Maximum PC

I just built my first computer about 3 weeks ago. I need some help with overclocking it in the bios.
My parts are:
NZXT Tempest EVO case (6 Fans)
ECS A790GXM-A V1.0 AM2+ motherboard
AMD Phenom 2 965 Black Edition 125W TDP cpu
Zalman CNPS 9900ALED heatsink
Crucial Ballistix PC6400 DDR2 ram 4 x 2 gb. sticks
XFX Radeon HD5770 video card
Hauppage WinTV HVR-1850 tv tuner
Corsair TX750W psu
American Megatrendes 080015 bios date July 14, 2009
2 Westren Digital Caviar Black 1.0 tb. hard drives
Windows 7 Professional x64

Yes? And? What do you need help with?

What to disable in the bios to be able to overclock my cpu and which settings to alter to overclock. I'm new to this stuff, but I know this cpu can perform better than 3.4 ghz. I don't know which settings to turn off, to leave alone or manipulate for the overclock. This mobo. doesn't have a Windows Based program like the other mobo. companies do. My next one will, but that's 6 months away for financial reasons.

Try AMD overdrive It is a pretty good OCing utility
Your motherboard manufacturer shows it will work.


(if you want to overclock with the BIOS you need to change the Clock speed and/or Multiplier)

Thank you. I think I'll try Overdrive. Are there any settings in the bios that I need to change before running it ? quote="JE_Delta"]Try AMD overdrive It is a pretty good OCing utility
Your motherboard manufacturer shows it will work.


(if you want to overclock with the BIOS you need to change the Clock speed and/or Multiplier)[/quote]

Nope there shouldn't be anything you need to change in Your BIOS.

However you must remember that you dont want the temps for that CPU to go above 62C (143.6F) and that the max voltage is 1.4V
Be very careful as going above one of these two limits CAN FRY YOUR CPU!!

take your time and make minor adjustments slowly. First you will need a stress/stability tester Prime95

make sure you have CPU-Z that will give you your Mhz and Voltage.

you will also need HWmonitor so the you make sure you are not overheating

After you make an adjustment in Overdrive start to run Prime95 while watching your temps with HWmonitor, making sure that they are safe.

after running Prime 95 for a while and A. your computer does not crash and B. Your temps remain at a safe level.
you may increase the overclock slightly. repeat these steps until your computer crashes, or your temps get dangerous.

once one of these two things happen, back-off the overclock a bit and run prime 95 once more, if everything is fine that should be a correct overclock.

Remember that overclocking reduces the life-span of a CPU. so you might not want to keep this overclock on all the time. maybe just when playing games and other heavy loads

EDIT: just out of curiosity why did you want to OC your CPU?

I ran the Autotune in AMD Overdrive this morning while at a doctor's appointment. It overclocked it to 3.7 ghz. with only chaning the Multiplier to 18.5 . Ran Overdrives Stability Test on it without any crashes. Already have CPU-z. Will download other Benchmarks and run them tonight.

The max you will get is about 3.8 at stock voltage
and just under 4Ghz if you increase voltage
so 3.7 is a healthy overclock for stock voltage.

I would also run Prime95 on it, as it does a better job of strewing out the CPU tha. Other stress tests do. If the CPU survives a 24-hour Prime run then it is stable.

It's better to overclock in the bios never use a tool in windows. It's best to increase the multiplier slowly until it crashes in stress tests then bump the cpu voltage slightly and repeat until you get a stable overclock. Also WATCH THE TEMPERATURE for AMD you generally want to stay under 62c. And for voltage on a 940 you don;t want to go too far above 1.4, 1.5 being the max with air cooling.

The reason why Overdrive kind of sucks is that it can fuck over your whole windows install doing it through the bios is a lot better because most critical errors will show up before you hit the windows load screen (such as not booting etc.)

For a beginner just learning how to overclock, Overdrive is OK. it helps you learn the basics about overclocking.
but you are correct in stating that a BIOS overclock is better.
also for his CPU (Phenom II X4 965) 1.4v is really the most you should go. IMHO I wouldn't go to 1.5v

EDIT:(changed values)