Xeon ES QK3M (E5-1650 v4) - Worth Overclocking?

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Oddworld

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Jan 16, 2018
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I have the following chips and am thinking about buying an ASrock X99 Taichi to overclock. Intended use may be gaming, videos, etc (already have plenty of servers).

Question: In your experience, am I able to overclock the QK3M to higher clockrates? The chip is currently in an HP dl380 Gen9, so it would require me to purchase another mobo specifically to overclock.

Available equipment:

- Xeon ES QK3M (E5-1650 v4)
- 6 Cores @ 3.5 GHz; 15MB L3 Cache
- HWinfo64 screenshot below

- 2x Intel QGSQ (E5-2667 v3
- 8 Cores @ 3.2 GHz; 20MB L3 Cache

- HP dl380 Gen9
- 64G DDR4 RDIMM ECC
- (considering whether to purchase) ASrock X99 Taichi (or other recommended mobo to overclock)










 

sparx

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Jul 16, 2015
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Isnt the only way to overclock the FSB? How much would that clock before not booting? 105MHz?
 

Oddworld

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Isnt the only way to overclock the FSB? How much would that clock before not booting? 105MHz?
I don’t know, that’s what I’m trying to understand. In my screenshots, HWinfo64 shows some cores “unlocked”. Is this chip multiplier unlocked?
 

Oddworld

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I don’t know, that’s what I’m trying to understand. In my screenshots, HWinfo64 shows some cores “unlocked”. Is this chip multiplier unlocked?
For example HWinfo64ists CPU Turbo max to be 38 x 100 MHz (unlocked). Then further down, multiplied up to 80x.

Does that mean this CPU is ratio unlocked? If true, I would hope that means you can overclock in the bios by increasing multiplier (rather than FSB).

What do you think? Worth purchasing a $220 motherboard to find out?
 

sparx

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Jul 16, 2015
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I have no experience in overclocking, so im probably talking out of my ... But as far as i know the Xeons arent overclockable except FSB. Probably why there was such a big reaction in the market when the xeon v3's were able to "unlock" full turbo in all cores with the modified ucode.
 

Nizmo

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Jan 24, 2018
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IMO you should'nt bother, the performance gains are not worth the higher temps and shorter life of an non-retail chip without warranty.

Risks outweigh reward, not to mention Xeons don't overclock well.

But if you really wanted, you could only raise the FSB which also causes issues elsewhere when doing that.
 

Oddworld

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Got it, thanks. I have no issue shortening the life (or even damaging the chip), but if there’s only a 5% gain involved then it’s not worth buying a new motherboard.

Appreciate the input.
 

sparx

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Jul 16, 2015
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I dont think anyone can guarantee any FSB increase. It will depend on whats on the bus. Maybe your board would crash at 102Mhz?
I remember trying it shortly on my Asrock X99M with a Xeon processor. It would bluescreen very easily. So I just dont overclock. =)
 

alex_stief

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May 31, 2016
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Risks outweigh reward, not to mention Xeons don't overclock well.
I strongly disagree. Single-socket Xeon E5 v3 (and previous generations) were on par or even better than their I7 counterparts when it comes to overclocking.
And the risks from normal overclocking a CPU are not really that high. This is a myth that stems from the times when you could easily fry a CPU with the wrong settings and you could not just look online what reasonable settings are. Overclocking CPUs got easier and less risky over the course of the last 20 years.

By the way, you don't really need a 220$ motherboard to give it a try. Supply of X99 motherboards on ebay is very high, you won't have to pay more than 100$ if you don't need the highest-end model. Unfortunately, I can not help you which motherboard will support your ES CPU. Concerning RDIMM: only ASRock and some ASUS boards support it.
From the screenshots you posted it seems reasonable to assume that you have one of the rare v4 CPUs with unlocked multiplier.
 
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Nizmo

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Jan 24, 2018
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Example, would be silly overclock a $5k or $10K chip. I bet they would not honor the RMA request.

My Opinion.
 

alex_stief

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May 31, 2016
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That is not the point here as these expensive chips are locked anyway and not the topic of this discussion about a relatively cheap ES CPU. Which is not under warranty anyway.

