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As we said earlier, the ASrock P55 Extreme 4 has been our first choice for this project, mainly because we have found the bios settings to be some of the easiest to configure with any board we have tested. Achieving a 1,400mhz clock increase on an Intel Core i5 760 takes 10 seconds. As you already have the system built and are using the ThermalTake Frio then we know the cooling is up to the task.
Build the system, boot it up and press delete on your keyboard as the bios starts.
Navigate to the ‘OC Tweaker' menu in the bios and select the ‘Turbo 50' Option. This applies all the settings needed for a 50% overclock. Depending on your bios version it may default the CPU Ratio setting to 20x which is for the Core i5 750, but you can adjust it to 21 manually. It is right at the bottom of our image above.
It is easy enough to push the cpu to 4.4ghz, but it can require a little tweaking with memory settings and additional core voltage and we want to keep this particular article as straightforward as possible.
Don't change the tab from OC Tweaker, but scroll down a little to ensure that your memory modules are running at 2000mhz. If you have bought the ram we recommended on the last page then this will configure automatically as seen above. Otherwise you may need to manually apply an XMP profile.
Reboot the system, press delete again and check that the 960 is running at the correct clock speeds, shown in the image above.
It is always a good idea, before installing the operating system to check the Hardware Monitor tab (H/W Monitor) to ensure the processor isn't running too hot. If you have mounted the Frio correctly you should be recording temperatures between 33-38c. If the temperatures are a little higher then you can always use the variable controller knob on the Frio fan lead to adjust speeds.
Install Windows on the Intel X25 V 40GB drive. We then recommend you disable Disk Defragmenter via services.msc, also stopping the running process. Do the same for Superfetch. There are many other tweaks you can apply to help speed up an SSD drive and to optimise space for a 40GB drive. Our colleague Faith wrote an interesting little viewpoint from the angle of an ‘average user' which shows that a small SSD is surprisingly capable. I also always disable System Restore on a small SSD to help give back some space.
CPU Validation is available over here http://valid.canardpc.com/show_oc.php?id=1362776
What can I do if the system crashes?
In the unlikely event the system is unstable, then go back into the bios and increase the CPU core voltage from 1.375 to around 1.390-1.400. Most 760's run stable at 4.2ghz with 1.375 volts but we found one that needed 1.390 for 100% stability. This is a little bit of trial and error. Just keep monitoring your temperatures under load, they should be under 70-75c at all times. If you run into issues, don't panic, press the reset CMOS switch at the back of the board and try again.
Today we are using Windows 7 Ultimate Edition 64 bit and the hardware components mentioned on the last page. All the latest bios updates and drivers are used during testing. We perform under real world conditions, meaning KitGuru test all games across five closely matched runs and average out the results to get an accurate median figure. We are using Forceware Driver 258.96 WHQL.
Our minimum frame rate game graphs have three main zones. These are sampled over a specific 30 interval period of time and then mapped into a chart. These are handy reference guides to detail worst case performance of the product being reviewed. When we test video cards we try to find the best combination of resolution and image quality settings while still maintaining playable frame rates.
Over 30fps is the zone most people want at all times, this means perfectly smooth frame rates with no hitching.
Between 30fps and 25fps is the KitGuru ‘Playable’ zone, although some people might notice occasional stuttering in specific scenes.
Under 25fps is classed as the KitGuru ‘Danger Zone’ which means that the game experience will be less than impressive. Settings and/or resolution would need lowered to help smooth out the frame rate.
