Overclocking i7-4790K & MAXIMUS VII HERO

[Rammstein874]

So i am looking to overclock the MAXIMUS VII HERO with the 4790K and i have looked around and tried doing overclocks that others have had but after testing it i would always get a hardware fail...

CPU-Z - http://valid.x86.fr/2xrtdw

Here are some settings that i have tried but keep getting hardware fail...

Also i plan to upgrade to 32GB of ram. What Ram would be good for the specs i have to overclock with as well

Should i overclock after upgrading the ram?

Any help would be great!

Thanks!

[Nate152]

More ram doesn't help performance wise and you only need a lot of ram if you use programs that call for it.

16GB will be fine but if you want 32GB don't let me steer you away from it, you can overclock your cpu before you upgrade your ram if you want.

Are you able to get your ram running at its rated specs by raising the cpu system agent offset voltage +.020v?

[Rammstein874]

Nate152 wrote:
More ram doesn't help performance wise and you only need a lot of ram if you use programs that call for it.

16GB will be fine but if you want 32GB don't let me steer you away from it, you can overclock your cpu before you upgrade your ram if you want.

Are you able to get your ram running at its rated specs by raising the cpu system agent offset voltage +.020v?

Ok so should i set all the settings that i have posted in my first post and then just set the agent offset voltage to +.020?

Would this be for 4.6?

Also i will upgrade to the 16GB of ram then and this would be a good choice then. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0080FFZ8E/ref=psdc_172500_t1_B0080GKCV8

[NemesisChild]

That is probably the best 2x8GB set available for the Z87 & Z97 platforms.
I ran that exact same kit in my 4790K build for a long time.
I was actually able to run the set at CL9 timings at stock frequency & DRAM voltage, with no special bios tweaks.

Once stability is achieved with manual voltage settings, switch over the value to adaptive mode.

[Nate152]

The system agent offset voltage (+.020v) is for stabilizing your ram, does raising this get your ram stable?

The G.Skill TridentX 16GB 2400MHz is a great choice for a ram kit. 🙂

[Rammstein874]

Should I use all the settings I have in the first post but then adjust the agent offset?

[Nate152]

Yes please and if it fails the test try setting your ram manually.

[Rammstein874]

Nate152 wrote:
Yes please and if it fails the test try setting your ram manually.

Before i change anything I also wanted to say that when we change the settings the Core speed and multiplier did not stay at the number i set it too..I put it to 46 but it was all over the place only time it went to 46 was when i ran the test

[Nate152]

That's normal it was throttling to conserve power, if you want it to run constantly at 4.6GHz set the windows power plan to high performance.

[Rammstein874]

Nate152 wrote:
That's normal it was throttling to conserve power, if you want it to run constantly at 4.6GHz set the windows power plan to high performance.

Ok i will do that as well!!!

So here are the following changes i will be doing.

Ai Overclock Tuner - XMP
CPU Core Ratio - Sync All Cores
Core Ratio Limit - 46
CPU Core Voltage - Manual Mode
CPU Core Voltage Override - 1.300
CPU system Agent offset +.020v

That sound about right?

BTW it's a buddy of mine computer. Going to have him do this today and will report back to you! Thanks for all your help so far!

[Nate152]

Yep that looks good, you can set the ram manually instead of using XMP, sometimes this gives better results. Before overclocking the cpu you could reset to defaults and set XMP only and run a stress test to be sure the ram is stable. Once you know it is then move on to overclocking the cpu, this way if there's any instability you'll know which is causing it.

First, try those settings without overclocking the cpu.