Overclockable Dell computers.

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

I just came across a CPU that was unknown to me that could breath some life, or maybe just extract some fun from Dell BTX Optiplexes, and other bottom feeders.
The mighty Pentium Dual Core (not C2D) SLGYP E6500K
Unlocked Wolfdale 2 core 2M cache 11x266fsb base clock with SSE4 disabled.
Basically a 45nm equivalent of the ancient X6800. Only sold in China. Can be affordable there.
Prices here are ridiculous.
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us...6-mhz-fsb.html
Apparently the small cache helps overclocking. CPUZ lumps the locked and unlocked E6500 PDC together but all top 15 overclocks are at least mid 5GHz.
http://valid.x86.fr/256fhm
The E7500 C2D can go 3.67GHz with a BSEL tapemod to 3.67GHz. 11x333f in an Optiplex so this should also. This puts all the 45nm Optiplexes into play for a Throttlestop overclock.
Too bad they disabled SSE4. 2 steps forward, 1 step back. Of course this thing would make a bunch of i3 series look silly.
I haven't published this in the bigger forums. I have few on the way to play with. Might stick one in my Opti 380 and see how it compares the X5470 Xeon swap.

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

The reason for the XPS410/9200 for overclocking is they have a 4 phase VRM that's very rare in a Dell. The E520,XPS210/9200c are also this way being different sizes of the same design.
The only other 4 phase VRM 775 Dell I've found is the Optiplex XE Desktop. Which was used for commercial applications such as airport signage, or barcode scanning (it has 24V. USB header for that). These were often built into cabinets with poor airfow. There was even an air duct kit for doing this. I grabbed a few, but haven't run one yet. I have no idea whether or not the 95W Optiplex CPU limit applies to these or not. The G45 chipset and 4 DDR3 RAM slots are hopeful signs. I can't find any userbenchmaeks for it to see what others have done.

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

The good QX6800 is the SLACP G0 version. I haven't tried this because I already own a couple of them, but the QX6850 SLAFN is also G0 stepping but 333fsb and is unloved. If you can manage a BSEL pinmod down to 266fsb you would have an unlocked "QX6600" G0 ( 9x multi.).
Now it's time for me to be honest about this. These are no longer $1000 CPUs. I don't stay within bounds on a few things. I also don't use this old junk for any data sensitive applications. I test with 3x Prime 95 on 4 cores which provides about 80-85% CPU load and seems to provide enough stability in the "real" world of benchmarks and gaming to work well. A QX6700 B3 stepping can be had for $20. But the thermal limits are very low on those and they don't OC well. But to try your hand at this,and develop some cooling mods might be worth the trouble. The 2 core X6800 B2 used to be cheap,and might make some speed on an Opti 745, but prices are way up on these for some unknown reason.
Maybe you guys can tell me how many Watts a QX6800 going 4GHz @ 1.5875V. is using? I actually never tested at that speed because I didn't know how to recover from a crash with those settings saved. But now i have some better cooling options, and Safe Mode will boot w/o TS running so I may look into it more. It may have crashed because
A- It went over 1.6V. which is an Intel hard limit on those computers. I tried 1.6V. it booted but crashed so I dropped Voltage 1 notch, got mY CPUZ valifation and never went back to it.
B- The Dell PSU couldn't make enough Watts on an 18A. 12V.rail. and shut down that rail.
I made a thread at Tom's about overclocking Dells if you want to look into it.
https://forums.tomshardware.com/faq/...uters.2528664/
I also didn't know the trick of using SetFSB to drop the FSB down, add another multi, and then bring the fsb back up for an incremental overclock. I just used whole multipliers back then. This was actually my first overclock, and the Dimension E520 is what I owned so that's what I used. I was struggling at 3.45Ghz when I tried a few mods, and discovered that every time the fan would speed up it crashed. So I wired the fan up to a Molex and gained .100V.(-.050V. starting point, and +.050V. higher limit) at the CPU and went straight to 3.73Ghz "stable", and on to 4GHz momentarily.

