I have an E6300 1.86 OC'd to 2.94. Everything reads correctly in the bios, all settings are correct. Now when I go into Windows Vista, the CPU speed reads 1.87 ghz under Vista and CPU-Z. Just yesterday everybody was telling the truth, now only the bios reads the correct speed. What the hell is going on?

It's possible that your processor is "throttling"either for power management reasons or because it is over heating. If you run a program like CPU burn, which would fully utilize the processor, you would see the reported speed pop back up to 2.94 if it is a energy saving thing. Check your temperatures to make sure it hasn't reached any maximums set in the BIOS or any physical limits determined by the processor. -Ryan Adams Free Computer Tips and more:http://RyanTAdams.com Paid Tech Support: Black Diamond

Do you still have SpeedStep enabled?

Sometimes cpu-z doesn;t report the overclock. I have an E6550 overclocked to 2.80 GhZ, but cpu-z also reports it at 2.4 GhZ. However, a utility such as Everest Home Edition or SIW does show 2.80 GhZ.

This is unreal. I dl SIW and it still reports a stock clocked 1.86! I reset my BIOS to a 420 bus, 2.94 cpu, proper voltage settings, no speedstep setting are available, no power or safety settings are in effect. Even when I go through a windows based app to OC such as EasyTuner6, the settings do not take!! What's left? It's like my rig has developed AI and does what it wants not what I want it to do!

Problem solved. I removed my rig, opened er up, made sure all fans are operating, cleared the CMOS, hooked her back up, fired it up, and it clocked in at 2.94 under SIW. My theory: perhaps a thermal event made the rig clock to default (maybe even somekind of damage done) then wouldn't clock back up until a hard clearance.Any thoughts?

"no speedstep setting are available" In your BIOS it's called "CPU EIST Function". Try these settings to run the CPU at 2.80GHz: CPU EIST Function = disabled CPU Host Clock Control = enabled CPU Host Frequency (Mhz) = 400 PCI Express Frequency (Mhz) = 100 C.I.A.2 = disabled System Memory Multiplier = 2.00 (assuming you have DDR2-800)