Depends on the GPU, really. Generally, though, I try to keep mine from going over the mid-70s. Some GPUs are rated at different temperatures than others and some handle the temperatures better too.

Ok, cool. I just overclocked mine yesterday for the first time. After benchmarking it with Furmark, I got the main clock speed just below the point of instability. After playing Skyrim for an hour or two, the temp hadn't gotten above 67 or so, but I will keep an eye on it.

Do you know of a website that rates GPUs for temperature?

The manufacturer of the GPU, not the card. AMD and Nvidia list it on the GPU's info page.

Thanks!

Overclocking the CPU is more advantageous than the GPU in the O.P.'s case, but the 750W power supply should be up to the task. I have a good quality 750W (PC Power and Cooling) and have my Phenom II X4 955 @ 3.6 Ghz (vs. 3.2 Ghz stock) and my GTX 460 OC'd to 875 Mhz (vs. 675 stock) and it handles it with ease. Skyrim plays very smoothy on Ultra with High shadows. Of course, with PC hardware and overclocking your mileage may vary.

not true, I have a gigabyte 6870 oced, runs just fine. went from 915mhz-1050mhz to 970-1150. still at stock voltage, card problem(bulls**t)


as for the phenom, you can get it to 4 ghz. is it black edition, it would do it alot easier. Im running the phenom 2 x4 970 be oc to 4.2 ghz on air. so 700 mhz oc easliy. and at just 1.456 v

My 7970 came stock at 925Mhz on the core clock and 1375Mhz on the memory clock. I overclocked them to 1100Mhz on the core and 1500Mhz on the memory and I have no problem with Skyrim. And a nice performance boost for some other games.

Bah, Bethesda games are okay with overclocking a GPU...just the only thing to remember about them is they're *really* sensitive to even slight instability in things like the vram frequency that's all.

All the issues I've ever had with overclocking with Bethesda games was with the Fallout series. I haven't had any issues with Skyrim myself. But we all know that those games were built on terrible unstable engines.

He would definately be pushing it with the current cooling situation aka stock fan/heatsink. The vcore would likely have to go close to the recommended max voltage of that processor if you were to go up to 4GHz or higher. It really all depends on your VID and if you have a black edition. You shouldn't be overclocking with a factory heatsink/fan period. Invent some money into a nice fan/heatsink or a cheap watercooling. Skyrim is worth an overclock. The performance gain is usually worth the headache of getting your overclock stable. I wouldn't go any higher than you are now without proper cooling.

I got the corsair h50 watercooler,my room i have the machine in is placed where all the frikkin house heat gathers and it's summer here so i've got it next to the window so the cooler radiater atleast gets fresh air,at the moment under these conditions the cpu temp measures on average system in idle,21c-25c sometimes 26-27c idle measured using coretemp so give or take 5c up or down,i've noticed the game jumps it to 31c-34c sometimes 36c.my worry is will an oc jump it's temp.

the 6850's temp seems to be running at 45-50-58c in the game,i've never seen it go over,i think it's got to do with the case design of the antec 902 it gets lots of air and the out flow is close to window height and off the carpet.Beautiful case stupid big outflow fan on top,looked cool at first now looks redundant.

Yep the chips a Black.

The temps measured by coretemp.

The clocks were done by autotune,not by me but AMD's horrible vision control centre,i prefer the old catalyst center.

What's a good clock prog to use,i've pulled that AMD overdrive but have started to readup on my mobo and clocking.

That 1.4 patch reset the game back to vanilla,i did'nt realise it until i noticed something that a mod puts in was'nt there so i'm going to start the manager up and put them back in and see if anything works better.

these chips are made to be able to run a lot hotter than 27C - for example, my old E2200 has a max operating temp of 85C - I think you're gonna be alright

xTx

The PSU won't give you trouble in your system, unless it's a very crappy cheap one.
I doubt you can overclock this CPU much higher without better cooling though, as you will most probably need to push vcore, which means more power and heat.

As others have stated, go for the 1.4 beta if you don't have so already, or get Skyboost, or just wait until the patch comes out of beta (likely soon).

Edit:
Another thought just occured to me. You might also try AMD Overdrive, set up a profile for Skyrim and overclock only two or three of your six cores and underclock the others. This should give you some thermal headroom and Skyrim anyway doesn't benefit from more than two or three cores.
Don't have much experience with Overdrive, though.

just done a bit of googling - seems 62C is the max for the CPU temp, and that core temps for AMD are inaccurate.

source: http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?p=18537536 and google

xTx

1kw don't be absurd lol The 750w the OP has is more than fine.

Rule of thumb for PSU: aim for rated power such that load is between 50% and 80%. You can have too much aswell as too little.

Yes the OP can overlock and if their CPU is a "black edition" they may as well. But don't expect anything special 4ghz is pushing it for a phenom ii: and as advised 3rd party cooler is essential.