Here's a Youtube on grabbing FSB control on a Dimansion 9200 aka XPS410.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X85Wh9o4K4E&t=179s

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

I like that 65nm Quad that you have. Makes me wonder if I should try to get another sample of a Quad with the same lithography, even when my brain keeps saying, "45nm".

If you only need to touch the core multi and Vcore, then the toughest test, often would be Linpack. You don't even need to run it more than around 30 minutes to do what an earlier Prime95 would require 12+ hours for.

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

I have an XPS410 project going which is the QX6800. BTX has an advantage for overclocking if you can get them unlocked. They were designed for 130W PentiumD and 3.8GHz Pentium 4. I ran benchmarks at 3.73Ghz, and CPUZ @ 4GHz.
But the T3400 is a 45nm project QX9650. I had to make my own best effort CPU cooler because there are no aftermarket solutions available. But when done right it can be very effective also.
No fsb involved. Due to the locked OEM BIOS just Voltage and multiplier overclocking.
At the time I did my Dimension E520 3.45Ghz was good for about 3rd place at CPUZ for the QX6800, and was the typical overclock. I raised 2 nd place to 3.73GHz 14x266, and then went to 4GHz (3989.9MHz)15x266.http://valid.x86.fr/bg4n0r
My PLL was a tick slow so I didn't get the full 4GHz. I'm looking to go beyond that now mostly with much better cooling and some FSB tweaking I didn't have before. I wanted to test my new cooling in the T3400 because it's such an easy 4+GHz overclock, and the VRMs were already heatsinked. But bad caps got in the way.
Here's a Dell Dimansion E520 running the userbenchmark at 3.73GHz.
https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/4588263
His PLL is better than mine and he pipped me at CPUZ 3.73GHz due to that, but he never went 4GHz on the E520. He went to the T3400 instead..
Throttlestop can also be text edited to only overclock 2 cores. Which actually makes sense for a retro gaming rig.
Here's his T3400 @ 4GHz QX9650
https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/14900919
The X38 chipset in the T3400 is supposed to have hidden 400fsb support, so maybe a BSEL pinmod will get me some differnt multiplier splits.
I have an XPS 420 that's the same as the T3400 except no dual GPU support. I've had it to 4GHz just to test it.

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

yupp thats a lemon chip all right. i had a Q6600 SLACR G0 stepping with 1.275v default vid and it needed 1.4v to be linpack and prime95 stable at 3.2 ghz (400x8). i think the cutoff point for a decent overclocking quad core conroe cpu would be 1.3v default vid.

Linpack passed at 3.2 Ghz, even with a duddy one at 1.4V set in the BIOS, albeit CPU-Z, IIRC, showed 1.39V, despite CPU load line calibration.

And the same with 3.3 Ghz.

I think at both of those frequencies, it would have FSB termination issues, I had to raise the FSB termination voltage to 1.3V to stop the bus-error-WHEA-BSODs from occuring and even that wasn't enough, the CPU strangely threw bus-LVDS-machine-check-exceptions when I didn't blow cool air right on it, even with a low load!

Because the CPU had FSB LVDS issues at only 367 Mhz FSB! I never had that kind of issue with Duos!

And this horse hockey was with a P45 chipset!

When running the tests:

Linpack would pass, but Prime95 in blend mode failed, when running blend Prime95, Windows 7 suddenly said "STOP: 0x00000124", which was for a bus-comm-error.
For that, you need more FSB termination voltage, apparently, because 65nm Quads are like a dual-dual-core sandwich. -> Feels as if it's having trouble because of Intel cramming two Duos into a single package. (65nm)

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

yupp thats a lemon chip all right. i had a Q6600 SLACR G0 stepping with 1.275v default vid and it needed 1.4v to be linpack and prime95 stable at 3.2 ghz (400x8). i think the cutoff point for a decent overclocking quad core conroe cpu would be 1.3v default vid.

