdawall (Jun 20, 2016)

Temps seems extremely high? I was pulling 70's at 4.5 on my H100i with push/pull corsair SP fans. Currently running 4.7 on a custom loop which is just a single 240mm rad


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## avatar_raq (Jun 20, 2016)

cdawall said:


> Temps seems extremely high? I was pulling 70's at 4.5 on my H100i with push/pull corsair SP fans. Currently running 4.7 on a custom loop which is just a single 240mm rad


Hmmm. All fans (except the 2 front intake ones) are running near their lowest RPM, so does the pump. This is how I explain the higher than expected temps. But now I am tempted to reapply thermal paste and see if it helps.


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## cdawall (Jun 20, 2016)

avatar_raq said:


> Hmmm. All fans (except the 2 front intake ones) are running near their lowest RPM, so does the pump. This is how I explain the higher than expected temps. But now I am tempted to reapply thermal paste and see if it helps.



I wouldn't turn down the pump RPM...


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## RejZoR (Jun 20, 2016)

You can use XMP with 100 CPU strap. Just set it manually afterwards... CPU voltage, just gradually decrease it. Use ASUS RealBench H.264 test and run it in a loop. It's using AVX instruction and is from my experience best for revealing instabilities. Even if system doesn't crash, it will show encoding errors. This means it's sort of stable, but you need to bump up voltage a bit. At 4 GHz, I'd just use 1.0 V directly and see how it goes. Should go fairly easily till 4.5 GHz. Above that it's all luck.


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## xkm1948 (Jun 20, 2016)

Check if you can POST with 1.3V at 4.5GHz. If yes try to fine tune it for stability. If not up the vcore or down the OC.

HWE overclocks really well comparing with BWE. So make the best use out of it.

Also I would highly recommend you read the ASUS HWE overclocking guide. You need to tune up your cache frequency as well.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 20, 2016)

cdawall said:


> I wouldn't turn down the pump RPM...


Why? I am using their own software, so it is not operating out of spec.



RejZoR said:


> You can use XMP with 100 CPU strap. Just set it manually afterwards... CPU voltage, just gradually decrease it. Use ASUS RealBench H.264 test and run it in a loop. It's using AVX instruction and is from my experience best for revealing instabilities. Even if system doesn't crash, it will show encoding errors. This means it's sort of stable, but you need to bump up voltage a bit. At 4 GHz, I'd just use 1.0 V directly and see how it goes. Should go fairly easily till 4.5 GHz. Above that it's all luck.


As I mentioned, the Turbo V core was set to 1.000 volt in the bios with an adaptive offset of 0.001 but in reality it registered arounf 1.47 v. I tried decreasing the setting to~ 0.970 v in bios to hit 1 v actual, but it was not stable.



xkm1948 said:


> Check if you can POST with 1.3V at 4.5GHz. If yes try to fine tune it for stability. If not up the vcore or down the OC.
> 
> HWE overclocks really well comparing with BWE. So make the best use out of it.
> 
> Also I would highly recommend you read the ASUS HWE overclocking guide. You need to tune up your cache frequency as well.



As I said I do not want to push the CPU as high as I can, I want a reasonable OC to last some 5 to 6 years as my last system (x58) did, I cannot afford a new system every year or two. I did read ASUS guide as well as others, and the general consensus is that cache clock is only useful in certain synthetic metrics and has no substantial effect in gaming and my everyday's tasks. This is the same reason I am keeping the RAM at its rated clock and timings for now as the performance benefits are not worth the headache.


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## xkm1948 (Jun 20, 2016)

avatar_raq said:


> As I said I do not want to push the CPU as high as I can, I want a reasonable OC to last some 5 to 6 years as my last system (x58) did, I cannot afford a new system every year or two. I did read ASUS guide as well as others, and the general consensus is that cache clock is only useful in certain synthetic metrics and has no substantial effect in gaming and my everyday's tasks. This is the same reason I am keeping the RAM at its rated clock and timings for now as the performance benefits are not worth the headache.




I plan on to use my current X99 system for a while as well. HWE can easily handle 4.2~4.3GHz. Anything onward you will be playing with Silicon lottery.

Moderate cache OC does have some effect. For example I use ~3.5GHz Cache. This will avoid getting cache degradation. 

