Not all cores are staying overclocked.

[Toxicbiz]

Hello everyone ! I am having a little problem with my fx 8120 I have overclocked it to 4ghz but sometimes when playing games like bf3 the first two cores stay at 4.0 but all the others drop down to 1.4ghz ! I am not sure why this is happening but it is making my fps in bf3 drop from 60fps to the 20-35fps. All my stuff in my bios seem to be in order.

My specs are :
FX 8120
2x 7850's 2gb
Asrock 970 extreme 3
8 gbs of ram
620w bronzes antec psu

 

[jamesriley94]

Hello everyone ! I am having a little problem with my fx 8120 I have overclocked it to 4ghz but sometimes when playing games like bf3 the first two cores stay at 4.0 but all the others drop down to 1.4ghz ! I am not sure why this is happening but it is making my fps in bf3 drop from 60fps to the 20-35fps. All my stuff in my bios seem to be in order.

My specs are :
FX 8120
2x 7850's 2gb
Asrock 970 extreme 3
8 gbs of ram
620w bronzes antec psu

What cooling are you using? And what temperatures are you getting?

 

[MacLeod]

The motherboard is probably throttling it down because its too much of a load for it. The 970 Extreme3 isnt a very beefy motherboard and only has 4+1 power phase which isnt that great. Ideally you want 8+2 in order to handle the current draw these FX chips suck down at anything other than stock speeds.

 

[Toxicbiz]

Im using an aftermarket air coolers forgot what it was called but its not bad. Right now on Core Temp its saying all cores are at 22c.

 

[jamesriley94]

Run something like Prime95 or OCCT and see what your load temps are.

 

[Toxicbiz]

Load temps are staying around 50c.

What is a 4+1 and 8+2 power phase? Or could you put a link explaining please.

 

[MacLeod]

Im not smart enough to know what it technically means but the simplistic version that my little brain can understand is that the more phases it has, the more lines it has to deliver power to the CPU which results not only in more power but cleaner, more reliable power as well which translates into much better stability for overclocks and heavy power draws like those from a FX chip.

And generally 4+1 boards will also have weaker parts on it and not be able to handle higher power draw too where 8+2 boards are meant to be hammered on so theyll usually have beefier parts and be better suited to handle monster CPU's like those FX chips which can suck down 200 watts if heavily overclocked! An average board wont be able to handle 200 watt draws like that and will throttle down to protect itself which is what I suspect your motherboard is doing.

 

[NeverBackDown]

Try finding a clock that can get all cores to the same clock? Jump down to 3.9ghz and check them in OCCT or whatever software is used. If not all cores are at 3.9ghz then drop to 3.8ghz-rinse and repeat- to get a stable overclock.

Keep in mind on changing voltage as well. Might want to stress test but "game stress testing" which is almost never a stable clock.