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Associate
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18 Jun 2011
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318
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Isle of Wight
I noticed the Xi Apex is out to buy now , have you got one yet and if so worth getting over the XI extreme ?
To be honest I will stick with my Extreme for now, it does all I want it to do, its a beast for overclocking my 9900k, I still have my Z270 IX Apex, a monster of a ram overclocking board, due to having only two memory slots, so the Z390 XI Apex does appeal to me, but I cant justify spending another £300+ on a third Z390 board.
 
Associate
Joined
1 Nov 2010
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81
Location
Gloucester
To be honest I will stick with my Extreme for now, it does all I want it to do, its a beast for overclocking my 9900k, I still have my Z270 IX Apex, a monster of a ram overclocking board, due to having only two memory slots, so the Z390 XI Apex does appeal to me, but I cant justify spending another £300+ on a third Z390 board.


That's fair enough , You could always sell me your cpu to fund it lol :)


I am similar minded tempted to buy but another 330 and it may not be stable at same vcore etc ,
 
Associate
Joined
13 Jan 2004
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1,137
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Bucks
Has anyone tried the Der8auer OC frame under an NZXT AIO cooler? wondering if it makes good contact using the provided screws and fixings or if I need to get any additional/replacement hardware before the frame arrives. TIA!
 
Associate
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Posts
318
Location
Isle of Wight
AI Overclock has now reasseded my system and given me an overclock of 51/51 at 1.270 vcore, that means 51 AVX and 51 non AVX, under full stress test load with RealBench its 1.243v, could probably lower the vcore a bit, as AI does tend to overvolt a bit.
Will post screens of RealBench run later as Photobucket is being its normal PITA.
 
Soldato
Joined
14 Apr 2009
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4,811
Location
Cheshire
Got some cash spare. What's the mobo to get for 250-300 (always had Asus and fancy a change) and is the 9900k worth it over the 9700k for gaming and streaming?
Also what's the RAM of choice?

Dont want RGB anything, maybe some white lights are ok.
 
Associate
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Isle of Wight
Screens of my 1 hour 5.1ghz run of RealBench at 1.243v under full load which AI Overclock set for me at 51/51 after reassessing my system, which it does every now and then, based on my cooling.

Fifty minutes in under full load.
3d7a1bc8-27d3-40ba-a722-6e19c8dee377-original.jpg

1 hour completed, max temp was 86c.
a9e2b98a-5784-435f-8e32-4e3ef969c024-original.jpg
 
Associate
Joined
18 Jun 2011
Posts
318
Location
Isle of Wight
Got some cash spare. What's the mobo to get for 250-300 (always had Asus and fancy a change) and is the 9900k worth it over the 9700k for gaming and streaming?
Also what's the RAM of choice?

Dont want RGB anything, maybe some white lights are ok.
Depends on what you intend to be doing with your setup, there are many good boards in that price range from various manufacturers, but at the end of the day it's your money and your choice.
 
Associate
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18 Jun 2011
Posts
318
Location
Isle of Wight
Continuing with AI Overclock, I decided to disable Hyperthreading, AI gave me 52/52 at 1.305v, under load this drops to 1.279v, and a 10c drop in max temps running RealBench, interesting stuff.
56028c23-2fd7-45e2-9dc0-47fac0aa6786-original.jpg
 
Associate
Joined
30 Aug 2018
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2,483
Okay, I finally pulled my finger out and uploaded some images.

5-GHz-Cinebench-2102.png

5-GHz-Realbench-1hr-Pass.png

1.128 was the lowest vcore I caught in a screenshot but not the lowest I observed.

5-1-GHz-Cinebench-2192.png

5-1-GHz-1hr-Realbench-pass.png

I think the lowest vcore for this was about 1.146v according to cpu-z

5-2-GHz-Cinebench-2189.png


The score on this one is quite low because I had other things running in the background while benching during the 5.2GHz run.


5-2-GHz-1hr-Realbench-pass.png

5-3-GHz-Cinebench-2224.png

5-3-GHz-1hr-Realbench-pass.png
5-4-GHz-Cinebench-2300.png

All runs were back to back and with an ambient temp of around 18 degrees ish.

