Teej

From what I've heard the 920 should likely be capable of 4.0 depending on what you have for a cooler. I went with the 950 because there was a bigger sale on it at the time so it only cost me about $20 more than a 920 would have, and in case I never OC it, it was 15-20% faster stock.

Ah. Gotcha. Yeah, A-10 definitely needs some GPU horsepower...although you can tweak a lot of settings. I personally don't go above 4x on aniso or AA - I can't tell the difference higher than that. I also don't use the HDR setting.

Let's see your e-leet cpu, memory, and overclocking screens...like these. Maybe throw in voltages too.

Hmmmm. I've only tested FC2 since dialing back the ram timing...testing now. OK, I can't discern any significant difference between mine with stock timings and extra voltage vs current. My "test case" was to use the takeoff training mission. I've done this a few times through the overclocking process so I know what to expect. With my graphics settings, when I start the mission I'm sitting on the runway at 28fps. As I accelerate to takeoff, it generally hits 50fps by the time the wheels come up (more of the airport behind me) and locking in at 60 (maxfps) over the departure end. Circling back around over the airport and town I drop to 27-30 again....which is unchanged from my "best case" overclock. Actually, that was 32 bit. Testing in 64 bit actually gave me a small boost again. It did early on...then for some reason I had identical performance...but now the boost is back, primarily over the town, less so on/over the airbase.

Nice! Glad to hear you got it going (faster)! Stretching the ram timing does have an effect, but not all that much in most cases. Remember, there's plenty of memory sold at a given speed that has those timings stock. :P You/I/both might have better luck with a separate fan blowing on the ram, given how long it took mine to go unstable.

This is a good thread...and I'm being a bit verbose for several reasons...none of which is that I think I know everything. :) I'm documenting this so that others (eg Mower who's been following along) might pick something up...and so that others with more OC experience on recent processors might find fault in what I'm doing. I've found y'all quite helpful and hope some of what I say pays it forward. So I went ahead and disabled vdroop, and right away turned the bios down from 1.34xx to 1.3v. Once I got the system up and running with orthos, I started pulling out voltage using eleet every few minutes of stable running. Got down to a full .1v drop from where I was before I started running into issues (I had even it pulled down into the 1.23 setting...briefly). Now, FWIW I don't consider it 'working' unless I can peg the processor at 100% with Orthos and still bounce around in browsers and apps (obviously orthos is at lower priority so when I do something, the system responds). If it's not stable, it's no good...even though nothing I ever do in the real world (gaming, office apps) will thrash the system like Orthos does. After a bit more playing...I figured I'd shut off hyperthreading - been meaning to and just kept forgetting. I was a bit surprised to find it shaved a full 5-7* C off my core temps. My temps were pretty cool before, but now...whoa... After 10 minutes of 100% operation (the temps stopped climbing after the first minute or two)...the cores are at 53 / 49 / 50 / 49 with a CPU reading of 41C and a system 30C Seems I have had to back off the timing on my RAM a bit even at stock speed to achieve max stability with the OC though. While it's supposed to be 8-8-8-24 @ 800, I'm currently running 9-9-9-25 @ 800. This let me pull back some RAM voltage as well. So currently I've got VCORE set at 1.25v and under max load it's rising to 1.29. I'll certainly agree that's far healthier than letting it idle at 1.35 and pull down to 1.32 under load! The temps are just...stunning. 20 minutes now and no further changes in core temps. Assuming it gets to 30 and still doesn't crash as I bounce around a few websites...I'll be quite pleased. Yup, it made it and then some. Now that it's cooled down from stress testing... I see CPU @ 18C (room temp!) with the cores at 31-34, 1.28v.

Interesting thought. Why would that happen? I'm running the PCI clock and RAM at stock speeds... voltage regulator is staying under the 70C temp I've heard as a "best below" line...(It gets into the 60s under 100% load, but tends to stay 40s/low 50s at idle or in a DCS engine that primarily uses a single core) What's getting stressed on the MB? I did find one area I was venturing into danger zone territory though...for a little while I was having > .5v between vtt & vdimm. (I've since narrowed that gap). I'll have to see how low I can go if I turn vdroop off. The way I'm understanding it...with vdroop (where I am now) you set a max voltage (in my case currently 1.34xv) and the system may/will drop below that under load. With vdroop off, you're setting a floor voltage and the system will end up running a bit above that point. Given that...I'm guessing I could probably drop down to 1.3 or lower w/ vdroop off, knowing that as the load went up the voltage would rise a touch instead of drop. I'll save what I've got and give that a romp. As to the temperatures...it probably helps that we're in winter now and my house temp is in the low 60s F (so...uh...about 17C...mebbe slightly warmer in the mancave)

Thanks...one thing I've learned is that I should mention...I have dialed the bios down from that 1.36 whatever to 1.34375....but more importantly that's with vdroop on - under load, vcore is down to ~ 1.32. Still higher than some have had, but with the temps being so cool under a load I'll never see...I'm not worried at this point. It should still outlive its usefulness. :D Def appreciate the input though. I did some overclocking in the early days, but I think the last system I really overclocked was a spare Celeron in the days when the 300mhz part easily went 450. Yeah, it's been a while. :D Yeah, I'm running 20x200

7.7 / 7.7 / 7.4 / 7.4 / 5.9 (I have a ~ 2-3 year old HD running as the system drive for now)

I got a bit more aggressive with the voltage pull, and it's about as far as I can bring it down - setting a tick under 1.35v with vdroop, it reads 1.32 under heavy load, with the temps a touch lower. I think I'm done. Heh.

