Amd Phenom Ii X4 940 Overclock
AMD has updated its gaming platform codenamed Dragon with launching Phenom II processors. Note that we have already reviewed some parts of this platform (for example, AMD 790GX Chipset, AMD 770/790 Chipsets, ATI RADEON 4850 512MB, AMD Phenom II X4 940 Processor). As all these parts turned out to be much more attractive than competitors in our tests and in terms of features, information technology's logical to presume that the new platform will merge all advantages of its constituent parts not just to make a poor part look ameliorate at the cost of other elements, just to raise platform attractiveness to a new level. Indeed, the Dragon platform has all chances for success, and it can avowal of initially democratic prices, which is an important matter in these days of crisis. However, in this commodity we'll go out out economical issues and phrases like "Wow, the unabridged computer is less than $1000". We'll deal only with technical problems of the platform every bit a whole. Permit's see how Phenom II overclocks on diverse motherboards, as it'due south the gaming platform where it makes well-nigh sense (if you use your figurer for serious tasks, information technology may just as well work for several hours, information technology's stability that matters; if you lot need your results much faster, you should think about a multi-CPU workstation or optimize your computational tasks). Then nosotros'll effigy out performance gains from moderate overclocking in mod games (that is how you overclock your computer without much efforts and extra investments into hardware). As is well known, the starting time models of Phenom II can be installed on motherboards with Socket AM2+. But as they have TDP of 125W, we should certainly stick to motherboards with corresponding VRMs. By the way, information technology does not mean that owners of cheap motherboards will have no Phenom II upgrade opportunity, because nearly futurity models will take TDP 95W, and system integrators of compact computers are promised 65W and even 45W models (theoretically). Besides, at that place are a lot of motherboards supporting TDP 125W and higher. As they take been present in the market for a long time already, they come with affordable price tags and usually easy to find in stores. The nearly interesting chipsets for gamers are 790GX and 790FX, every bit they support CrossFire and can boast of rich peripheral functionality. Nosotros've selected contenders from what we have in our test lab. By the manner, most motherboards with these chipsets are equipped with excessive VRMs for Phenom Two processors. They were designed for top Phenoms, and the first revision of 9950 had TDP of 140W. On the other mitt, the official 125W TDP for top Phenom II processors looks more similar playing safety (as this parameter for Core i7 equals 130W, then there were no reasons to reduce it; and cutting this parameter means stricter pick requirements, which raises manufacturing costs and reduces production volumes of already insufficient (at first stages) GPUs). In fact, Phenom Ii does not abound very hot, we already figured it out, when we tested this processor in nominal frequencies. What's left is to overclock it. All motherboards with onetime BIOS versions booted up correctly with Phenom II (they detected its clock charge per unit, multipliers, and voltage correctly). Merely then we flashed new BIOS, of course (in Windows) to run our tests with the latest version. It's good news, considering that stores frequently sell motherboards with old BIOS versions. In this example users won't have to choose a compatible processor to wink their mobos or to address their service providers. Fifty-fifty moderate overclocking commonly implies raising the core voltage. Specifications of the current stepping (C2) mention the working range of voltages from 0.825V to 1.5V. And AMD does not recommend voltages higher up 1.55V for overclocking with air cooling. Notwithstanding, even Phenom Two X4 940 requires no more than than 1.35V in the nominal mode, which leaves a considerable margin for safe voltage increment. Maximum safety temperature of the processor package is 62°C. As far equally a cooler is concerned, we installed Zalman CNPS9700 AM2. It's a relatively quondam cooler. We bought it several years ago, and even then it was non a new product. However, it'south a popular, efficient model. Besides, we are non going to intermission records here. That is we did as most common users -- if y'all tin can install one of your quondam coolers, why not? And when you want acoustic comfort or higher cooling capacity (in summer), yous may fork out for some trendy Thermalright or Xigmatek. If you cull new PC parts for overclocking, information technology certainly makes sense to spend some more fourth dimension on choosing a amend cooler. What concerns a power supply unit, its choice is determined past your graphics card. As we are going to overclock a elevation model in the serial, information technology'due south just natural to install the most power graphics menu -- ATI Radeon HD4870 X2. And so nosotros had to employ a 750W PSU (Seasonic M12D-750). Even though Phenom II X4 940 has an unlocked multiplier, we initially overclocked this processor with a fixed multiplier past increasing the Base clock rate. Even these results get it borne in that it's much easier to choose a motherboard for overclocked Phenom II than for Phenom. Yep, it sounds very strange, every bit we managed to