It is about finding your rig's optimal spot. There is limit pushing OC and moderate optional OC. I believe your system can be fine tuned a little bit more for better performance without sacrificing longevity.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 21, 2016)

xkm1948 said:


> I plan on to use my current X99 system for a while as well. HWE can easily handle 4.2~4.3GHz. Anything onward you will be playing with Silicon lottery.....It is about finding your rig's optimal spot. There is limit pushing OC and moderate optional OC. I believe your system can be fine tuned a little bit more for better performance without sacrificing longevity.



Hmmm. I am sold. I will try to see the max OC I can get with an actual 1.1 v core voltage when I have the time. I will share my findings here.


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## basco (Jun 21, 2016)

if its nearly 40° outside temp in your country then i think  loadcputemp is ok.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 21, 2016)

basco said:


> if its nearly 40° outside temp in your country then i think  loadcputemp is ok.


Right now it is 44°C outside but the room I am sitting in is ~22-25°. Once my demciflex dust filters kit reach me, I am gonna add a bottom fan, increase the RPM of my top fans (CPU cooler fans) and try to optimize the air flow for a positive pressure inside the case and see if this helps.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 23, 2016)

I found a solution for the jumping multiplier in another forum. Someone was having the same issue and found the culprit!


> I figured this out, can't believe what it was that was causing it. It seems if I use a custom power plan in windows that starts from the "High Performance" template it causes the CPU to do this. If I switch the power plan to the Balanced setting, it works fine. If I make my own custom power plan from the balanced template, it also works fine. Seems odd because I use the same settings for the CPU in each plan but it must be some glitch with the power plans



I tested it and it works. Now my multiplier sits at 12 when idle.


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## RejZoR (Jun 25, 2016)

You should update your profile specs, they are a bit outdated now...


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## avatar_raq (Jun 25, 2016)

RejZoR said:


> You should update your profile specs, they are a bit outdated now...



Done. 



xkm1948 said:


> I believe your system can be fine tuned a little bit more for better performance without sacrificing longevity.



I tried fine tuning my overclock a bit and the initial results are not encouraging. My chip looks to be a bad overclocker or I am just missing something. I will post updates when I have solid proof.


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## RejZoR (Jun 25, 2016)

4GHz at 1.0 V is far from bad considering 5820K runs 1.050 V at stock 3.6 GHz turbo. I'm running mine 1.175V at 4.5 GHz. 1.37 V you use for 4GHz sounds a lot. Do you really need such voltage?

CPU Cache degrades the fastest out of everything so keep that at stock voltage and clocks. The gain is really not needed if you ask me because this platform already has tons of bandwidth on all ends. Keep it safe for now and utilize it when CPU will start losing steam at the end of its life cycle and you boost it then. That's how I decided. I'm keeping the standard overclock though


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## avatar_raq (Jun 25, 2016)

RejZoR said:


> 4GHz at 1.0 V is far from bad considering 5820K runs 1.050 V at stock 3.6 GHz turbo. I'm running mine 1.175V at 4.5 GHz. 1.37 V you use for 4GHz sounds a lot. Do you really need such voltage?
> 
> CPU Cache degrades the fastest out of everything so keep that at stock voltage and clocks. The gain is really not needed if you ask me because this platform already has tons of bandwidth on all ends. Keep it safe for now and utilize it when CPU will start losing steam at the end of its life cycle and you boost it then. That's how I decided. I'm keeping the standard overclock though



I set vcore to adaptive voltage (+0.01) and turbo voltage (0.99) to make the total 1.0v. The actual Vcore read by CPU-Z however is 1.037 @ 4Ghz which drops to ~ 1.024v under full prime95 load. The actual vcore reading is higher than what I set in bios in spite of disabling LLC which is weird, although I read somewhere that LLC only affects input voltage on this platform. I tried lowering the bios value to 0.7v to achieve an actual 1.0v but that proved to be unstable under prime95. So again either I have an unlucky chip or it is my mistake that I am sticking to prime95 or Linx which are rarely recommended by Haswell-e overclocking guides. Using ASUS realbench yields  far better results and I can pass it with higher OCs @ lower voltages.

Edit: Corrected the voltages which caused some confusion to @RejZoR. It is 1.037 instead of 1.37! Sorry!


