# Sticky  How to overclock an i2500k



## greenbrucelee

I have been saying I will post this for a while to go with my other overclocking thread on how to overclock a core 2 duo or quad.

As before you overclock at your own risk, overclocking can damage a cpu and limit it's life expectancy and really with todays CPUs it really isn't needed but it is fun.

As stated in my other thread you will need a good power supply, a good aftermarket cooler and decent make of ram such as gskill or corsair.

Guidlines that will be stated here are basically the same for any motherboard that you use although some sections in your BIOS will have different names.

First you need some software such as Real temp, Prime95 and CPU-z

Here goes.

Go into your BIOS

Enter the Ai Tweaker section or section where you can adjust settings

Set any Ai tuner or auto overclocking to manual
Set BCLK/PEG frequency to 100

Turbo ratio By all cores to 40

Memory frequency to whatever it is lets say in this case 1333MHz if your is more than 1800MHz you will need to do more than what is listed here to have a stable system.

Set your DRAM timings (first 5 settings) to whatever you RAM has for instance CAS latency 8, RAS to CAS Delay 9, RAS Pre Time 8, RAS ACT Time 24 DRAM command mode 24.

Set your DRAM voltage to 1.5 unless it is different but usually ram for p67 boards and up is 1.5. It will state this on the ram itself.

LLC or load line calibration set this to high or auto (you can disable this but it will mean that you have to set the CPU vcore higher)

CPU Voltage set to manual

Select the next available voltage but for 4GHz as we are doing now it should be around 1.232v

CPU spread spectrum - disable this. On some asus boards auto is disabled but I like to manually do it so I know it is disabled.

Now Save and boot into windows. If it does not boot you need more voltage for the vcore. If everything goes ok open up CPU-z and look at your settings.

You will notice that speed looks wrong and possible the voltage this is because Intel speedstep is enabled in the BIOS which means the CPU will throttle itslef down to low speed when not doing much but if you run something stressful you will see the speed go upto 4GHz (but do not do this now).

Now open up real temp or core temp to look at the temps of your cores.

Now open up Prime95 and run it for 1 hour. If you get any errors or the system restarts itself you may need to add a bit more vcore but not past what I stated above as that should be more than enough for 4GHz.

You do not want your temps to go over 70 degrees c.

If everything is ok and you want overclock more see below.

go back into the BIOS and go to the part that says by all cores set this to 45. This will set your CPU to 4.5GHz

Set the Vcore to 1.35 you may need less or more as not every cpu is the same.

set PLL over voltage to disabled.

Once this is done you will have to stress test with prime 95 again but this time test for 6 hours. You do not want your temps to go over 70 degrees c.


I could go on and tell you how to overclock this CPU to 4.8 and to 5GHz but this requires very specific settings and if not done properly can render the CPU useless and I am not prepared to take this risk in wasting your money.

Good luck.

There are other things you can do to keep things cooler but generally these are not needed such as disabling hyperthreading, getting a better cooler and making sure your case has really good airflow.


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