The issue is with the socket, not the chip. I feel weird too because Foxconn has been making sockets for so long but stupid things happen sometimes I guess q

I think most chips these days can exceed 4Ghz overclock. If SuperPI screenie is what you're interested at, it shouldn't be hard but if you want things to run stable 24/7 then that's the challenge Sometimes it's not easy to get things stable at high clocks.

Here's my i3 530 @ 4.51Ghz HT ON 1 hour Prime stable. Idle temps are around 27C, 30C water cooled

Boleh tahan, 32nm is interesting to explore with but the RAM can only do CL9, lol. Crap RAM

I haven't tried but will do so later I'm now trying to reduce and tweak the voltages for my daily 4.5Ghz usage

No choice, I had to buy grocery and food so had to sell my i7 off

I think it's worth to try out those 32nm chips The 860 is still 45nm but of course, it's a lot faster than the i3

I don't think it's the board, everyone is happily overclocking 4.x Ghz with that H55 board Perhaps it's something else, your settings, etc. You might want to google to get some sample settings from others to try out.

Yes bro, I think it's really hard to get it Prime stable at 4.6Ghz and above as even the Vcore has to be substantially up. I guess the i3 540 might have better capabilities to hit that clock Nevertheless, I'll try some suicidal runs and see if I can boot into Windows at 4.8-5.0 later when I have nothing better to do

I can boot up 4.9Ghz too but the moment it goes into Windows then BSOD I think we need to top up the CPU VTT as well but I haven't tried much on that. 1.7Vcore is a lot and I don't think M3F has such jumpers to increase it More trials required and if still can't, it means the chip is already at it's max, haha.

My VTT is only 1.2X but I can't remember the exact value, still tweaking

Most of us are with the cheapest i3, not sure about the more expensive ones though

RAM price is still soaring with recent 6GB Team Elite kits at RM900-1000 range if I'm not mistaken. Not the best time to spend a lot on them

The H55 works fine and if you google, many people easily clock their i3 to 4Ghz+ with those board

Actually I don't quite understand because most modern boards can easily get you a decent overclock What are your expectations like? If you're looking to max out everything, overclock that i5 750 or i7 860 to 5Ghz, etc then maybe you want to spend on a better board. If you're just an average overclocker that wants your chip to run faster for day to day use, I really don't see a problem with the H55.

Here is mine Total ownership of the i3 is around 3 weeks before going back to i7 again.

How about the temps? Maybe it's too hot?