new at overclocking...
 

Hey, guys. :)

I recently bought a new PC, with the following specs:

Antec 1200 Case
Corsair 650W Power Supply (the TX, not the HX)
Foxconn Flaming Blade motherboard
Kingston 6gig memory hyperX 1333MHz (and a fan)
Intel core i7 920 with standard cooling (wanted to try with the standard one first, if you guys want me to, I could replace it with a Corsair H50 Water Cooling) (standard cooling results in an idle core of something below 40°, haven't really tested the stressed one)
500gig HDD (sata, 3.5")
LG LF2500 Series (37" LCD TV, works perfectly for my needs)

=========================

Now, my question is as follows: every time I try to overclock my Flaming Blade, every time I even simply enable this System Turbo setting, simply enabling it, results in my PC restarting twice, after having saved the settings. After he's restarted twice, the settings are restored back to the stock ones.
So, if I can't even simply enable this System Turbo setting, in order to be able to overclock even a little, well, overclocking isn't gonna be much use then. ;)

So, my question is: why does my MB always do that? Is there some kind of setting I still need to adjust in order to keep this from happening? Cuz it's really annoying me. Running at 2.66GHz while I could apparently easily run at 3.8GHz, which is one hell of a lot of difference. ;)

And another question: Overclocking is a risky business, I know, and there are really no standards, I thought. But aren't there any overclocked settings which could generally be accepted as "safe", taken you have some decent hardware? Well, that is, if I can get my new PC further than the double restart. ;)

Any feedback would be loved and deeply appreciated. I really wanna get past 3GHz, at the very least, if possible.

PS: if there's still something I should've told, or if you have some more questions, feel free to ask. :)

Well, if the BIOS fails it's always a good idea to update it to the latest version and see if it fixes the problem.

To safest way to overclock any component is by only increasing it's clock and leaving the voltages as they are. Increasing the voltage with 0.1V isn't much but you have to make sure that the increase in voltage is worth it. Also very important is to keep an eye on the temperatures and keeping it well below the maximum temp will increase the life span of your hardware ;)

Updating the BIOS... Well, good idea. One question though: how do I do that? You see, I've never done that before. Could you maybe link me to a guide/tutorial that explains it a bit, if possible one that explains how to do it on a Flaming Blade?

And about the temperatures, yeah, don't worry, I've got CoreTemp installed, plus I've got the Logitech G15 keyboard installed, so I see my temps at all times. The hottest they've gotten is 43°, with standard cooling.

So, could you guys maybe link me to a guide on how to update/flash/whatever the BIOS?

It depends on the motherboards. Sometimes you have to make a DOS bootdisk and run a flash tool, but most motherboard manufacturers have Windows utilities for flashing the BIOS.

You should check out the Foxconn website for instruction on how to update your motherboard's BIOS ;) (ps. mothoardboard updates are sometimes called firmware updates).

Of course, you must realize that flashing a motherboard is always risky thing to do. If it fails halfway (power failure, error, ...) you'll end up with a dead motherboard.

I used the live tool via Windows on several foxconn mobo's... works like a charm... just do it with stable settings and no background programs running...

Btw, if the windows flash tool fails ... DON'T REBOOT !
:p

Yeah, I noticed the live tool via windows did indeed work, thank God. But I can't get it past a BClock of 149MHz, which would result in ... 3.1-3.2GHZ, which is good, but which can still become better, if I only knew how...
Oh yeah, temperatures are more than ok, both normal and overclocked with the live tool. normal settings: around 30°, and since I've installed the H50 from Corsair, I've never had a temperature above 60° yet. So, temperature-wise, overclocking should be quite safe.

Tried looking at the site of Foxconn and found much info about flashing the mobo, but they seem to send me to a compleeeetely outdated webpage (come on, seriously, DOS? Windows ME? Even XP is outdated these days.)
Plus, the info they give about flashing the BIOS is just in general, not at all applicated on the Flaming Blade. So, status on flashing my BIOS? Zero, still standing nowhere.