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

OC'ed 65nm Quads @3.3+ are easily more like 225+W TDP, if you lost the silicon lottery. And still 200+W TDP with a better batch. Looks like you'll be super lucky for the TDP to be less than the 200W mark! So expect TDP throttling with any attempt to get anywhere towards 3.5 Ghz! Much less the 4.0 figure! 3.5 Ghz usually requires ones of the best batches.

That's why OEM motherboards are considered junk for OC'ing 65nm Quads. (TDP=The TDP with all cores loaded)

Much more likely to get a better batch with a QX6800 than with a Q6600.

Only 130W TDP for 2.9 Ghz on a QX6800! Nothing like my duddy, bus-error-WHEA_UNCORRECTABLE_ERROR-prone Q6600 G0, LOL.

Higher-VID=The more likely to consume a lot of watts. My Q6600 G0 was a high-VID one of course... (1.3250V for only 2.4 Ghz!)

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

Well I just got myself in trouble with a Dell T3400 workstation. I bought it
"refurbished". At some point I put copper heatsinks on the VRM, chipset and a few other places. I finally decided to do the overclock on it. They go 4.15GHz with a QX9650 with no other mods. I thought I would see how much more a serious effort would get.
XPS 700 0HN518 heatsink.lapped and modified to fit in an Optiplex housing to mate up to a 150x50 mm Delta 260cfm fan. Lapped the QX9650 while I was at it. When I went to put it together I noticed swollen/leaking caps hiding in between the RAM slots.
Sanyo 820mf 6.3V. caps. Green ones. I see them a few other places also. but those look OK.
i have 3 spare MB for this ( $14 each) so i looked at them. Rubycon MCZ everywhere. on those. Looking NOS. Swapping the MB is easy. Moving all the heatsinks not so much.
It looks like someone went to a lot of trouble to screw it up.

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

You could play around with TS and SetFSB on your existing CPUs and see how it goes for you.
SetFSB has a virus warning on one of it's pages. I unplug my hardrives and boot a linux live DVD to go there and get what I need. The virus warning might be fake. The developer no longer supports it. There w as a free version and a pay version. The older free version still works I think.

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

There has been some success with T7500 using SetFSB.
https://www.overclock.net/forum/5-in...ion-t7500.html
A separate PCIe SATA/SAS/Raid controller to move off of the MB SATA bus which gets corrupted by SetFSB..
The X5687 4C/8T can run dual CPU and has a turbo speed of 3.86Ghz that might be unlocked for all cores with TS. Plus SetFSB should get you something. The limitation of SetFSB is no way to raise Voltage which TS can only do on unlocked single QPI CPUs.
XTU was created by Intel at a later time than TS and only goes forward from that point. Intel had no commercial interest in supporting their older procs.
T3600 T3610 and the equivalent HP machines should work with XTU. HWBOT is tied in with XTU and shares setup nifo. there.

[momaka]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

The T3500 is a favorite at the TPU Throttlestop Overclocking thread.
https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/t...op-pcs.235975/
But the dual CPU machines don't support the unlocked single CPU Xeons this requires.

Yup, can confirm this now.
Got a T7500 workstation with dual E5605 CPUs and was hoping I could OC them, as they seem they can go up quite abit... but NO. Throttlestop simply could not do anything to move the frequency of the CPU even a notch. I could use it to down-clock the CPU, though.

Ah well. According to CPU-Z built-in benchmark, my two E5605 CPUs were only about 15% slower in multi-CPU score compared to an i7-2600k (in single-core benchmark, the E5605 is much much slower than the i7-2600k, though.) Kinda sad, but still not too bad. I guess I can expect more or less the same performance as an i5-2500? Things should change quite a bit, though, if I do indeed swap those E5605 CPUs with higher-frequency hex-core ones.

Intel XTU is the software overclocking tool of choice for newer than LGA1366 systems.

Hmm... I wanted to try that one too, but simply couldn't get it to install. Said it required NetFramework 4.6.2 or newer... which I downloaded but couldn't install due to some other error (installer did not specifically say what.)