Currently doing another Orthos stress test with the voltages pulled back a bit. CPU down to 1.36875 selected, e-leet reading 1.34 under load DRAM pulled to 1.65 (rated voltage) at rated speed 4 copies of orthos with affinities set to stress all 4 cores (1 as "CPU and ram", 2 as "CPU and some ram" and the 4th just CPU) I get these temps: CPU 52 VREG 67 System 29 Cores are reading 66/64/63/62 Anyone think I should tweak anything further? This is getting to be a range I'm happy with. Thx. Teej

Well, as others have said, every chip seems to run a bit different, and mine are a little higher than I'd like where I changed them. I changed the CPU to 1.40 Changed VTT from 0 to 100mv. I'm using Corsair XMS3 ram rated at 1.65v, but I've got it bumped to 1.75 at the moment. Probably going to try to bring that and the CPU down.

Depends if the settings you tweak to OC are cranking up the PCI bus rate. FWIW, I now have mine running at 20 x 200. When I tried it last, I had forgotten to adjust the memory clocks. So now I have it set w/ memory at stock clock rate.

OK, I just tested mine again (and tweaked some OC while I was at it). Normally I keep my throttle plugged into my monitor's built in hub because it's easier for cable management. For purposes of testing I plugged it into the motherboard. S1 suspend - does not shut off lights. S3 sleep - shuts off lights S4 hibernate - shuts off lights Windows Shutdown - shuts off lights. So I guess your answer is get an X58 FTW3. :D

My throttle is plugged into my monitor's USB hub. :D I shut off the monitor, out go the lights. After applying the firmware however, I tested with the throttle plugged into the motherboard. In retrospect I don't remember trying an actual shutdown, but at least for me going into S3 standby would extinguish the lights. So perhaps you need an X58 FTW3 m/b. :D

Well, it's always possible you got the runt of the litter. (Piece of silicon that failed during higher speed testing so it got the low speed tag).

As I've stated elsewhere, what you're probably seeing is that although the lights don't "go out" until the WH gets powered down...they don't get turned on with power - the firmware only turns them on once it has established communication with Windows ("enumerated").

I might be able to back off the 1.4 a bit, not sure. I don't consider the current setup permanent - just stable and runs plenty cool, so I'm not super concerned. I'll have more time to play with it over the next couple of weeks.

When I tried going with anything x 20 (be it 133 or 200 or 1-2 tries in between)...I had left most of that stock. Thought I had the memory set for a ~ stock speed. As it sits right now I've got the cpu set at 1.4v, memory at 1.75 (rated at 1.65, bios wanted to only feed it 1.5) at stock speed 8-8-8-24 timings. There was one other voltage setting I nudged up...forgot the name of it off the top of my head...stock was 0, I tried 100mv and then 200mv before system booted/ran stable.

No worries, logical mistake given that's the #s and explanations TM put in the book. The curve works...it's just...an odd set of numbers. Since I was there, I think this really highlights the issue I / we (VTB) have seen, realistic or not....if you change the jcurve numbers to 24/41, you still get the same curve as posted above. That means that in the range we spend most of our time, the throttle is nearly twice as sensitive to small movements!

I had tried dropping my 950 down to a 20 multiplier and it too failed to post. Currently running 160 x 23.

Well, no.....I did exaggerate, but only about half as much as you imply. I wasn't going to get anal about math, but....It's true that a 80/95 or 81/96 J-curve on the throttle will map the response of the stock WH to the DCS profile...but that's not quite the same thing. The TMHWH hits the stops after 2/3 of its electrical travel...67%, not 80%. Load the script editor and without a script running run the device analyzer. The throttle is displayed as a 15bit range, from -16384 to +16384. At zero throttle, I get +16384. At the physical detent I have -5400. (16384+5400)/32768 = 67%. By the same process, the 81/96% curve (which puts me at min-aug FC2 when the throttle is pushed up to AB detent - annunciator lights are on but there's not burner flame in the graphic model) puts me at 88% throttle. This really isn't an issue for 99.9% of the people out there. Curving the throttle works quite well. For people enjoying formation work, curving the throttle makes it way too sensitive to the small movements we typically use. >95% of the Thunderbird (and therefore VTB) show is flown in the 80-90% rpm range (at least for the diamond....solos exercise the throttle a bit more), so having the throttle response for that range squished down makes it harder to make the small power changes we need. I do truly love flying the Warthog...this is an awfully small nit to be picking. :D Just as a followup...I'm not sure where TM got the 80/95% numbers from. I've been using that or 81/96 since talking with Dimebug about this back in June. You'll notice that if you play with the graph that 66 / 87 (which is what I say is the Warthog / DCS response) on the jcurve gives the exact same curve as 80/95.

Well..you can (I'm assuming you meant TARGET)...but... Just pulling out numbers as an example...these probably don't resemble the real numbers in anything more than concept... Let's say the Cougar and Warthog throttles both had 90 degrees of movement. With the Cougar, the detent came after, say, 80 degrees. With the Warthog the detent hits at, say, 45. Thus, your dry thrust is constrained to ~ half of the travel of the throttle instead of ~ 90%. Harder to make small power changes.

What kinda bums me out is how well set up my Cougar throttle was. Of course now I wanna keep the extra functionality....but I never even had to tweak/set the detent spot on it - it was perfect in FC1/FC2. With the detent where it is...subjectively it feels like there's about 2mm throw from 70% to 90%. (Not true of course, but it feels like it). I'm seriously thinking about trying to tweak that piece...or even get an aluminum piece machined with about 1/3-1/2 of the afterburner zone.

Actually contrary to my previous statements there's one thing I'm debating whether to mod or learn to adapt to. I want more throw "pre-afterburner detent" and less after. Might have to shorten up the detent rails on that drop in piece. :P It's either that or get used to flying burner jets without detent. :P