Hi guys. I'm in the midst of my first overclock and have run into a bit of a conundrum. I can't see to get my board to accept any of the settings I throw at it. I've read up quite a bit on OC'ing thanks to some great guides and threads on the subject. Alas, my board is throwing me for a loop.

Here's the specs:

GA-P35-DS3R
Q6600 Rev B3 (kept loose to 5-5-5-15)
4GB G.Skill PC6400
Scythe Ninja Cooler
Bios F12f

It doesn't seem to accept any of my FSB or voltage settings. I've tried gradually stepping up to no avail. CPU-Z does see changes to my multiplier and changes to my RAM. It seems perpetually stuck at 267.

I've seen a few other people with similar problems. Generally clearing the CMOS seems to do the trick. No luck here.
I've also seen people say that their USB external drive was causing issues. I've unplugged everything but no luck.
I have also ensured that every protective, hand-holding setting in BIOS I could turn off is off.

Anyone have any ideas? Anything I could post to help deduce the problem?

Thanks!

Is the bios up to date?

I just updated it to F12f. Released on 3/27/08

I believe those are as up to date as they get for this board.

I recently had trouble with my GA-EP35-DS3R. For me, the issue was caused by the program MemSet. If you can't even post at anything other than 267, then my hints aren't likely to be useful.

Regardless, the issue was that when XP booted, MemSet would try to drop my tRD down to 7, which was way too low at the settings I was trying. I uninstalled the program on default FSB and clockings and tried again and bingo - no issues.

Also, I think my MCH wasn't too happy about providing small FSB steppings. 410 doesn't work well for me, neither does 415. But 425 and 435 work like a charm. 450 won't even POST, though

If you're going to increase your FSB, remember to set the MCH and FSB voltages to +.1V or more to make sure that too low a voltage is the issue. I would probably put both of those on +.3V, then set the CPU multiplier back to about 6 and the memory divider as low as it goes (I believe they call it 2.0 on these GA boards). Then increase your memory to around +.3V, and step your FSB up to 300MHz for a first trial. If this doesn't even POST, something's probably amiss.

The thing posts and boots to Windows just fine. Thanks for the idea on MemSet but I don't believe I have that installed anywhere. Running Vista Ultimate SP1 32bit.

I've done everything from tiny increments to larger ones. I even got a little ballsy, and went for:

400 FSB
x9 multiplier
2.0 divider (for 1:1)
+.2V MCH
+.2V RAM
VCore 1.3685 (even went as high as 1.425 at one point since temps seemed fine...no smoke but no love either)

I've tried just about every combination I can think of, from the lowest setting to those above. While my board reports that the changes have been made in the BIOS, it still posts 267 on boot and in CPU-Z.

Oh and this is not an issue where the board auto-reboots back to good settings (2 failed boots, then a boot back to safe settings). This is an immediate bootup but with the only changes reported in memory and to the multiplier.

Ohhh.... So you change the settings, but they don't seem to stick. I've heard of this problem before. Look for other posts in the forum on other Gigabyte P35 boards. It may be a bios issue.

Well I've tried just about everything I can think of to get this working and have had absolutely 0 luck. Memory timings and multiplier are the only things that change upon reboot. FSB stays at 267. Voltages stay at board defaults. Cleared CMOS, removed battery completely, tried various bios's. Nothing.

Did I just get a crummy board?

I've got this board and it has been the most solid overclocker i have ever seen!
I use to be an asus fanboy...NO MORE!

My guess is you got a bad mobo or bad ram, try removing 2gb and moving sticks around in diff slots!
Try disconnecting everything , such as your cd and hard drive and use the bare minimum to get to boot screen, try FSB settings.

Maybe it's your PSU, all the plugins attached to your mobo correctly?
doubtful on PSU!