Followup
Because this is one of the most viewed threads on the forum for some reason, I think I should follow up with my OC results here even though I have done so on other threads, just in case new overclockers with similar setups are stumbling across this thread looking for some results (even though mine is hardly the most exciting overclocking venture).
My motherboard worked fine right off the bat but I downloaded p21 and started overclocking with that. I managed to get the e6400 up to 3.2 Ghz at about 1.38V. After that, it didn't matter how much voltage I gave it, It wouldn't run stable any higher,even though my temps were not all that high. I downloaded the p23 bios and reseated my AC freezer pro7 and found that I could then get it to 3.4, but with 1.43V- despite the voltage increase, my temps were still idle at 40 and loaded at 56 using TAT so that's what I left it at. Not sure how much of this improvement was the new bios, and how much was the reseating of the heatsink. whatever it was, I can now run at 3.2Ghz at only 1.33V.
I have run the 8800 GTS at 600Mhz core and 900Mhz memory and it worked fine, but day-to -day I have it set to 513, and 792.
My OCZ Gold 6400 will run stable at stock timings and 900Mhz, or at stock speed of 800Mhz and 4-4-4-12 timings. Not super but I think this is somewhat exceptional for this memory.
If someone stumbles on this thread and is looking for overclcoking guides, here's a link:
http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/showthread.php?t=182
UPDATE: I am now running my e6400 at 3.4 GHz at 1.43V and my 8800GTS at 600 core and 1000 Memory and have watercooling on the way from NCIX and the revised 680i from evga so I'll update my OC if I can squeeze some more juice out of it with water cooling.
UPDATE 2- P26 Bios allowed me to get 3.45Ghz CPU
UPDATE 3- Switched to water cooling- now I am running the e6400 at 3.6GHz with 1.55V. My 8800GTS will run stable at 680MHz GPU and 1100 MHz memory- I run it 24/7 at 650 and 1050
UPDATE 4: I switched to p27- THIS IS AN AWESOME BIOS!- I went from 3.6 to 3.84 stable- I actualy was running most of today at 3.9 and ran a bunch of benchmarks, but it caught an error in Orthos. For some reason at around 3.7 there are some instabilities though- I've heard from others who found the same. I was also abe to get an e4300 up to 3.55 with this bios
UPDATE 5: Check out
this review where I compared e6400 and e4300 overclocking on air and water.
UPDATE 6: hehe...I just remembered the name f this thread was "safe" overclocking...well once the bug catches you, all that goes out the window- that said, I don't run my e6400 at 3.84 24/7- right now because the house is getting warmer, I run it at 3.5 with 1.475V- on water, it idles at 37C when it's 26C ambient, but I have some better fans for my radiator on the way and they'll definately bring my temps down. The ones I'm using only push 11.7CFM, and the 37mm thick panaflos I've ordered push 67CFM.
