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Guide: Overclocking FX-8350 To 4.8GHz On Crosshair V Formula-Z

MarshallR

Its been a year since our FX-8150 and Crosshair V Formula overclocking guide, so weve updated it f or our AMD f ans to cover ROGs Crosshair V Formula-Z and the new FX-8350 CPU, overclocked to 4.8GHz. As ever, overclocking is never guaranteed . Your mileage will vary depending on the components, such as level of cooling, quality of power and memory and environment (humidity and ambient temperature etc) and of course, the CPU you use as despite having the same FX8350 name, not all silicon is made equal. If youve got f urther overclocking questions join us in our OC f orum, or if you have problems with your Crosshair V drop into to the Crosshair f orum.

Installing the CPU

Release the CPU socket arm, and lif t it into an upright position Install the CPU. No f orce is required, just drop it into the socket in the correct orientation, and the CPUs pins will sink all the way in. Match the golden triangle on the corner of the CPU to the marker on the CPU socket. Dont f orce the CPU; breaking any of the pins will kill it!

Lower the socket arm and lock the CPU in place Add thermal paste in a thin layer across the top (as necessary). Use a f lat edged item such as an old credit or debit card to smooth the thermal paste f lat and even.

Fit your CPU cooler of choice Overclocking an FX-8350 to 4.8GHz WILL require a high end cooler. Weve used a Corsair H80i here, but any similar liquid cooler will work too. Youll notice weve dropped in a pair of memory DIMMs as well.

A word on power
T he Crosshair V Formula-Z is equipped with an additional 4-pin CPU power connector. While f itting it isnt necessary, it can help the stability of high-level overclocks such as the one were attempting here. If your PSU doesnt have one spare, dont worry!

Before we start
Be sure to download the latest version of the boards BIOS and extract it to the root directory of a f lash drive. You can then use the EZ Flash utilty in the BIOS Tool menu to easily update the latest version. You should also download (or install f rom your driver disk) Asus AI Suite II. T he thermal sensor on the FX-8350 is not read by some thermal monitoring programs. Well be using AI Suite II to monitor temperatures and voltages, CPU-Z to monitor CPU status/f requencies and Prime95 to check the stability of the overclock.

Make sure everything works

As always, bef ore you start overclocking, you should Install/boot windows and make sure everything works f irst. Start the system and enter BIOS (image BIOS welcome) Press F5 to load optimized BIOS def aults (image reset to def aults) Hit F10 to save the BIOS and restart Boot Windows Open CPU-Z and AI Suite II Run Prime95 and select the CPU intensive Small FFT test the CPU should clock up to 4.0GHz, the maximum clock speed of this chip. As you can see, at its def ault clock speeds the FX-8350 runs quite happily at a temperature of 49c. T his was perf ormed in a room with an ambient temperature of 24C, so a 25C delta-T is great.

Over on page 2 its time to tweak!