overclock our sample to impressive 3800MHz, and it's not even the best result for Phenom Ii, as you may read in overclockers' forums. The first explanation that comes to our mind is significantly reduced power consumption. Past the style, Phenom processors (B3 revision) have no real problems with their power consumption at nominal frequencies either. But when overclocked, a motherboard must really supply high currents (in tests and programs with high CPU load). And preserving stability in these conditions is precarious at best. To go on the system stable, VRM must exist cooled well. Besides, design peculiarities too make themselves felt, hence different overclocking results of various motherboards. Here is an illustrative instance of moderate power consumption of overclocked Phenom II processors with an inexpensive ASRock motherboard. It has no heatsinks on MOSFETs, merely information technology all the same became a formal leader of this exam (in fact, the difference of 2-3MHz in Base clock rate tin can be written off to peculiarities of our samples). On the other paw, temperatures of VRM heatsinks on other motherboards did non exceed the environs temperature, while MOSFETs and chokes on the ASRock AOD790GX/128M were rather hot, so we cannot recommend installing it in a small PC enclosure. In other words, it's upwardly to you to determine whether it's worth paying some more than money for actress reliability or but install a fan on the rear panel (choose a proper instance CPU fan that can blow at the VRM, etc). Artistic activeness, overclocking. What'due south more important, processors themselves have grown much friendlier to overclockers. Reducing the CPU NB multiplier (in motherboards supporting this choice) did not improve overclocking results, and so nosotros left this multiplier on the initial level (x9). Past the way, the relatively low default multiplier plays into the hands of users that own motherboards without this option. On the other mitt, increasing the CPU NB frequency is justified, because other than overclocking CPU cores, information technology affects the general performance level, peculiarly in memory-heavy applications. And now let's see what nosotros've got with overclocking using multipliers. Practically the same results. In other words, overclocking our processor (our sample) by increasing the Base clock rate is not much worse than "self-contained" overclocking with a CPU multiplier. However, overclocking inside 3.6-iii.9 GHz is typical of the first samples (given to testers, journalists, motherboard manufacturers, etc). Processors that go to stores may overclock even to 4.0-4.one GHz without much trouble. Information technology may be justified to overclock the cores of such processors with the multiplier. But fifty-fifty in this instance, you'd meliorate combine both approaches, if your motherboard does not allow to modify CPU NB multiplier, like both Foxconn models. You may want to practise that to raise frequency of this part too. By the way, Advanced Clock Calibration, that affected Phenom overclocking then much, is now integrated into the processor. It will certainly please owners of early on motherboards with the 790FX chipset and SB600 Southbridge, which did not support this technology. Enabling ACC on motherboards with this BIOS option does non affect overclocking results at all. Information technology may even hang some motherboards, which BIOS is non optimized for Phenom Ii, then that yous have to reset settings. In other respects, we plant no inadequate responses to the CPU upgrade. That was to exist expected, as Phenom II demonstrates self-sufficiency even in power saving problems, which commonly depend on a motherboard. We usually disable dynamic frequency control technologies (Cool'n'Quiet) in our performance tests, today is not an exception. Afterwards we increased frequency and voltage, idle CPU temperature remained on the same minimal level as earlier. That is idle units of this processor consume very little power even at high clock rates. To all appearances, that'southward the upshot of AMD CoolCore applied science: it dynamically disables idle units of a processor. We have no other explanations how this processor copes to absurd down to the environment temperature, when it'south idle. It'due south an democratic engineering that does non crave drivers or BIOS options. Too, the processor supports Cool'due north'Quiet 3.0, which allows to reduce the idle temperature to 800MHz now. And the coming version of AMD OverDrive promises a combination of dynamic overclocking and reducing frequency depending on the load. Write a comment below. No registration needed! 
Brief theory
Overclocking
Board Core clock (multiplier), MHz CPU NB clock (multiplier), MHz Voltage, V Base clock rate, MHz ASUS M3A79-T Deluxe 3825 (x15) 2295 (x9) 1.52 255 Foxconn A7DA-South 3810 (x15) 2286 (x9) 1.52 254 Foxconn A79A-S 3825 (x15) 2295 (x9) ane.52 255 Gigabyte MA790GP-DS4H 3840 (x15) 2304 (x9) one.52 256 ASRock AOD790GX/128M 3855 (x15) 2313 (x9) 1.52 257
Board Core clock (multiplier), MHz CPU NB clock (multiplier), MHz Voltage, V Base clock rate, MHz ASUS M3A79-T Deluxe 3838 (x19) 2222 (x11) 1.52 202 Foxconn A7DA-South 3838 (x19) 1816 (x8) 1.52 202 Foxconn A79A-S 3857 (x19) 1824 (x8) 1.52 203 Gigabyte MA790GP-DS4H 3876 (x19) 2288 (x11) i.52 204 ASRock AOD790GX/128M 3876 (x19) 2288 (x11) 1.52 204 
Source: http://ixbtlabs.com/articles3/cpu/phenom-2-overclocking-p1.html
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