Tuesday 2nd September 2008

VIDEO: 6GHz plus: Overclocking the E8600 with liquid nitrogen

Posted at: Tuesday 2nd September 2008 by Antony Leather

CustomPC and BenchTec overclocked the Intel Core 2 Duo E8600 as far as it could go

We recently had the chance to test Intel's latest overclocking-friendly CPU, the Core 2 Duo E8600, at Amari's labs near Watford. Not content with merely wowing us with their Dream PCs 2008 entry - the fantastic submersion-cooled XCP - Amari provided the facilities to overclock the E8600 with liquid nitrogen. Custom PC was aided by two of the UK’s best-known overclockers from BenchTec, Sacha35 (Paul Watkinson) and Bazx (Barry Wynd), where we cooled the chip to a chilly -120°C and achieved some truly impressive clock speeds and benchmark results.

Liquid Nitrogen isn't easy to obtain in large quantities, but thanks to a contact provided from our work exchange student, we were able to obtain 25 litres of LN2, from a bio-research facility where it is used to freeze cell samples.

EARLY PROBLEMS

Testing was delayed for an hour or two due to some driver issues with Radeon HD4870X2, preventing us from running any meaningful 3DMark benchmarks. After we had solved this issue, we applied the LN2 and Paul and Barry were able to set to work in the BIOS, increasing both clock frequencies and voltages.

Rather than using Windows XP or Vista, we performed testing using Windows Server 2008. This operating system has lower overheads and a more stable design, making it much easier to work with at extreme clock frequencies. To squeeze every last point of benchmark performance from the hardware, we were able to disable all non-essential services in Windows before performing any tests. To eliminate the I/O bottleneck from any results, we used a Crucial SSD and two Gigabyte I-RAM drives in an 8GB RAID 0 array.

DIZZYING HEIGHTS

Leaving the multiplier at 10x, our liquid nitogen cooled system had no problems running with a clock frequency of 6GHz, by increasing the CPU voltage to 1.9v. The Asus Rampage Extreme motherboard didn’t even flinch at exceeding 600MHz FSB. At this speed, the E8600 managed an incredible SuperPI 1M rating of 7.8 seconds. A brilliant initial score.

After this, we spent time tinkering with many of the options in the BIOS then using the Rampage Extreme’s TweakIt overclocking controls to fine tune primary voltages and clock speeds without having to reboot.

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Intel E8600

Liquid nitrogen cooling pot with fittings

Everyone overclocking

Paul about to pour

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Comments

@savagehenry

Its similar to Formula 1 - Petrolheads would love a reliable, affordable car with the outragous performance of an F1 car. Just because we can't have Formula 1 performance in every day cars doesn't mean Formula 1 isn't interesting and fun to watch.

Comment by combatus at 7:49pm 9th September 2008

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fan dabby dosie!

If only we could get a quad core to overclock that far? Better yet we should try get this kind of overclock for our home computers. Crysis would go of the rails!!!

Comment by Nickuk1987 at 5:34pm 9th September 2008

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Very Impressive.. But what's the point ?

Very impressive.. 6Ghz. Woot!. wouldn't we all love these sort of speeds at home. However, unless you can constantly cool your CPU with Liquid Nitrogen. This demostration serves no real purpose other than to show off. What would be more impressive if you we could see the overclock potential with current cooling solutions that users can run outside lab conditions.

Comment by savagehenry at 11:13am 8th September 2008

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Ln2 is not as dangerous as you may think (SoulCruiser) in small amounts it bounces off your skin instantly because you are 37c and Ln2 is -196c! As for evaporated nitrogen you have to remember that 80% of the air we breathe is the same stuff but of course in high doses can pose a serious health risk as can too much of anything. You could pour Ln2 over your hand and nothing would happen (get a little chilly at the most, but don’t try this at home!), however if you submerge you hand into a container with ln2 that is already at a stable temperate it would be dangerous because it is your hand that is getting colder not the Ln2 getting hotter and evaporating off your skin. It takes a surprisingly large amount of Ln2 to bring something down to temperature, now it was not shown in that video but every time we poured Ln2 into one of the pots it evaporated within a matter of seconds, the idea being to get the pot down to temperature because it is easier to control that way. It is important to carefully control the temperature of the pot and the CPU because as said in the video if the CPU gets too cold it will reach a “cold bug” point where it stops working. All CPUs have a different cold bug point, xtreview.com reported that Intel Nehalem chips work happily at -120c whereas most processors tend to show cold bug at around -100c. That is not to say that Nehalems have no cold bug (the title on xtreview could be a little misleading), but they certainly respond well to low temperatures which is great news to overclocks. In the above e8600 experiment the cold bug was showing between -110c and -120c which is very good considering.

Comment by tcorbyn at 8:26pm 5th September 2008

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@Cerberus_xiii

The default clock of the E8600 is 3.33GHz The final frequency was 6.17GHz, a 2.84 GHz increase, which works out (if my maths is right) to 85.28% over default

Comment by OB_Writer at 3:01pm 5th September 2008

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LN2 ain't that dangerous SC, it evaporates before it does any real harm if spilled - its submerging stuff in it that will do the damage! and its often advised not to wear gloves when using the stuff in case the LN2 gets into the gloves and freezes your hands! The most dangerous risk associated with using LN2 is spilling it and it evaporating in a room with limited ventilation as it will cause you to suffocate - there was a story years ago of a LN2 dewar breaking in a lift and the person in the lift with it died of asphyxiation....

Comment by matt___ at 1:46pm 5th September 2008

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Errrr guys that stuff is dangerous!

Outstanding results! I have to admit you showed that CPU who's boss. But you guys are a health and safety nightmare! One splash or spill and the conversation would go from "Wow look at the speed of that sucker" to "Hey guys who's seen my Footcicle" Method 3/10 Results 15/10 ;)