Overclocking is it worth the trouble?

[g00gle88]

Hello,

I'm thinking of buying a new gaming rig pretty soon, with all the new hardwares nowadays, is overclocking still worth all the trouble and money?

Cheers

[CoffeeFiend]

Haven't tried to OC my Athlon X2 rigs, but on the Intel side (well haven't tried with i7 yet), it's super simple and you can get some amazing results...

My old, low-end, discontinued Intel E2160 that was only like $75 back then? Stock clock is 1.8GHz. I raised the FSB from 200 to 375 (not in one shot obviously) and set the RAM divider so it runs at 900MHz or so and I was done. It's been running at 3.4GHz for a couple years (85% overclock). It's still a hair quicker than a E7400 that's like $120 today. It was quicker at the time than CPUs that costed $300 or more (E6300, Athlon64 X2 6400+...)

That being said, not all chips OC as easily (depends on several factors) and not all chipsets and motherboards are alike either.

[puntoMX]

Most of the CPUs I use are OCed, but, I must say that you need a good base; the motherboard. The late AMD CPUs are cheap and OC about some 20-30% without much problems and Intel will do indeed way more when you get your self a CPU that has a FSB of 800MT/s and a high multiplier. When you go with a motherboard then keep just 1 thing in mind: Intel CPU with Intel chipset and AMD cpu with ATI/AMD chipset .

We are here to help you out...

[ripken204]

it really depends on what you are using the computer for.

for gaming, the video card matters a lot more. going from 3GHz to 4Ghz on the cpu will yield very small if any FPS gains.

i do suggest a moderate overclock, for example to around 3GHz.

but most importantly, what graphics card are you going to purchase?

[jcarle]

for gaming, the video card matters a lot more. going from 3GHz to 4Ghz on the cpu will yield very small if any FPS gains.

That's utterly incorrect. As in most situations, you can't generalize the entire gaming spectrum to determine hardware. There are many games that are CPU starved so badly that even the fastest GTX 295 is insufficient alone. When I play WoW at full resolution of my 24", even with my E8400 overclocked to 3.6GHz, I'm STILL running into 100% CPU issues.

[Octopuss]

Plus performance of a graphic card is HIGHLY dependant on speed of the CPU. For example some years ago I had Nvidia 6800GT in a system with Athlon64. Do we say LOL?

[Zenskas]

for gaming, the video card matters a lot more. going from 3GHz to 4Ghz on the cpu will yield very small if any FPS gains.

That's utterly incorrect. As in most situations, you can't generalize the entire gaming spectrum to determine hardware. There are many games that are CPU starved so badly that even the fastest GTX 295 is insufficient alone. When I play WoW at full resolution of my 24", even with my E8400 overclocked to 3.6GHz, I'm STILL running into 100% CPU issues.

Not utterly incorrect. I have seen you having a go at many things ripken204 has said the past week and I don't think it's very nice to correct him for everything he says. Not to say he is entirely right, but GENERALLY speaking, upgrading the GPU will improve performance in gaming far more than upgrading the CPU. I even have a real life scenario for you. I have a friend with an old P4 3GHz CPU, 160GB HDD, 2GB DDR400 RAM and it's just a basic box. He had a Geforce 6600GT. He spent a small amount of money (about $160 or so-remember this is Australia!) and bought a 9800GT. It flew! He ran plenty of games on his 22inch monitor (Crysis, Fallout 3, GRID, anything new) and they ran fine. Now getting a better CPU (say... a P4 3.8GHz, or a P4 4GHz if one existed) would not have improved performance as much in games. Getting a 9800GT increased performance multiple times over. So as you can see he is not utterly incorrect. With the PC in my sig I highly doubt upgrading the CPU to a top end dual core E8600 would increase gaming performance as much as upgrading to a new GTS 250 or GTX 260 would. GPU power may be somewhat limited by the CPU (as getting an E8600 and a GTX 260 would be the best option if I had the money) but it's not like upgrading the CPU is better at all most of the time. Any modern CPU (45nm Intel or AMD) would benifit more in the graphics department with a GPU upgrade.

EDIT: I would be interested in how many FPS you get playing WOW? If it is over 60, then who actually cares if the CPU is running 100% load? With less intensive games, of course you will run into CPU bottlenecks. That's why when people benchmark CPUs for gaming performance they put the game settings down to a low resolution so it is easier to see any differences in gaming performance as it will often be close. 180FPS vs 220FPS at 640x480 sounds great, but for modern games will not be much of a difference at larger resolutions.

EDIT 2: @TheWalrus: I don't see anything wrong with having an Athlon 64 with a 6800GT. They came out within a year of each other, and a half decent Athlon 64 3200+ or something would go fine with a 6800GT. I got a Shuttle PC lying around right now with just a P4 2.8GHz and a 6800 GPU, which plays COD4 and CSS half-decent at 1024x768.

Edited August 3, 2009 by Zenskas

[jcarle]

I have seen you having a go at many things ripken204 has said the past week and I don't think it's very nice to correct him for everything he says.

I correct anyone who gives incorrect information. It happens simply that ripken gives out incorrect information more frequently then other members because he does not take the time to properly read posts, do research before replying or gives generalized statements which in themselves can't always be true.

Not to say he is entirely right, but GENERALLY speaking, upgrading the GPU will improve performance in gaming far more than upgrading the CPU.

That's only partly true. Your gaming experience on a PC can be affected by many components. If you're memory starved, or running a very very slow hard drive, not even the strongest card can help. All aspects of the computer must be balanced for the video card to work well.

