How are Liquid Series overclocked

[SasRad]

Hello all,

I ordered a Liquid Series PC and keep asking myself how the computer will be overclocked. The following is advertised for Liquid Series:

Overclocked Performance​

Tuned to provide blistering speed
Our technicians work extremely closely with key hardware manufacturers to ensure each and every component within our Liquid Series® systems are finely tuned to deliver maximum performance. Countless hours are invested into BIOS analysis & component reliability tests to guarantee extreme performance straight out of the box.

And my processor is sold 'overclocked @4.55 GHz'.
I have seen the awesome work of noddypirate Overclocking Options Ryzen 5000 but also the disclaimer on overclocking from pcz here
Warranty When Overclocking!.

The 5950x should be able to operate way higher than that. Now I am a bit unsure because I expected something 'finely tuned to the maximum', what 4.55GHz shouldn't be it. I would like to see overclocking like the curve optimization and if I do it myself, I risk giving up the warranty.

So: how will pcz overclock?

I heard you like full specs.

Spoiler

Case
THERMALTAKE LEVEL 20 HT WHITE TEMPERED GLASS GAMING CASE
Custom Liquid Cooling Kit
Liquid Series RGB Extreme Kit - EK
Tubing
Clear Hardline Acrylic Tubing (Black Fittings)
Graphics Card Cooling
GPU Water Block - For One Graphics Card!
Coolant Colour
Mayhems X1 Blue
Coolant Colour
Mayhems X1 Blue
LED Lighting
2x 50cm UV LED Strip
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked AMD Ryzen 9 5900X 12 Core (3.7GHz @ up to 4.7GHz)

Change to: Overclocked AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16 Core (3.4GHz @ up to 4.55GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® CROSSHAIR VIII HERO WIFI (DDR4, PCIe 4.0, CrossFireX/SLI) - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
32GB Corsair VENGEANCE RGB PRO DDR4 3600MHz (2 x 16GB)
Graphics Card
12GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 3080 Ti - HDMI, DP
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB SAMSUNG 980 PRO M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 7000MB/R, 5000MB/W)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB SAMSUNG 980 PRO M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 7000MB/R, 5000MB/W)
Power Supply
CORSAIR 1000W RMx SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre European Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Braided Power Supply Cables
CORSAIR Premium Individually Sleeved PSU Cable Kit Pro - Blue
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
Extra Case Fans
6x Corsair LL120 RGB LED Fan + Controller Kit
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Card
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
Windows 11 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KUK-00003]
Operating System Language
Germany/Deutschland - German Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 11 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Supplied on USB Drive
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft 365® (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
BullGuard™ Internet Security - Free 90 Day License inc. Gamer Mode
Browser
Google Chrome™
Warranty
3 Year Gold Warranty (2 Year Collect & Return, 2 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
2 DAY DELIVERY TO GERMANY
Build Time
Liquid Series® Build - Approximately 22 to 24 working days
Promotional Item
Get Guardians of the Galaxy with select GeForce RTX™ 30 Series GPUs
Welcome Book
PCSpecialist Welcome Book - Germany
Logo Branding
PCSpecialist Logo

Thanks in advance and have a nice day!
Sascha

 

[steaky360]

I believe the quoted figure is what they will guarantee as far as the OC goes but from what others have said, the CPUs can be OC'd higher than that. Currently it appears to be 3.7 to 4.7 GHz, not certain where the 4.55GHz came from (unless @NoddyPirate maybe)?

As you're buying an OC'd system, its warranty is unaffected by the factory (PCS) overclock. But I expect if you push your system farther then all bets may be off (although you'd need to contact PCS for their verdict in that regard).

I'd guess PCS have a set of OC settings/adjustments which would be tweaked during testing to suit your specific CPU (aka good old silicone lottery).

 

[NoddyPirate]

Hello all,

I ordered a Liquid Series PC and keep asking myself how the computer will be overclocked. The following is advertised for Liquid Series:



And my processor is sold 'overclocked @4.55 GHz'.
I have seen the awesome work of noddypirate Overclocking Options Ryzen 5000 but also the disclaimer on overclocking from pcz here
Warranty When Overclocking!.

The 5950x should be able to operate way higher than that. Now I am a bit unsure because I expected something 'finely tuned to the maximum', what 4.55GHz shouldn't be it. I would like to see overclocking like the curve optimization and if I do it myself, I risk giving up the warranty.

So: how will pcz overclock?

I heard you like full specs.

Thanks in advance and have a nice day!
Sascha

Hi there!

The 5950X operates up to a max boost of 4.9 GHz according to Ryzen. That highest number is a single core boost value only and doesn't indicate the frequency the CPU will operate at when many or all cores are fully tasked. So you'll see 4.9 GHz (actually more like 5.05 or even a little higher depending on the quality of your particular CPU) only during single core loads. As the remainder of the cores load up that frequency will slowly drop off.

With all cores loaded, a stock 5950X will run at about 3.8-3.9 GHz. So your overclock of 4.55 is actually pretty decent in that respect as it will apply to all 16 cores at the same time (i.e. a Manual Overclock). 4.55 GHz also represents the stock frequency with that CPU out of the box with half the cores loaded (around 8-9 of the 16) which is probably just coincidence more than anything else.