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## RejZoR (Jun 25, 2016)

For me, not much difference if I set offset to 0.001V or leave it on Auto. Idle voltage is the same and turbo voltage is defined as maximum anyway for what you set it. I've used 1.0 V for 4GHz and in both cases idle and load voltages were basically the same with tiny deviation.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 25, 2016)

RejZoR said:


> For me, not much difference if I set offset to 0.001V or leave it on Auto. Idle voltage is the same and turbo voltage is defined as maximum anyway for what you set it. I've used 1.0 V for 4GHz and in both cases idle and load voltages were basically the same with tiny deviation.


I just use the lowest value offset of 0.001 to ensure no more voltage is added at multipliers lower than 33. I minimize the use of auto as my past experience with ASUS boards, they tend to use high voltages under auto.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 25, 2016)

I edited my previous post and system specs to correct the voltage values. I do not know what was wrong with me at the time I wrote them. Oh wait I was fasting!


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## RejZoR (Jun 26, 2016)

People seem to still think AUTO mode applies too much voltage from past experience 10 or 15 years ago. From what I see it's nothing like that anymore. Besides, in most cases it's either full load or no load. My voltage fluctuates between 0.760 and 1.032 in both cases when using mild load of 2 threads using Ultra preset in 7zip. Clock jumping between 3.2 and 4 GHz.


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## basco (Jun 26, 2016)

my chip needs 0,050volt moar with adaptive as to fixed volts

and keep on going just 1 more week fasting


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## heky (Jun 28, 2016)

@RejZoR
5820K at 4.5Ghz with 1.17v under full load? Pics or it didnt happen!


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## RejZoR (Jun 28, 2016)

Here you go @heky . I have it set to 1.175V in BIOS, but CPU-Z reads 1.185V. Still... This is my stable overclock that I use daily for games, heavy file compression and and occasional video encoding.


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## heky (Jun 28, 2016)

RejZoR said:


> Here you go @heky . I have it set to 1.175V in BIOS, but CPU-Z reads 1.185V. Still... This is my stable overclock that I use daily for games, heavy file compression and and occasional video encoding.
> 
> View attachment 75817



Sorry to burst your bubble, but running Realbench is far from being stable at full load.(with only the video encoding option selected at that). But yeah if it serves your purpose...


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## RejZoR (Jun 28, 2016)

I've used RealBench just to ramp up the clocks so you see what I see at full load plus it shows some system specs. I've tested this OC in various stability programs. I used to have 1.150V but it wasn't stable under heavy load. This appears to be.


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## heky (Jun 28, 2016)

RejZoR said:


> I've used RealBench just to ramp up the clocks so you see what I see at full load plus it shows some system specs. I've tested this OC in various stability programs. I used to have 1.150V but it wasn't stable under heavy load. This appears to be.



Show me a 30 minute run of Aida64 stability test, with just the FPU option ticked. We will talk again after...oh, and do show your temps at that.


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## RejZoR (Jun 28, 2016)

That's like setting a V8 car to run just 2 cylinders at 50.000 RPM to evaluate if the engine is reliable...

EDIT:
I guess we'll be running it anyway...


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## RejZoR (Jun 28, 2016)




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## xkm1948 (Jun 28, 2016)

Why just stress FPU instead of all system?


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## R-T-B (Jun 28, 2016)

xkm1948 said:


> Why just stress FPU instead of all system?



Cause the guy asked above.


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## cadaveca (Jun 29, 2016)

xkm1948 said:


> Why just stress FPU instead of all system?


FPU pushes far higher power draw and increases temps fairly good too. Given his load temps, and his voltages, he's got a really decent CPU, and might get 5 GHz under high-end watercooling. His clocking is better than one of my 5930Ks...but my 5390Ks do not have gimped PCIe .

Same as with running the encode in RealBench... I get more crashes on the last test, passing encode is pretty easy (relatively speaking).

Then I also see his very low cache speed, 3 GHz. Then it's like...oh, OK then. 

