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Higher Clock speeds, worse benchmark results?

Cptn Vortex

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So here's an interesting one, not sure if anyone has run into the same issue.

Last night I updated my BIOS on my board, since I was having issues on re-starts. Basically, even though the system is rock stable, if I restart or shutdown/start up, I would get the "bd" bios code and have to hard reset, then get the overclocking failed message. It was a nuisance. The BIOS I was on was very old, from 2015. So I updated to a 2016 BIOS, then the latest (Had to do this since the jump to the latest wouldnt recognize the file as an actual BIOS file, until I went to a slightly newer one, then to the latest).

This new BIOS did fix my restarting issues as I assumed, so that's all good now.

Next up, I merely jumped 200mhz from 4.2ghz to 4.4ghz @ 1.275v (same voltages I ran before). Left RAM speeds/timings and other settings all as they were before. Cinebench got a nice boost in performance from 1174cb to 1276, as expected.

Now here's the weird part. wPRIME 32m went from around 4.5s to nearly 10seconds... I tried over and over again, and still, it would only get about 9.5-9.9s at best on 12 threads. I tried 6, threads, and I got similar results.

Next up I ran some 3Dmark. My scores were down when compared to the runs I made before the BIOS update. GPU scores were the same, however all my physics scores were down 10-15%. And this is with a 200mhz bump compared to the last tests.

Anyway, anyone have any idea what is going on? I mean, it would be one thing entirely if my Cinebench scores were also lower, but they are not, they went up! I'm at a bit of a loss!
 

sswilson

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Normally I'd chalk something like that off to significantly less aggressive secondary memory timings under the new bios, but while it's been a while since I played with that kind of benchmarking, I can't imagine that much of a drop from just memory timings.

Any chance it's spectre related? Did you try a fresh OS install?
 

Cptn Vortex

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Normally I'd chalk something like that off to significantly less aggressive secondary memory timings under the new bios, but while it's been a while since I played with that kind of benchmarking, I can't imagine that much of a drop from just memory timings.

Any chance it's spectre related? Did you try a fresh OS install?

Mem timings are identical: 2666mhz 16-18-18-35 2T 1.2v (Stock for my LPX chips)

Yea, only thing I can think of is Spectre/Meltdown patching built into the latest BIOS.

Nah not ready to do a full re-install any time soon... those damn games are way too big to start all over again! Lol.
 

Bond007

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Confirmed that it was running @ 4.4 in the benchmarks? Memory freq and timings back to what they were before the bios update (they will need to be re-entered and would cause a drop if not). CPU temps fine during the run?
 

sswilson

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Mem timings are identical: 2666mhz 16-18-18-35 2T 1.2v (Stock for my LPX chips)

Yea, only thing I can think of is Spectre/Meltdown patching built into the latest BIOS.

Nah not ready to do a full re-install any time soon... those damn games are way too big to start all over again! Lol.

I was thinking secondary timing as opposed to the main ones... you know... the ones we used to spend hours tweeking up and down trying to shave off 5/100's of a second off of prime........ :)

As far as spectre goes... the reason I asked about fresh OS was that Windows itself installed patches based on the hardware it saw and I'm wondering if that patch isn't conflicting with the new bios version.
 

Cptn Vortex

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Confirmed that it was running @ 4.4 in the benchmarks? Memory freq and timings back to what they were before the bios update (they will need to be re-entered and would cause a drop if not). CPU temps fine during the run?

Fully confirmed. As mentioned, oddly Cinebench results did go up.

After BIOS update I had to set all my OC settings from scratch again. I was prepared for that so wrote all the settings down (there werent too many, couple tweaks but all the fine-tuning I left auto).

CPUZ, HWmonitor etc all reporting correct information. I did however notice my CPU cache is running 3000MHZ. i cannot recall what it was pre-BIOS update, but I did not touch any cache ratio settings before, or after.
 

Valkyrie

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Fully confirmed. As mentioned, oddly Cinebench results did go up.

After BIOS update I had to set all my OC settings from scratch again. I was prepared for that so wrote all the settings down (there werent too many, couple tweaks but all the fine-tuning I left auto).

CPUZ, HWmonitor etc all reporting correct information. I did however notice my CPU cache is running 3000MHZ. i cannot recall what it was pre-BIOS update, but I did not touch any cache ratio settings before, or after.




Prime suspect!...I was thinking it had to be something significant to more than double your time on a short running bench.


The spectre thing may be playing a part, but that is a big drop for wprime32m.
 

Cptn Vortex

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Prime suspect!...I was thinking it had to be something significant to more than double your time on a short running bench.

If that is the case, what should I be looking for to rectify this in the BIOS? The board is a beast, with quite an in-depth "Tweakers Paradise" section. Is there a recommended cache speed/setting for the modest Overclock I have on this chip? My end goal is just a nice stable everyday 4.4-4.5ghz and fine with 2666mhz mem.

Thanks everyone so far, always good to get some direction when I'm stumped!
 

Valkyrie

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I would expect that previously your uncore freqency was 1:1 with your core.


The Spectre/Meltdown update stuff was cache related, but should not cut performance in half.


IIRC Cinebench is less memory sensitive so the higher core speed wins out.
 

Cptn Vortex

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I would expect that previously your uncore freqency was 1:1 with your core.


The Spectre/Meltdown update stuff was cache related, but should not cut performance in half.


IIRC Cinebench is less memory sensitive so the higher core speed wins out.

Interesting. I'll dig around and see if I can find the right setting to bump it up. Thanks!
 

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