Alienware Area-51 Intel i7 930 - Overclocking Help

I have a brand new Area 51 with the i7 930 and simply could not get ANY overclock with the stock motherboard.  The 930 is one of the easiest processors to overclock, with most resulting in a stable 4.0Ghz.  I gave up and with some help from some folks on this forum swapped motherboards.  I hope you have better luck.

shearness what mobo did u swap with and who did u get help from re: swapping mobos - I'm interested

If you want a 4.0 Ghz overclock you would change the turbo values to 30 for each core. Next you would change the power settings. You set Turbo Mode TDC to 180 and TDP to 200. Next you change the Vcore Offset to +120.

That will give you 4.0Ghz with turbo. If you want it to run that clock 24/7 then you need to go into the Windows Control Panel. Click Power Options and change it to High Performance. This will keep the CPU multiplyer always at the x30 for a constant 4.0 ghz.

Thanks for the Tips!

Prime - I swapped over to the Asus Rampage III Extreme.  There are many reasons I went with this one.  EVGA has just released a new board that is semi-interesting, but the Rampage still seems to be THE board to have.  One thing to keep in mind is that m3th0d1k4l tried an EVGA board in the past and had some trouble getting the MIO board to play nice.  My only issue is that the vents do not close on power down, which seems to also be an issue with the stock systems, so I am guessing I am simply having the common CC/MIO board issues.  I also swapped power supplies.  I went with the Corsair AX1200.  This of course opens up a whole new can of worms, which is where Morblore and m3th0d1k4l were of assistance to me.  Both of these guys seem to know these systems very well.  They were able to help me get the nerve up to disassemble this beauty and undertake this process with a brand new Area 51.  If you decide to make a MOBO swap, I highly recommend the Rampage III Extreme.  In fact, that is the ONLY board I would use.  Falcon Northwest and Origin both use these as the stock boards in their high end PC's.  It has received incredible reviews and has also just been listed as Maximum PC's "Best of the Best."  Good luck.

hey shearness, im having a few issues swapping over the stock area 51 alx motherboard with the rampage iii extreme. are you able to take some photos of the i/o board connection to the motherboard. i unpluged each wire from its original housing and connected it to where im pretty shore they would go but lights only sometimes work on startups and vents as u menchined dont close. any tips you can give me on how u did it would be greatly appreciated

kind regards, murphy26198