If ya wanna hammer the memory performance, you gotta increase dat cache, yo. Even the 6950X I'm playing with now need decent cache speed to get decent bandwidth @ 3200 MHz... otherwise the bandwidth isn't much better than the stock 2400 MHz; only copy perforamcne increases, and latency drops. Unfortuantely, I can't get much more than 3600 MHz on the Broadwell-E, while both my 5930K's can do 4.2 GHz with ease.

But dem 4 added cores..... mmmm....













So, 5820K can still be a very good chip to buy, if you can get a good one!


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## RejZoR (Jun 29, 2016)

My CPU seems to be super sweet up to 4.5 GHz and then it's a total no go from then on. I've tried everything, 4.6, 4.7, 4.8, 4.9 and it wouldn't work regardless of voltage. 5 GHz wouldn't work even on one core. I'd have to really invest more time fiddling with it, but at 4.5 GHz on all 6 cores, I just can't be bothered to be honest. As for the cache, considering all the horror stories about degradation, I'm keeping it stock. For what I do, I don't really notice a difference. I might clock it higher later on when CPU will be a bit outdated and needing some boost.

The "gimped" PCIe is a non-issue since I only have 1 graphic card and 1 soundcard. I've had a M.2 SSD, but I sold it for the 2TB Samsung SSD.

As for the temperatures, I have my system setup for silent operation. If fans weren't set so conservative, the temps would be a lot lower I think. For short heavy loads, perfectly fine and it's so quiet most of the time I have to look at the lights if it's even working (if screen is in standby), especially now that I don't have any HDD in it.


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## heky (Jun 29, 2016)

Nice one @RejZoR, you really have a golden sample. Thanks for sharing.

I need 1.254v to be stable at same clocks under full load( my cache is at 3.5ghz@1.15v though) . But i do have lower temps thanks to EK.


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## xkm1948 (Jun 29, 2016)

With my 128GB RAM my OC limit is down from ~4.4GHz to 4.25GHz. Running max RAM with DDR4-3000 speed seems to drag down OC headroom severely.


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## xkm1948 (Jun 29, 2016)

cadaveca said:


> FPU pushes far higher power draw and increases temps fairly good too. Given his load temps, and his voltages, he's got a really decent CPU, and might get 5 GHz under high-end watercooling. His clocking is better than one of my 5930Ks...but my 5390Ks do not have gimped PCIe .
> 
> Same as with running the encode in RealBench... I get more crashes on the last test, passing encode is pretty easy (relatively speaking).
> 
> ...




Hey I can take that 6950X off your hand if you want. I have use for 4 moar cores!


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## cadaveca (Jun 29, 2016)

xkm1948 said:


> Hey I can take that 6950X off your hand if you want. I have use for 4 moar cores!


It's going back to Gigabyte in Taiwan this evening.


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## xkm1948 (Jun 29, 2016)

I assume a 6950X full review coming up soon.


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## cadaveca (Jun 29, 2016)

xkm1948 said:


> I assume a 6950X full review coming up soon.


Wasn't provided for a CPU review and Intel declined to provide sample for said purpose (jerks! ). You will see a mobo review with it for sure, but I do have a few reviews now waiting to be published.

I am expecting another Broadwell-E sample some time in the future though, so maybe that chip will get reviewed. I'm not sure which chip I'll get next though. Intel's marketing department is in shambles since the lay-offs, so they need to pull their heads out of their collective butt and get me chips for review or I can't be bothered to do one properly. I wasn't very impressed with the CPU I got and is pictured above, TBH.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 29, 2016)

cadaveca said:


> I wasn't very impressed with the CPU I got and is pictured above, TBH.


Every review I read about Broadwell-E mentions the limited OC headroom, and because I was hoping the 5820K broadwell-e counterpart has the full 40 PCI-e lanes or 2 more cores I was very disappointed and went a head and bought a 5820K as it is cheaper, available now and hopefully overclocks better.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 30, 2016)

I did some more overclocking and so far I got a stable 4.6 Ghz @ 1.3v core, 1.95v input voltage (without LLC, drops to 1.85v under load). I stopped using Prime95 and LinX and used ASUS realbench and Aida64 stability test instead. Also I connected the fans of H110i GTX to the motherboard directly and set a custom fan curve, as I found it easier this way because when the fans were connected to the CPU block, the Corsair link software used the water temperature instead of CPU temp. Pump profile was left at quiet.