  • CPU delidded and with liquid metal (no die frame right now :eek: )
  • RAD xspc tx360 with 3 be quiet! 120mm high speed PWM fans in pull config
  • CPU BLOCK EK Velocity
  • RESERVOIR Phanteks R160
  • PUMP EK DDC PWM
  • COOLANT Ice Dragon
  • VRMS also in the loop
I've got my GPU on a separate loop and when I have enough fans I am going to be adding a MO-RA3 as an external radiator to the CPU loop.

Some of the runs have lower than expected scores in Cinebench and this is due to other things going on in the background while I was benching. I only have the one PC and not a great deal of time so I have to multitask, sorry about that. I may revisit this and update the scores if I begin tweaking the RAM and working on lowering the vcore for a given frequency.
I can run Realbench at 5.4GHz but it starts giving WHEA errors, you'll see that all my screenshots include HWinfo to show that each run was WHEA error free. I 'think' I am at the limit of the board now in terms of power delivery, or perhaps my loop is at the limit in terms of heat but I am not going to try overclocking at below ambient.

For what it's worth, the VRMs on the Maximus XI Formula peaked at 42 degrees during the 5.3GHz 1hr Realbench run and don't go higher for 5.4GHz Realbench so I think they are doing fine. Even if the temp sensor is inaccurate and is reporting something crazy like 40 degrees lower than the hottest point I'm still well within the spec.
 
Associate
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At load it drops to 1.288 which you can see (hard to tell, sry about that) in the row just below the CPU-z box.

Current 1.332 / min 1.288 / max 1.35

I thought it was set at 1.35 for vcore in bios with llc7 but if the max is showing as 1.35v in hwinfo that seems unlikely. Let me check and get back to you.

EDIT: Bios is 1.35v so the 1.35v maximum in HWinfo must have been a spike. I've just confirmed this by running everything again and recording the same figures with realbench running while I type.

Screenshot-118.png
 
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Associate
Joined
30 Aug 2018
Posts
2,483
Fwiw the 5.4GHz Cinebench run was also at 1.35v in bios with llc7.

I don't know what I can do to get Realbench and other benches to run without WHEA in Hwinfo at 5.4GHz because upping the voltage doesn't seem to help a great deal. I've fiddled with power settings and cache and anything else I can to see if i can get an hour of realbench without errors but hwinfo keeps reporting them. This is from 1.35v up to 1.40v in bios which shows 1.35v at load in realbench.

I think i'm right on the cusp of stability but something is holding me back and I don't know what it is. I keep looking at the evga dark and wondering...

1.4v+ is where the cpu package and my hottest core begin hitting 90-93 under sustained load which I'm sure adds to the instability negating any benefit the extra voltage brings.

Edit - at 1.41v + i think i'm at the limit of my block thermally since it can't draw heat from the cpu fast enough. But I feel sure I should be able to get 5.4GHz stable at 1.4v. It's so close, it's maddening!
 
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Associate
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30 Aug 2018
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2,483
Maybe. I feel like the scaling so far should let me hit 5.4. I don't think 5.5GHz will be possible without sub ambient cooling, like iced water at a minimum, but that 5.4 is sooooo close.
 
Associate
Joined
30 Aug 2018
Posts
2,483
5.4 unconditionally on ambient is the stuff of fairy tails. Pick yourself up a chiller if you're looking to push the ceiling.
If I had believed the reviews, then anything over 5 on ambient was the stuff of fairytales, not to mention the various forums where one often hears that 5.1/5.2/5.3 at x.xxx vcore isn't possible. I wouldn't run it as a daily anyway if it is using 1.35v+ underload given what I've learnt about spikes, but I feel sure I should be able to get it stable with this CPU even if it is at the very edge of the thermal limits in extended stress testing.
Maybe it is the board, maybe it is something I'm doing or not doing, but I'm not giving up on it just yet. Somewhere there is a guide to all the various UEFI settings and what they do and when to use them, I just need to find it :D
Hell, if I ignore the WHEAs then it is stable :p
I'll keep at it when I have the time to fiddle with settings. For now I'm dialing it back and enjoying some games ;)
 
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