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core ratios and BIOS config on 4790K and Formula

flyinion
Level 12
Hi guys, need some advice here. I don't know if it's that I'm not used to all the options of a UEFI BIOS or what, but I can't seem to get my 4790K working with the correct default operation of Speedstep. As near as I can tell the "CPU Core Ratio" section under Extreme Tweaker is where I should be setting the ratio on the CPU. What I've noticed is if I set the ASUS multi-core enhancement to auto, it clocks everything to 4.4 all the time so I figured out to shut that off.

So that leaves me with the Core Ratio section. On Auto which seemed logically the default setting though, I get 3.8-4.2Ghz, and CPU-Z and the AISuite System Info always say 100x42 and never change (maybe that's their correct operation? If I set it to Sync All Cores I get 4.0-4.4Ghz which seems correct except for one "problem" in both cases (3.8-4.2 and 4.0-4.4). When I use Prime 95 to put the system under load on all cores the speed goes up (to 4.2 or 4.4) not down.

My previous cpu was an i7-860 which would clock down to the low range of speedstep when all cores were in use. Has the way speedstep works changed? Thanks for any help you guys can give as I'm very very confused right now.
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Nate152
Moderator
Hello flyinion

Your 4790k is 4.0GHz - 4.4Ghz boost at stock settings and this is what you want it to run at.


Speedstep will throttle down the cpu frequency when the cpu is not under load. When the cpu is under load (4.4GHz) speedstep will not throttle down the cpu frequency.

Nate152 wrote:
Hello flyinion

Your 4790k is 4.0GHz - 4.4Ghz boost at stock settings and this is what you want it to run at.


Speedstep will throttle down the cpu frequency when the cpu is not under load. When the cpu is under load (4.4GHz) speedstep will not throttle down the cpu frequency.


Ok so you're saying that the current gen of Intel cpu's puts the chip at the turbo frequency when all cores are under load? Just want to double check on that. The way I'm used to it working is if you're only using basically one core for example the other ones get "shut off" and the remaining one ramps up beyond the based clock (i.e. from 4 to 4.4 in the case of the 4790K) but if you had all cores loaded then it would only run at the base of 4.0 or possibly slightly more. For example my i7-860 would add x1 multiplier to the base clock even if all cores were loaded vs. adding x4 if only one was. I just want to make sure I have things set up and working properly at what should be default settings before I run off manually overclocking and also tweaking a flight sim that is very CPU bound.

chevell65
Level 12
The "Asus multicore enhancement" setting in bios will allow the CPU to ramp up all 4 cores to 4.4 rather than just one. Although for overclocking I've seen this setting turned off.

I have it turned off though and I'm still getting all cores clocking to 4.4 under load.

chevell65
Level 12
The Ai tends to do that with multicore enhancement enabled while showing a 4% overclock in the Ai.

But with the Asus multicore enhancement disabled the 4% overclock in the Ai doesn't show up any more yet the Ai retains the 4.4Ghz setting unless you take it down to 4.2 manually. It's a little strange.

flyinion
Level 12
The AI Suite? The only thing I have installed from that is the system info module. I don't have the overclocking module installed. Are you talking about that the BIOS is storing a setting from having the multicore enhancement turned on originally? I guess for now I'm just leaving it on Sync All Cores. At least I get 4.4 on that setting. On Auto it won't go over 4.2 except once the speed monitoring in RealTemp showed something like 104x43 to get around 4.3Ghz when I had it set to "Auto". Not sure why the bclock would be changing like that. I wonder if it has to do with that I've set the Ai overclock tuner to XMP to get the XMP profiles on my RAM? Maybe I should set it to Manual and put in the manual timings for my RAM instead?

flyinion
Level 12
Setting Ai Overclock Tuner in BIOS to Manual, manually setting my RAM and timings to the XMP speeds, and trying all variations of the "CPU Core Ratio" setting the only one that manages to get to 4.4 is "Sync All Cores". "Auto" and "Per Core" all result in a max of 4.2Ghz. On "per core" I tried leaving all of them on Auto for the value and I also tried setting each core to 44, 43, 42, 42 (in order from top to bottom of the listing in BIOS) assuming that's the way the turbo clocking was supposed to work i.e. 1 core run it at 44, 2 run the cpu at 43, 3 or more in use run it at 42.

In bios, did you turn on the "Asus Multicore Enhancement" setting? That is the one for 4.4Ghz. Like I said it's a bit wonky and confusing how it all works. Mine shows 4.4 for all cores in the Ai. You don't need to use the auto tuner in the Ai, you can use it for just the fan control separately if you want.

flyinion
Level 12
I turned off multicore enhancement because it was clocking (as far as I could tell) everything at 4.4 constantly (i.e. would not lower clock when idle). Maybe I'll try it again and double check that.