Intel DX58SO: Overclocking

In recent years Intel has become much more understanding that the enthusiast community has grown quite large and that raw performance ranks number one with this consumer group. For that reason Intel has softened their view significantly regarding the overclocking of their processors and motherboards. In fact with the materials provided with the Core™ i7 review kit Intel even included a rather in depth 22 page document entitled Intel Extreme Motherboard DX58SO ...Performance Tuning Process. This document elaborates quite freely on the best way to overclock the Core™ i7 family of processors. In the document Intel states that there are four multipliers on the motherboard which are used to set the system speed:

1. CPU Speed: When multiplied by the system base clock speed (default 133.33 MHz) gives the CPU frequency. Four multipliers are used to define different speeds based on the number of active CPU cores.
2. Memory Speed: When multiplied by the system base clock speed gives the memory frequency. For example a memory multiplier of 10 times the base clock of 133.33 MHz results in a memory frequency of 1333 MHz.
3. Quick Path Interconnect (QPI) Speed: Selectable transfer rate of data transferred between the CPU and the IOH.
4. Uncore Speed: This multiplier applies to the non-CPU related items in the processor. The limit on this multiplier is set by the memory multiplier.

What Intel relates in their documentation is completely accurate when it comes to their motherboard, the DX58SO. The ASUS P6T X58 Deluxe brings a slightly more robust BIOS to the table that offers the ability to adjust some features not present on the DX58SO, especially in the realm of voltage manipulation. Whether these additional features are truly necessary is certainly debatable and with time and effort we shall certainly see which BIOS functions most tickle the fancy of the i7 family of processors.

In this review we overclocked the DX58SO leaving left turbo boost enabled and were able to comfortably run the system at 4.035 GHz. We realized that due to the very nature of turbo boost we probably got a high overclocked value that we would have been able to attain with turbo boost disabled. Since the ASUS P6T X58 Deluxe does not offer turbo boost as a BIOS option when the system is overclocked we were forced to not use this feature in our overclocking exploits with the P6T. We we able to attain the same overclocked level with ASUS P6T X58 Deluxe without turbo boost as we did with the DX58SO with turbo boost enabled using a multiplier of 28 and a base clock of 144 MHz. Unfortunately, those levels were not as stable as we would have liked to see with the ASUS P6T. We were able to achieve a completely stable overclock of 3.875 GHz upping the multiplier to 29 and leaving the base clock at the stock 133 MHz speed.

CPU-Z View of DX58SO Overclocked with Turbo Boost Enabled

It was at this point we decided to compare the two systems overclocked at their respective levels, the Intel DX58SO using turbo boost and the ASUS P6T without turbo boost. We thought the results would be quite interesting and help to either prove or disprove the merits of turbo boost.

CPU-Z View of ASUS P6T Deluxe Overclocked without Turbo Boost Enabled

<< Prev - Next >>