 |
| Overclocking Results: |
|
|
AMD's
Phenom II X4 975 Black Edition processor is
multiplier unlocked so we can overclocking it simply by
increasing the clock multiplier beyond 18.0x, or
by boosting the motherboard bus speed above
200MHz. Any combination of these two parameters will also overclock the
processor.
PCSTATS
is going to aim for a 4.5GHz overclock with this chip, the question is will we
manage to get the CPU to agree?
Pre-Overclocking Warm
up...
To give
the quad-core processor a fighting chance the Corsair XMS3-1600C8 DDR3-1600
test memory was set to run in DDR3-800 MHz mode so it wouldn't hold things back
as bus speeds increased. The standard AMD reference AVC Z7U7414001 heatsink will be used for cooling (the
latest and greatest heat sinks can be found on Frostytech.com). The overclocking motherboard today
comes care of ASUS, the AMD890FX Crosshair IV Formula has so far
proved quite good.
Now onto
overclocking.
The
Phenom II X4 975 BE CPU operates with an 18x multiplier by default, so the first
step was to increase the multiplier to 19x, then 19.5x, 20x... 20.5x and 21x. The
multiplier was overclocked to 22x as well but this caused the system to
immediately crash at POST. In the end, PCSTATS was able to overclock the CPU
multiplier to a maximum of 21.5x, resulting in a clock speed of
4.31GHz. Not bad, but we're aiming for higher speeds with this
chip!!
Overclocking Motherboard Bus
Speed
With the
Phenom II X4 975BE's CPU multiplier reset to 18x, we set about overclocking by
bus speed this time. Starting from 200MHz, the Phenom II X4 975 BE processor was
rapidly overclocked by changing the bus speed to 220MHz, 230MHz and finally
240MHz. Higher clock speeds were tried but the system proved too unstable and
would crash while booting up Windows 7. The maximum overclock by bus speed alone
was thus 240MHz, or a processor clock speed of 4.334GHz - about
the same as before really.
Bus + Multiplier
Overclocking
For the
final round of overclocking fun, the ASUS Crosshair IV Formula motherboard had
its bus speed reset to 200MHz and AMD Phenom II X4 multiplier back to 18x.
The AMD Phenom II X4 975 BE was then overclocked with a combination of the two
parameters and like an 80's montage this took a while...
To make a long overclocking story short, in the end
PCSTATSsettled on a 19.5x CPU
multiplier and 225MHz bus speed which left us with a maximum CPU overclock
of 4.402GHz. That's a an overclock of
800MHz above the stock speed of the AMD Phenom II X4 975 Black Edition processor
and not too bad at all! If you manage to overclock this chip higher, do let
PCSTATS know what settings and hardware you use.
Next up,
PCSTATS has several rounds of benchmarks to test the Phenom II X4's
multi-threading capabilities and find out how it stacks up against Intel's Core
i5 and Core i7 processors!
Prelude to Benchmarks
Over the
following page PCSTATS will be running AMD's 3.6GHz quad-core AMD Phenom II X4
975 Black Edition processor though our standard set of gaming, productivity, and
multi-threaded processor benchmarks. There are a wide variety of real world and
synthetic benchmarks to illustrate the different performance qualities users can
expect from this quad-core socket AM3 AMD processor. Please take a moment to
look over PCSTATS test system configurations before moving on to the individual
benchmark results on the next several pages.
|
| PCSTATS Test System Configurations |
|
test system |
reference system #1 |
reference system #2 |
reference system #3 |
| processor:
|
amd phenom ii x4 1100t
amd Phenom II X4 1090T
AMD Phenom II X4
1075T
AMD Phenom II X4 975 BE
AMD Phenom II
X4 970 BE
AMD
Phenom II X4 965 BE
AMD Phenom II X4 910e
AMD Phenom II X4
840
AMD
Phenom II X2 555 BE
AMD Athlon
II X4 645
AMD
Athlon II X4 635
AMD Athlon II X4 620
AMD
Athlon II X3 435
AMD Athlon II X2 240e |
Intel Core i5
750 |
Intel Core i7
920 |
Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 |
| CPU Process
Technology: |
45nm |
45nm |
45nm |
45nm |
| Socket: |
Socket AM3 |
Socket LGA1156 |
Socket LGA1366 |
Socket LGA775 |
| Clock
Speed: |
16.5x 200MHz = 3.3GHz (1100T)
16x 200MHz = 3.2GHz
(1090T)
15x 200MHz = 3.0GHz (1075T)
18x 200MHz =
3.6GHz (975 BE)
17.5x 200MHz = 3.5GHz (970 BE)
17x
200MHz = 3.4GHz (965 BE)
13x 200MHz = 2.6GHz (910e)
16x 200MHz
= 3.2GHz (840)
16.0x 200MHz = 3.2GHz (555BE)
15.5x 200MHz =
2.9GHz (AIIX4 645)
14.5x 200MHz = 2.9GHz (AIIX4 635)
13x
200MHz = 2.6GHz (AIIX4 620)
14.5x 200MHz = 2.9GHz (AIIX3 435)
14x 200 MHz = 2.8GHz (AIIX2 240e) |
20x 133MHz = 2.66GHz |
20x 133MHz = 2.67GHz |
9x 333MHz = 3.0GHz (E8500) |
| Motherboard: |
Gigabyte GA-MA790FXT-UD5P (AMD
790FX)
MSI 890FXA-GD70 (AMD 890FX)
ASUS Crosshair
IV Formula (890FX) |
Gigabyte GA-P55-UD6 (Intel P55)
|
MSI X58 Platinum (X58 Express) |
MSI X48 Platinum (X48 Express) |
| Videocard: |
ASUS ENGTS250 DK
(Geforce GTS250) |
ASUS ENGTS250 DK
(Geforce GTS250) |
ASUS ENGTS250 DK
(Geforce GTS 250) |
MSI NX8800GTS-T2D320E
(Geforce
8800GTS) |
| Memory: |
2x2GB Corsair XMS3-1600C8 DDR3
|
2x2GB Corsair XMS3-1600C8 DDR3 |
3x2GB Corsair TR3X6G1600C8D DDR3 |
2x1GB Patriot PDC32G1600LLK DDR3 |
| Hard Drive:
|
74GB Western Digital Raptor WD740 |
| Optical
Drive: |
ASUS BC-1205PT-BD
|
| Power
Supply: |
PC Power & Cooling TurboCool 750W |
| Heatsink: |
Athlon64 K8 Reference Heatsink |
Intel Reference 1156 Heatsink |
Intel Reference 1366 Heatsink |
Intel Reference 775 Heatsink |
| Software Setup: |
Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate (32bit)
AMD Catalyst
10.3
nVIDIA Forceware 195.62 |
Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate (32bit)
Intel
9.1.1.1019
nVIDIA Forceware 195.62 |
Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate (32bit)
Intel INF
9.1.1.1019
nVIDIA Forceware 195.62 |
Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate (32bit)
Intel INF
9.1.1.1019
nVIDIA Forceware 195.62 |
| Benchmarks:
|
System Benchmarks:
SYSmark
2007
PCMark Vantage
SiSoft Sandra 2009 |
Calculation B/M:
Super Pi 1.5
wPrime
2.0
ScienceMark 2.3
WinRAR 3.8
Bibble 5 |
Rendering B/M:
Cinebench R10
POV-Ray
3.7
SPECviewPerf 10 |
Gaming B/M:
3DMark06
3DMark
Vantage
Cyrsis
FEAR
| | |
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