overclocking

[freakdaddy64]

im not a tech guru and i see alot of talk on overclocking can someone explain to me what the big deal is i mean if i have a 3.6 cpu that can overclock to 4.0 why wouldnt i buy a 4.0 cpu, if i have 3200 ram that can overclock to 3600 why not just buy 3600 ram im sorry i dont get it.

 

[KeyboardDemon]

There are a few reasons why people might want to overclock.

- increasing performance of older hardware so it will stay current longer
- getting a free performance boost by getting lower tier components to run at higher tier performance levels
- some people simply build to overclock, like a sport of sorts and measure their success through achieving high benchmark scores
- some just want to gain more frames per second in their favourite games

I've tried overclocking and it's not for me, I don't have the patience to spend time trouble shooting and trying to tweak settings in order to find a sweet spot, I would rather buy something that suits my needs and then enjoy it.

But having tried it before I do see the appeal, there is something quite satisfying about taking a CPU that's designed to run at up to 4.4ghz and pushing it to 4.9ghz and getting a benchmark result that shows my PC is in the top 1% of similar spec PCs in the world.

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[Carlos]

im not a tech guru and i see alot of talk on overclocking can someone explain to me what the big deal is i mean if i have a 3.6 cpu that can overclock to 4.0 why wouldnt i buy a 4.0 cpu, if i have 3200 ram that can overclock to 3600 why not just buy 3600 ram im sorry i dont get it.

Just don't worry about overclocking. Just don't touch it. Unless you see something that requires that spec. Example: Suppose you bought the PC for Modern Warfare, and you see Black Ops Cold War [COD 2020] requires 4.0ghz as minimum, and you don't have money for a standard 4.0ghz chip. You overclock your system to run 4.0ghz, but there's a catch. There's always a catch with overclocking: Your system will begin to work harder to achieve it, and keep it locked there. Think of it like fps maintenance.

And when it does, you'll need more hardware to keep it cool. Meaning more money. Unless you have the hardware ready for overclocking. Anytime you overclock you'll rack up more wattage per overclock.

 

[KeyboardDemon]

Just don't worry about overclocking. Just don't touch it. Unless you see something that requires that spec. Example: Suppose you bought the PC for Modern Warfare, and you see Black Ops Cold War [COD 2020] requires 4.0ghz as minimum, and you don't have money for a standard 4.0ghz chip. You overclock your system to run 4.0ghz, but there's a catch. There's always a catch with overclocking: Your system will begin to work harder to achieve it, and keep it locked there. Think of it like fps maintenance.

And when it does, you'll need more hardware to keep it cool. Meaning more money. Unless you have the hardware ready for overclocking. Anytime you overclock you'll rack up more wattage per overclock.

I think that was a more accurate description for a few generations of CPU back.

We already have a form of overclocking and have done since Intel and AMD brought in features like Speed Boost and Turbo Boost etc... as well as features like XMP.

Your Ryzen 5 3600 has a Base clock of 2.2ghz and boosts to 4.2ghz under load where thermal limits permit. The default RAM speed is 2133mhz but if you use 3200mhz RAM and get it to run with XMP on you can make your RAM run at that speed.

What overclocking will do, where thermal limits permit, is allow to run your CPU at a higher clock speed but that will keep it at that higher speed, which means more power draw and higher running temperatures, the return is better performance.

For those that overclock the rewards are greater than the costs, but overclocking will lead to instability. A skillful overclocking expert will know how to mitigate against such issues by doing things like increasing CPU voltages, adding more expensive cooling and setting tighter fan curves to manage this, but they won't be able to eliminate it.

Like @Carlos , I think it is more trouble than it is worth, in the past I've spent many hours tweaking an overclock just to get a higher score on a benchmark that runs for a few minutes. I've then had to deal with random crashes that are usually caused by incorrect voltages or memory leaks due to the higher running speed.

At the moment I prefer to run my system at stock, I also prefer to run it in the Power Saving setting. When I can I'll post videos to show what difference it makes to my frame rate running at a lower power setting compared to Ultimate high performance in the power options on Windows 10. You should try it too, if the difference between running a game in a low power state compared to a high performance state is big enough then it might be worth thinking about overclocking, for me I think it's not worth it.

Your milage may vary.

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