Overclocking i7 920, unclear settings in the IDCC

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Legit Little One
Legit Little One
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Joined: Tue Jul 31, 2012 5:43 am

Overclocking i7 920, unclear settings in the IDCC

Post by Dellius » Tue Jul 31, 2012 6:52 am

I have a question about some settings in the Intel Desktop Control Center that came with my DX58SO motherboard.

Here is the situation.

Goal - achieve a stable OC at 3.6GHz, then at 4.0GHz

Progress - CPU is overall stable at said frequencies, with minor exceptions related to power.

Problem - AIDA64 zLib and Hash fail with a freeze and instant reboot, with no BSOD, and the reason is logged in Performance Monitor as a "Kernel Power Failure". Intel's tests pass OK, Prime runs no problem, temps stay within operational parameters. Even games such as Sniper Elite v2 are playable, but the zLib and Hash tests cause an instant freeze and reboot.

Suspected culprit - Probably an underpowered CPU due to settings in the IDCC I do not understand at all due to insufficient info on what they are supposed to do, since most people OC through their BIOS and not through this utility, as it's compatible only with select few Intel motherboards and my BIOS on the other hand doesn't have some of the options they talk about, but this thing has some options missing in the BIOS, making up for this. Yes, it is messy.

Question - What do the settings in red do ?

- CPU Volts = vCore volts which I cannot adjust through the BIOS, only in here. Question is why when on defaults the vCore is set to 1.2v, but the CPU casually still pulls 1.24v, which is the next setting in the dropdown list. Never does it when I OC, in fact when I OC and set everything to 1.4v, the CPU will pull considerably less, even under stress, about 1.36v and never reaches 1.4v. Maybe this means it is safe to actually keep it on 1.4 as I OC, as the CPU never pulls this much anyway, but destabilizes immediately if the vCore is not set to 1.4v @ 4.0GHz. Probably vDroop and other power options do stuff here, so I was just curious, and less concerned.

- Max Power (A) = 110 - What is this supposed to do, or correspond to ? Nobody discusses the IDCC anywhere and this Turbo Mode setting is not really well documented in the IDCC Help file.
- Max Power (W) = 130 - I understand this is the stock CPU power setting. What I don't understand is what is the common BIOS setting equivalent, am I supposed to raise it, and how do I determine by how much and what is the safe limit ?

Since we will be talking about Watts and Amps and power here, is there a utility which can actually make the calculation how much power will I need after I change the Watts and Amps so I can tell if my PSU will be capable of providing all this before I go over my head and set things that will be impossible for my PSU to comply with ?

Pic related, it's the IDCC.


System specs
DX58SO, with latest BIOS
IDCC latest version
i7 920 Bloomfield C0/C1
Barracuda 1TB
Kingston Value 4x2GB
PSU Corsair 850W.
All USB ports are populated with stuff that pulls some power from them.

I cannot set the power features through the BIOS, as they are all greyed out there, but IDCC successfully sets them for me from the desktop, and actually allows me to change many settings I cannot otherwise modify, so that's why I am asking.

TL;DR - what do Max Power (A) and Max Power (W) do and what BIOS settings do they correspond to ? What are the safe max values for these and roughly how do I estimate by how much I need to move them, if there is such a rule at all ?

Legit Extremist
Legit Extremist
Posts: 605
Joined: Mon Jan 31, 2011 11:51 am

Re: Overclocking i7 920, unclear settings in the IDCC

Post by DragonFury » Tue Jul 31, 2012 5:20 pm

Desktop overclocking, i do not recommend. the reason why they would be greyed out in the BIOS is because you haven't set the parameters to manual.
Mini ME
Is in a state of flux....

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