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

The BTX I'm running right now is a $20 Optiplex 380 MT. This was a low end 2 core 4GB system. But they forgot to give it a 95W CPU limit, and the G41 chipset supports the LGA771 mod. So here it is with an X5470 3.33GHz, 2x4GB DDR3 1066, and MSI GTX1060-3Gb.
https://www.userbenchmark.com/System...iPlex-380/1942
It took a modded BIOs to do it. maybe the modded BIOS supports a QX9650? If so then some overclocking might happen. It didn't work when I first tried it.
It can run the Superposition benchmark at 60fps on 1080P medium setting.
https://benchmark.unigine.com/result...5f5fe38c56c90d
Some of my runs have a slight SetFSB overclock and some don't, so the CPU score varies a little. All the Opti 380/X5470 runs are mine at userbenchmark.

Here's a Dell T3400 QX9650 @ 4.15GHz. The XPS 420 can do this also.
https://www.userbenchmark.com/UserRun/14900919

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

BTX was designed to support 130W PentiumD and up to 3.8GHz Pentium4 CPUs.
VRM cooling and high clock speeds are in their DNA. Most of them ended up in <95W CPU office machines. But if you can cut them loose they're lots of fun.

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

Hmm.. I wonder if this ThrottleStop will work with the bigger Dell Precision workstation PCs, like T3500.

It's mind-boggling how much the price has gone down on these old workstations. They can still be 100% useful, though.
This is one reason why I just can't see myself going to the store and buying all new hardware for my next built - there are just so many cheap older parts with tons of life left in them.

The T3500 is a favorite at the TPU Throttlestop Overclocking thread.
https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/t...op-pcs.235975/
But the dual CPU machines don't support the unlocked single CPU Xeons this requires. HP workstations are fair game also.
Intel XTU is the software overclocking tool of choice for newer than LGA1366 systems.
The Opti 755 with an E7500 2 core can be tape modded to 3.67GHz and with an SSD will come alive. Turn off Auto Defrag. and put in a 4 core heatsink D9729. Intel sold 2 core LGA771 Xeons a 3.5GHz so it's not that big a stretch.
The Zotac GTX1050 2GB Mini drops right in with no PSU swap needed. This does assume the Tower size and not the smaller cases.

[momaka]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

well better clear up the dust if u want those machines to continue running!! lol!

Would love to - you know I enjoy cleaning and restoring old reliable PCs.
But these I can't really touch, as we do contract work for that company, and I'm not exactly their IT guy... though once in a while, they do ask us to move some of their workstations around.

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

On some of them, you can see a wall of dust on the front intake.

well better clear up the dust if u want those machines to continue running!! lol!

[momaka]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

Hmm.. I wonder if this ThrottleStop will work with the bigger Dell Precision workstation PCs, like T3500.

Reason I wonder is because I just bought a T7500 for cheap with 2x (I think... we will see) Xeon quad core CPUs. Planning to upgrade to 2x hex-cores and maybe overclock them a little if this software allows it. But I dunno... this is socket 1366 stuff, so I think the mem controller is in the CPU and hence ThrottleStop won't work(?)

For actual performance the T3400 workstation is better withQX9650 and dual GPU support. I've picked up T3400 MB for $14 each.

Nice!
It's mind-boggling how much the price has gone down on these old workstations. They can still be 100% useful, though.
This is one reason why I just can't see myself going to the store and buying all new hardware for my next built - there are just so many cheap older parts with tons of life left in them.

i still have like 5 of the xps 410 with 3.4 pd cpus, they are tanks.

Many of those old Dell BTX systems are. Well, badcaps aside in some of them (both in PSU and on motherboard), they are very reliable. I still see offices around here with these machines handling various duties. In fact, the company I contract for still has a fleet of these running (mostly Dell Optiplex 755 and similar with Core 2 Duo's.) On some of them, you can see a wall of dust on the front intake.

[Retrorockit]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

They can run the QX6800 SLACP and overclock nicely. It's the same MB as the Dimensin E 520 above except a Mid tower layout with room for full size GPUs.

[brethin]

Re: Overclockable Dell computers.

i still have like 5 of the xps 410 with 3.4 pd cpus, they are tanks.