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Certain games don't like when you overclock your CPU?

Soundtrack2chaos

Soundtrack2chaos

Member
Oct 31, 2017
1,260
The Blocc
Recently overclocked my CPU and I noticed a few games just act weird or flat out don't work when I overclock my CPU to 5ghz (I have a i9 9700k). Specifically:

Sekiro won't launch

AC Odyssey crashes in the menus

GTA 5 has weird behavior when I'm in the map

On top of that it seems a few other games have less noticeable issues, for ex. GRID 2019 runs but it just seems a tad bit off when I play it.

Meanwhile, other games just don't seem to have any negatives, like DOS2, Resident Evil 2, Dragon Ball Z Kakarot.

So I dialed back my overclock from 5ghz to 4.8ghz and the above games are back to normal. I'm just curious, is this just something that happens with CPU overclocking in general or did I do something that made things a bit unstable or something? Cause my temperatures are just fine but the above mentioned games are just wonky as hell.
 
OP
OP
Soundtrack2chaos

Soundtrack2chaos

Member
Oct 31, 2017
1,260
The Blocc
jediyoshi said:
Sounds like instability? I'd look into stability testing with something like Prime95.
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Yea I'm new to this,I assumed that as long as your temps are good that things are stable,I guess not. I'll have to look into that.

Resident Guru said:
Your overclock isn't stable. Just because your temps are good does not mean your overclock is stable.
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Hmmmmm so I guess I should increase my voltage from 1.35 if I want to bump it up to 5ghz?
 
Darkkahn

Darkkahn

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
2,350
Soundtrack2chaos said:
Hmmmmm so I guess I should increase my voltage from 1.35 if I want to bump it up to 5ghz?
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Not an expert but be careful:
www.resetera.com

I fried my CPU with a 1.35v overclock...

And more puzzlingly it's a Ryzen 5 3600XT, which is supposedly well known for being high-grade overclockable silicon? Gutted. I didn't do anything explicitly wrong, at least I'm sure I didn't. Pushed the voltage up incrementally to 1.35 to see if I could push 4.5GHz on all cores. At max load...
www.resetera.com www.resetera.com
 

Deleted member 16908

Oct 27, 2017
9,377
Just leave it at 4.8 GHz. Nobody will think less of you.
 
Flandy

Flandy

Community Resettler
Member
Oct 25, 2017
3,445
9700k here and the only difference I've noticed between 4.6Ghz and 4.9Ghz is higher power draw lol
 
Cheerilee

Cheerilee

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
3,969
IIRC, when I was overclocking my CPU, I read that there are some applications that actually demand a bit more from your CPU than your CPU is set to deliver, and this is apparently completely normal behavior. Like, your CPU is supposed to be open to the idea of being asked to do occasional, very minor overclocking, beyond it's current clock, when a program knows how to ask for it.

I have an Intel 3.4ghz CPU, and I figured out that I could push the CPU to it's absolute limit of 4.3ghz (based on my luck with the silicon lottery). Which was a pretty nice increase. Temperatures never once became an issue, thanks to my aftermarket Noctua 120mm cooler. I tested it with Prime95 and 4.3ghz was the very edge of where my CPU was stable, but stable is stable, so it's all good, right? Then a month later I needed to convert a video, so I fired up Handbrake, and my computer instantly crashed. Tried it again, and it crashed again. So I turned the overclock down to 4.2ghz, and everything has been fine ever since.

The knife edge of CPU stability is not exactly where you want to be. Give the CPU a bit of extra breathing room.

Edit: I would not increase my voltage past any general consensus of safe voltage for your CPU, to increase the stability in an attempt to chase down a few more ghz. You won't notice the difference from the negligable performance increase, but your CPU will sure notice the difference when it burns out and dies due to overvolting.
 
Futaleufu

Futaleufu

Banned
Jan 12, 2018
3,910
This is a thing I found out in the Athlon XP era. Even if the overclock is stable some apps and games won't work properly and may crash or blue screen your system.
 
Piggus

Piggus

Member
Oct 27, 2017
4,693
Oregon
I've been out of the CPU loop for a while but it sounds like a lot of these newer CPUs from both brands don't overclock very well. Or are they just pushed closer to their limits out of the box? I'm still on x99 and recently picked up a dirt cheap i7 5960X, and that beast was quickly running at 4.5 GHz stable (up from 3.5 ghz stock) at under 1.3v and hasn't given me any problems in the month that I've been using it. This CPU will probably be 8 or 9 years old by the time it's time to retire it. šŸ˜
 
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Finaika

Finaika

Member
Dec 11, 2017
13,288
Overclocking is really not worth it these days.