I even have a real life scenario for you. I have a friend with an old P4 3GHz CPU, 160GB HDD, 2GB DDR400 RAM and it's just a basic box. He had a Geforce 6600GT. He spent a small amount of money (about $160 or so-remember this is Australia!) and bought a 9800GT. It flew! He ran plenty of games on his 22inch monitor (Crysis, Fallout 3, GRID, anything new) and they ran fine. Now getting a better CPU (say... a P4 3.8GHz, or a P4 4GHz if one existed) would not have improved performance as much in games. Getting a 9800GT increased performance multiple times over.

In this instance, sure. A classic Pentium 4 3GHz is not a weak CPU. Had it been a Celeron 1.2GHz, the story may have been different and the 9800GT may not have been enough.

So as you can see he is not utterly incorrect.

I may have simply overemphasized.

With the PC in my sig I highly doubt upgrading the CPU to a top end dual core E8600 would increase gaming performance as much as upgrading to a new GTS 250 or GTX 260 would. GPU power may be somewhat limited by the CPU (as getting an E8600 and a GTX 260 would be the best option if I had the money) but it's not like upgrading the CPU is better at all most of the time. Any modern CPU (45nm Intel or AMD) would benifit more in the graphics department with a GPU upgrade.

Again, see above. But in your case, that's most likely true.

EDIT: I would be interested in how many FPS you get playing WOW? If it is over 60, then who actually cares if the CPU is running 100% load?

I cap my framerate at 60FPS with vertical sync. I am able to far exceed that. The problem is that when WoW hits 100%, the entire game starts to stutter and becomes almost unplayable until the CPU usage drops below 100%. Edited August 3, 2009 by jcarle

[ripken204]

jcarle - you need to do research yourself.

This is just one review, there are a few more out there on the subject.

The games that you claim to be cpu starved are often unoptimized games.

I was able to play wow with a 7800gt and opteron 170 without lag.

So in short, if he has an extra $200 to spend, it would be more beneficial for him to invest that into a gpu than a cpu.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/cpu-gp...grade,1928.html

However, games are not 100% dependent on the graphics card; the Geforce 8 and 9 require a basic level of power, otherwise they are unable to exploit their 3D potential. The speed of the CPU should lie somewhere between 2600 and 3000 MHz; any lower, and the new graphics chips lose considerable performance.

There is no obvious advantage to quad cores over dual cores, at least according to the graphics-based benchmarks. In order for the Q6600 to compete with the dual core E6750, the same clocking rate is recommended. If you wish to combine an E2160 with a Geforce 8800 or Geforce 9, you will need to overclock. Without a clock rate of at least 2400 MHz, you will lose a considerable amount of graphics performance, because the card is not fully loaded.

The difference in performance among CPUs costing $77, $268 or even $1,237 (50, 170, 800 Euros) is actually relatively low. If you compare an E2160 at 1800 MHz to an E6750 or Q6600, you will find a 30% difference in the overall results. If the E2160 is overclocked to 2400 MHz, though, the difference in overall results is just 15%. The smaller cache of the E2160 budget CPU can be overcome by a higher clocking rate of up to 3 GHz.

Edited August 3, 2009 by ripken204

[jcarle]

From that very article :

However, games are not 100% dependent on the graphics card; the Geforce 8 and 9 require a basic level of power, otherwise they are unable to exploit their 3D potential. The speed of the CPU should lie somewhere between 2600 and 3000 MHz; any lower, and the new graphics chips lose considerable performance.

The games that you claim to be cpu starved are often unoptimized games.

Optimized or unoptimized does not change the reality of the fact.

I was able to play wow with a 7800gt and opteron 170 without lag.

I'd love for you to do so using the same settings as I run, using the same add-ons, using the same resolution and in the same IceCrown locations.

And from that article, as you've already stated :

However, games are not 100% dependent on the graphics card; the Geforce 8 and 9 require a basic level of power, otherwise they are unable to exploit their 3D potential. The speed of the CPU should lie somewhere between 2600 and 3000 MHz; any lower, and the new graphics chips lose considerable performance.

There is significant overhead in modern display drivers that can very well affect performance. Again, video cards by themselves are only part of the equation. It's also the reason why the gain from SLI or CrossFire is not 100% per card.

[ripken204]

i never said video cards were the only part, do you even read what i am writing? i said that it is more beneficial to buy a better gpu over a cpu.

that thing you quoted 2 times now says the cpu speed should be between 2600 and 3000 MHz which nearly all new intel cpus are and if not they can easily OC into that range.

[MadOCer]

Hello,

I'm thinking of buying a new gaming rig pretty soon, with all the new hardwares nowadays, is overclocking still worth all the trouble and money?

Cheers

If you know what you are doing, then overclocking on Intel based, as well as AMD based system isn't very hard these days. Nearly all motherboards come with overclocking options integrated into the BIOS. Some with more detailed options, some with less.

The question if it's worth it is a question that can't be easily answered. It all depends on what you are doing with your system and what parts the system contains.

If you really need the extra power, then it sure is worth it as you can get extra power at nearly no cost. On the other hand I doubt that most poeple who indeed do overclock their rigs, really need it. I used to overclock each and every computer part that I could, for years. In the last 1-2 years I had only limited time and only one system that was also the system to do my study works on. So that system had to run and had to be stable while running, so it stayed at stock speeds.

And what shall I say: For the amount of coding, using virtual machines, watching movies and playing a game at non high end settings, every now and then, even a stock clocked Xeon 3050, 3GB of RAM and a HD2400XT were enough.

So, it's up to you to decide if it's worth performance-wise and in regards to the time that it takes to get a fully stable overclocked system.