The next step is to find if I can lower the core voltage without sacrificing stability, or probably see if I can achieve a stable 4.5Ghz with 1.2v or 1.1v. Fingers crossed.


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## cadaveca (Jun 30, 2016)

even 4.6 @ 1.3V is pretty good. Your package temps are just a bit high though; try to stay under 75C. Lowering cache(ring) voltage and multi can have dramatic effects sometimes.


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## RejZoR (Jun 30, 2016)

What's a stock voltage for cache anyway on 5820K ? The one showed in BIOS?


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## avatar_raq (Jun 30, 2016)

cadaveca said:


> even 4.6 @ 1.3V is pretty good. Your package temps are just a bit high though; try to stay under 75C. Lowering cache(ring) voltage and multi can have dramatic effects sometimes.



I reduced the Vcore to 1.25v and it looks to be stable with better temps. Good news. I left the cache multiplier and voltage at default (x30, 0.9v respectively), by selecting an offset of 0.001 and not even leaving it at auto. I do not know why the package temp is so much higher than core temps.






Now I have few questions:
1- Did I make the right decision by ditching the brutal stability tests (Prime95, LinX)?
2- Do I leave it at this OC (4.6Ghz@1.25v) or do I go back to my previous one (4Ghz@1v)? I am concerned about the longevity of the CPU and plan to keep it long as possible.
3- With the new OC, the package temp is in low 70s with occasional spikes to 80 C. Is this OK?
4- If the answer to question 2 is 'keep the 4.6 OC', do my bios settings look ok? Did I miss anything?

Here are my settings:
Bclock: 100
Core multiplier: x46
Vcore: Adaptive, offset +0.001, Total Turbo Voltage: 1.249v
Cache Multiplier: Auto
Cache Voltage: Adaptive, offset +0.001, Total Turbo Voltage: Auto
Input Voltage" 1.9v (Drops to ~1.8v under full load)
LLC: Level 1 (0%)
System Agent Voltage: Adaptive, offset +0.001 (result ~0.8v)




RejZoR said:


> What's a stock voltage for cache anyway on 5820K ? The one showed in BIOS?



For me it is ~0.737v in idle (core multiplier x12) and ~0.9v under full load (core multiplier x46). Like you I did not OC or overvolt the cache.


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## cadaveca (Jun 30, 2016)

RejZoR said:


> What's a stock voltage for cache anyway on 5820K ? The one showed in BIOS?


There is no set "Stock"; it varies from chip to chip. So to find your "stock", on an ASUS board, clear CMOS, boot into BIOS after clear, and check monitoring page in BIOS. Voltage listed is your "stock".(note this doesn't include turbo boost).



avatar_raq said:


> Now I have few questions:
> 1- Did I make the right decision by ditching the brutal stability tests (Prime95, LinX)?
> 2- Do I leave it at this OC (4.6Ghz@1.25v) or do I go back to my previous one (4Ghz@1v)? I am concerned about the longevity of the CPU and plan to keep it long as possible.
> 3- If the answer to question 2 is 'keep the 4.6 OC', do my bios settings look ok? Did I miss anything?


1:  Yes. There are many other tests that are good for testing stability for more users, such as ASUS Realbench. P95 and LinX are extreme load examples, and are useful for testing the capability of your cooling, or stability under those specific loads. For memory-specific or cache testing, I might suggest something else, but ASUS Realbench ATM is fairly good.
2:  1.25V is conservative, and should last you as long time, especially since you are leaving cache at default. what I would do is stop using offset voltage, since offset is relative to the multi in use, and as such, does not guarantee your voltage is at any set level for the domains that are set to offset.
3:  Please upload screenshots of your BIOS for proper suggestions. You can do this using USB drive and pressing "F12" in BIOS to capture the screenshot.


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## RejZoR (Jun 30, 2016)

Considering RealBench H.264 loads all cores to max and uses AVX, I think it's a very reasonable load.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 30, 2016)

Here are the bios screenshots. I tried to be thorough


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## avatar_raq (Jun 30, 2016)

cadaveca said:


> .... what I would do is stop using offset voltage, since offset is relative to the multi in use, and as such, does not guarantee your voltage is at any set level for the domains that are set to offset.