As a side-note: I personally would overclock a 5k$ CPU. Call me whatever you want :D
 
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Patriot

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Example, would be silly overclock a $5k or $10K chip. I bet they would not honor the RMA request.

My Opinion.
What do you think forcing all core turbo or changing the duration of turbo and power caps is?
Also, QK is an QS chip not 5k retail chip.
 

Nizmo

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Jan 24, 2018
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Of course if the context is cheap QS/ES chips then have at it. I've never personally gained any substantial reliable performance.

These days I don't have much non-critical machines so my opinion is a bit biased I guess.
 

alex_stief

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May 31, 2016
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I think we can agree that it depends on the purpose of the machine and how critical it is. I just disagreed on the verdict "Xeon CPUs can not be overclocked, gains from overclocking are marginal and the risk of frying a CPU is substantial".
 

Nizmo

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Jan 24, 2018
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Don't get me wrong, love the overclock on my i7's.

There's a difference between "Xeons don't overclock well" and "You cannot overclock at all".
 

Oddworld

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Help me sort through this.

What are the odds the multiplier is unlocked, based on what you already know? Give me a guess... 80% chance?

Just to be clear: there is no warranty, I have a handful of these chips lying around, I don’t care if I fry it, and it’s not going to run anything mission critical.

The ONLY downside is purchasing a $200 motherboard that I don’t really have a use for.
 

Marsh

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May 12, 2013
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Fun facts.

All cores turbo overclock , using bios to reduce CPU voltage to reduce stress and increase stability

8 cores , 16 Threads , from 2.4GHz to 3.1GHz
Model name: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2673 v3 @ 2.40GHz
Stepping: 2
CPU MHz: 3099.937
CPU max MHz: 3100.0000
CPU min MHz: 1200.0000

10 cores , 20 Threads ,from 1.8GHz to 2.5GHz
Model name: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2650L v3 @ 1.80GHz
Stepping: 2
CPU MHz: 2499.750
CPU max MHz: 2500.0000
CPU min MHz: 1200.0000

14 coers, 28 Threads , from 2.0GHz to 3.0GHz
Model name: Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5-2683 v3 @ 2.00GHz
Stepping: 2
CPU MHz: 2999.790
CPU max MHz: 3000.0000
CPU min MHz: 1200.0000

All running on cost low $100 Asrock X99 boards ( including WS , Taichi models ) from ebay.

I'll let you decided for yourself if it is worth the effort and trouble.
 
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alex_stief

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May 31, 2016
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There's a difference between "Xeons don't overclock well" and "You cannot overclock at all".
There is indeed and I kind of regret my word choice. But Xeons don't overclock well is still pretty far from the truth. Those that can be overclocked do not lack behind their "Core" counterparts. Xeons were either completely locked or overclock just as well as the I7 with the same die. Too bad that Intel completely removed unlocked Xeons from their lineup.

What is overclocking anyway? Intel sells "overclocked" Xeons aswell. Same chip, same core count, but higher clock speed and TDP. The only difference: they charge you hundreds or even thousands of dollars extra for it.
 

Nizmo

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Jan 24, 2018
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There are too many Xeon chips out there to say definitively "all" will do anything. Just my general opinion, and my personal results have been lackluster on any kind of overclock on Xeons, specifically adjusting multipliers or FSB settings.

I usually set all my cores to max, can do this through Power Management on Windows and Bios but i would hesitate to state thats an overclock.

 

alex_stief

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Poor overclocking results through BCLK are not a problem of Xeon CPUs. Intel locked this feature long ago, every current Intel platform and CPU will fail with more than 3-4MHz overclock on BCLK. Well with the exception of "non-k overclocking" of Skylake CPUs.
And locked multipliers...well some had it, some didn't. Those that didn't could be overclocked pretty far. My last one was a Xeon E5-1650v3 that made 4.4GHz core and uncore as well as DDR4-2666 or DDR4-3000 with UDIMMs. Even further with lower uncore frequencies.