i3 2130, Voltage dramas Options

[Moph]

I have an i3 2130 here on an ASUS P8H77-M Pro motherboard and can't work out the voltage specs on it.

ASUS TurboV EVO utility reports default voltage as 1.205V. I've undervolted to 1.05V Prime95 stable, but as this is a software undervolt I don't think it affects voltages at startup as reported by the BIOS.

Asus BIOS is reporting 1.168V CPU voltage. Core Temp is reporting VID 0.8250V, and both CPU-Z and CPU-ID are reporting 0.81V Vcore at both idle and load.

Anyone know what's happening here? I suspect BIOS and the TurboV EVO utility are correct and that the other utilities are misreading, but can't be sure.

[Dasa]

well if you can undervolt it from 1.2v to 1.05v without losing stability but going lower makes it unstable that in itself suggests its working you should also see a fair drop in temps or fan speed

[Moph]

well if you can undervolt it from 1.2v to 1.05v without losing stability but going lower makes it unstable that in itself suggests its working you should also see a fair drop in temps or fan speed

Yeah I've since realised that ASUS EPO utility also stuffs around with voltages and overrides TurboV EVO utility. So if in the EPO utility you set 'Max. Power Saving' it automatically undervolts both the CPU and the chipset. It really slows things down though - Prime run takes twice as long on that setting.

I'd rather not play with the utilities at all and do it all through the BIOS, but unfortunately the H77 BIOS is gimped and won't allow many settings to be changed.

I have worked out though that the 24/7/365 cost difference between the Max Power Saving mode (28W draw) and default BIOS settings (32W draw) is only $7.60/yr, so I don't think I'm going to bother lol.

EDIT: Oops ... it's a 2120 not a 2130. Just FYI if you're wondering why the hell I would spend $20 extra for 100Mhz more lol.

This post has been edited by Moph: Aug 1 2012, 02:44 AM