I did not get this. I do not use offset, I use adaptive with an offset of 0.001 as it is the lowest value and I do not want to leave the offset option under adaptive to auto in fear of the motherboard adding more voltage. The goal is to keep the voltage at default when the multiplier is 33 or less.


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## basco (Jun 30, 2016)

LLC should be for vcore and not for input voltage ? never saw my input drop. i got my input at 1,650volt
but i need 0.050volt more vcore with adaptive or offset volts- thats pretty much-against fixed vcore


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## avatar_raq (Jun 30, 2016)

basco said:


> LLC should be for vcore and not for input voltage ? never saw my input drop. i got my input at 1,650volt
> but i need 0.050volt more vcore with adaptive or offset volts- thats pretty much-against fixed vcore


AFAIK Intel changed things up in X99, the cpu now handles the vcore internally while the motherboard handles the input voltage and we all know the LLC is a motherboard feature operating outside intel specs to minimize or remove V droop. You never saw a drop in input voltage because probably you did not disable LLC.


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## basco (Jun 30, 2016)

yeah got mine since the old days on llc level 7 to 8.
could you test if ya need lower volt with fixed volts?
and i would go with 4,0 ghz and maybe make a 2nd profile with 4,6ghz if ya need it for benching or other stuff.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 30, 2016)

basco said:


> yeah got mine since the old days on llc level 7 to 8.
> could you test if ya need lower volt with fixed volts?
> and i would go with 4,0 ghz and maybe make a 2nd profile with 4,6ghz if ya need it for benching or other stuff.


I try to avoid LLC for the long term as many people believe it causes very short voltage spikes way higher than the set value, so it tends to shorten the life span of the CPU, but this again applied to old CPUs, when the vcore was affected by LLC, I am not sure it still applies to x99. In my recently retired x58 system, the core i7 930 OC became unstable after about 4 years and I posted a new thread here at TPU and many TPUers suggested leaving the LLC calibration enabled is what caused the CPU to degrade. I had to increase the core voltage by 0.05v to keep the OC, which in retrospect seems fine considering that motherboard and CPU lasted me more than 6 years overclocked and are still running well.
Now I am in the process of optimizing my input voltage as I am not comfortable with the VRM sitting at idle temps of 50-55. I will report back with the final result. Probably 1.888 or 1.9 is too much and I can manage stability with lower values.


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## avatar_raq (Jun 30, 2016)

The lowest stable input voltage appears to be 1.8v. I believe it is the stock voltage.


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## cadaveca (Jun 30, 2016)

avatar_raq said:


> I did not get this. I do not use offset, I use adaptive with an offset of 0.001 as it is the lowest value and I do not want to leave the offset option under adaptive to auto in fear of the motherboard adding more voltage. The goal is to keep the voltage at default when the multiplier is 33 or less.


Your settings look fine, but I wasn't too concerned about core voltage, I was a bit more concerned about the others. You have an automatic multiplier setting for cache, and then offset enabled. Although the offset is low, BIOS could pull some weird stuff one day and set it to something you do not expect, so it might be best to manually set cache multis. Also, do not move off of 100 Bclk. ASUS has stated that adaptive voltage settings will not work correctly when adjusting Bclk, due to a bug in the firmware.


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## RejZoR (Jul 1, 2016)

4 GHz at 1.017V. 70°C while being dead silent. Radiator and case fans didn't even go up lol XD


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## avatar_raq (Jul 1, 2016)

SO it turn out 4.6 Ghz @ 1.25v is not fully stable after all. I tried running cinebebch and it crashed almost immediately in spite of passing hours of AIDA64 stability stress test and realbench. Wierd. Unwilling to go back to 1.3v, I dialed back to 4.5Ghz and now it is stable but I need to see the lowest voltage to maintain stability.

Edit: I tried to increase the input voltage to 1.85v and now it is stable @4.6Ghz, 1.25v.


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## avatar_raq (Jul 3, 2016)

After running many stability tests including OCCT and Aida64 for prolonged periods of time, I settled for a 4.5GGhz @ 1.25v core, 1.9v input, 1.12 system agent, 0.9v cache and the last 4 voltages were set to auto and the motherboard seems to get them right as I could not lower any of them significantly without causing instability. All this time and effort and I settled for auto voltages


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