You're sacrificing stability, more heat and lifespan of your hardware for single digit fps increase.
 
Pargon

Pargon

Member
Oct 27, 2017
11,996
Futaleufu said:
This is a thing I found out in the Athlon XP era. Even if the overclock is stable some apps and games won't work properly and may crash or blue screen your system.
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ā€¦that means it's not stable. What do you think stability is?

Piggus said:
I've been out of the CPU loop for a while but it sounds like a lot of these newer CPUs from both brands don't overclock very well. Or are they just pushed closer to their limits out of the box?
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It's the latter. CPUs run far closer to their limits now, right out of the box, without having to do anything.
 
Linus815

Linus815

Member
Oct 29, 2017
19,720
TheMadTitan

TheMadTitan

Member
Oct 27, 2017
27,208
Not every CPU is the same, even across models. Manufacturing tolerances can be razor thin and you really have to tune to frequency and voltage to your specific chip. Just because Bob's 9700k can handle 5.0GHZ, yours might not be able to boost that high and remain stable at the same voltage, and someone else could hit the same numbers with less electricity running through the chip.

Anything that uses more processing power than three browser tabs could cause what you're trying to run to close or even blue screen your computer.
 
sweetmini

sweetmini

Member
Jun 12, 2019
3,921
White Glint said:
Even just a +100/+900 gpu overclock is bad for lifespan?
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The thing is, nowadays you don't get just +100/+900 ... since the whole card already boosts +20% under load, trying to max out the equation power delivery/temps/frequency (normally power limited if all goes well)
So, if you have an AIB piece, you are overclocking the factory overclocking of a founder boosting.
This is not a problem if you keep your gpu 2 years, but it will be if you keep it 7.
My non professional opinion (i.e. empirical, building computers since the 1980s), how bad for the lifespan depends on the components quality, how often boosting/OC occurs, how you are forcing it to occur (undervolting might help) and of course playtime. If a quality component is rated for 3000 hours at 70 degrees celcius and default voltage, it can probably last 12000 if you don't go crazy with a little undervolt (60000 if just doing base work to display a desktop, way under the specs) , and 4000 if you push it (or much worse than rating if you go completely out of specs, with LN2 for example).
Every time you push, you suck a little bit of life out of your component.
Get a proper picture of your board (techpowerup), and try to get the life expectancy of the components, to know how long your card will last, at least on the power delivery side.
Bullzoid might already have covered your card
 
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Vexii

Vexii

Member
Oct 31, 2017
2,385
UK
Darkkahn said:
Not an expert but be careful:
www.resetera.com

I fried my CPU with a 1.35v overclock...

And more puzzlingly it's a Ryzen 5 3600XT, which is supposedly well known for being high-grade overclockable silicon? Gutted. I didn't do anything explicitly wrong, at least I'm sure I didn't. Pushed the voltage up incrementally to 1.35 to see if I could push 4.5GHz on all cores. At max load...
www.resetera.com www.resetera.com
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Lmao, glad I'm being used as a cautionary tale still šŸ˜‹

Yeah OP it isn't worth it and your OC isn't stable. Do not go past 1.35, you're already on the skirts of what is considered a "safe" voltage and even then it still killed my CPU
 
Kabukimurder

Kabukimurder

Banned
Oct 28, 2017
550
White Glint said:
Even just a +100/+900 gpu overclock is bad for lifespan?
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A GPU ages so fast that it's very unlikely that it's going to break before being obsolete. For me it's a no brainer to get the most out of it in the short window that it's relevant for modern gaming. If anything clocking a GPU will expand it's lifetime relevancy.

If you clock the shit out of your CPU you might reduce the lifespan of it from 30 years to 25 and you'll probably will have replaced it 5 times anyway. You don't really hear about a CPU breaking on its own.
 
daninthemix

daninthemix

Member
Nov 2, 2017
5,022
I've also heard that "stable" can decrease over time. So your 4.8 "stable" OC is no longer stable a few months later. Not sure if true though.
 
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