What this all means though is that the PCS applied Overclock will have the CPU run at 4.55 GHz all the time. So, if you are tasking your 5950X with loads that require more than half the cores to be in use at the same time, your overclock will suit you well, as the stock performance would be running a lot slower. If however, you load up less than half the cores, then the overclock will inhibit performance, as the stock 5950X would run substantially faster than that it if was not OC'd. This is why, in general terms for gamers or low core count workloads, overclocking Ryzen is not recommended.

The 5950X can be overclocked higher than the PCS attempt if given the time and attention such a tweak would require. But you wouldn't really get a whole lot more out of it - perhaps 4.7 GHz before the power draw goes off the charts. But I expect PCS stick with a baseline OC that will allow them to provide the guarantee that they do. Tweaking it to the edge of reason is not in compliance with such goals.

Hopefully that explains things a little more??

 

[SasRad]

Yes, this is very understandable. Thank you very much for your detailed answer!

I'm going to use the PC for a lot of different purposes. I love gaming, but that thing will also have to run multiple instances of VMs or other shared resource stuff from time to time. I will also try to dive deeper into ML. So I guess 16 x 4.55 is the way to go.

 

[NoddyPirate]

Yes, this is very understandable. Thank you very much for your detailed answer!

I'm going to use the PC for a lot of different purposes. I love gaming, but that thing will also have to run multiple instances of VMs or other shared resource stuff from time to time. I will also try to dive deeper into ML. So I guess 16 x 4.55 is the way to go.

Sounds good.

FWIW, I do think better overall results could be achieved with PBO and the Curve Optimiser. And most likely at a decently lower power draw. But while your lower core count performance would be helpfully bumped you likely wouldn’t see much gain, if any, over the 4.55 GHz all core action.

But the biggest issue would be that I think you almost certainly won’t find a warranty, from PCS or Ryzen, that will properly cover such a setup. So if you’re happy your workflow will make proper use of the 5950X you should be happy as is. 👍

 

[Scott]

What will you be doing in the VMs? Off the top of my head I don't think OCing the chip will offer you that much of a benefit. I don't think your money is being best utilised in a liquid setup either.

If VM truly is one of your more pronounced uses then it's highly likely you will need far more RAM.

As much as you have configured a beast of a system, on the face of it to me, I don't think it's well considered or suited to your needs.

 

[SasRad]

I will stock up to 64GB RAM but I couldn't configure it in. This will be enough for my use cases. I will 'emulate' networks, spawn clusters (k8s, ES), admin them, try to break them and so on. That's what I want cores and RAM for.

For gaming and ML purposes I want a good GPU and fast CPU.

I was just curious, because I have seen 5950x which had been clocked way higher than 4,55GHz and reading the great work of NoddyPirate just left me with the question: how much will PCS do with that potential. Cooling should not be my problem, I guess.

I want Liquid Series just for the astethics and because I'm sick of the noise of my good old 1080, which sounds liks a starting jet. You're right, this is not a pure rational decision, it's more an 'I want that' thing.

 

[Scott]

That's fair enough then.

Some notes to consider:

I would half the primary drive and double the secondary drive capacity. Better to keep your main drive as clean as you can. The Secondary will run faster anyway, especially if you're sharing with the VMs.

I would significantly drop the fan count on the build. What's the point in a liquid build on the CPU/GPU to then add 6 fans? Massive over-kill. It'll be "noisy" with the LLs too.

I would drop Windows 11 to Windows 10. It's too important and too much of an unknown right now. W10 is proven.

Drop Bullguard, it's a nightmare. Windows Defender has you covered.

 

[SasRad]

It's already on its way.

Both drives are primary. I work with Linux. And I will hang my old SSD with data in.

The second drive is for gaming. Maybe Win11 was a mistake. I am a total windows noob. I tend to keep my system up to date. But as long as games work I'm fine.

I was hoping the fans adjust their speed when their not needed.

Thanks for sharing the experience with Bullguard. It's gonna get dropped soon then.

Can you explain what you mean with

The Secondary will run faster anyway,

Those are my first M2 drives. I haven't really bothered with hardware for a long time (running an Intel i7 3770k atm).

 

[Scott]

Ahh, that's a shame. Should really have asked for advice before ordering.

Not sure what you mean by both drives being primary? Do you mean that each drive will have an OS on it with a dual boot configuration?

That's fair enough then, I would probably have gone with a dual boot on a single drive in order to leave the secondary running at full tilt for VM (if required of course).

The primary drive will have the operating system on it. The OS will utilise the drives I/O to some degree continuously. The second drive will have it's own I/O lane and thus be free of any interruption from the OS utilisation. This can be handy when using the drive for multi-tasking as you won't have any slowdown on the OS as the drive is separate. You will also have no slow-down on the secondary drive due to the OS. It's a win-win.

The fans will adjust, but even at their lowest..... 6 of them are going to create a drone.

 

[SasRad]

I'd definitively done that if I knew how helpful you guys are. Unfortunately the German section is really quite and I recognized waaay too late, that I just have to change the .de to.co.uk domain for some more discussions.

I see your point in splitting I/O for maximum performance. Maybe I give it a shot. Just asking myself if this would be a noticeable performance increase on those 980 Pro monsters.

Thank you so much for your help and advice!