Overclocking Athlon II x4 620 Questions

[DaveLembke]

I decided to check into overclocking my system and see how hard I could push it and yet keep it from crashing. I got my Athlon II x4 620 ( native clock 2600Mhz ) running at 2798.7Mhz with an adjustment to my FSB to 215Mhz from 200Mhz. My motherboard is a Biostar MCP6PB M2+ and the Performance Booster section allows for you to boost the FSB up to around 400Mhz.

I tried for 3000Mhz, but it crashed at FSB 230Mhz. Seen some references online to running this CPU at 3.1Ghz without any issues with proper heatsink etc.

Going to stick with the FSB of 215Mhz for a while to see if it crashes or not, although I do want to try for 220Mhz and 225Mhz FSB is 220 Mhz is without issues.

Questions I have are:

Any savvy over-clockers out there have any suggestions on a safe FSB to run this system at, or is it all trial and error to find the fastest you can go without crashing?

I haven't altered my voltages to my RAM, so is it safe at the higher FSB or am I going to cook my RAM?

Are there any good Linux distros out there, such as a Live CD or DVD or Thumb drive with a specific tool to stress the system on at the overclock and not chance trashing the Windows 7 on the hard drive? ( I dont like having the Windows 7 hitting the BSOD like it did at 230Mhz FSB for chance that data could get written to corrupt the OS. )

Attached below is hardware info of my system at almost 2800Mhz ( 200Mhz faster than native ). Would be nice to get to 3Ghz and be stable, but maybe I am asking for too much. This is the first overclock I have performed since a 486DX many years ago. Dont want to cook this CPU like I did that 486. At least these days there are many hardware monitors and safetys involved to avoid a smoke show. At the current overclock and system idle with cool-n-quiet disabled, its idling at 34C which is pretty good. Thats only 4 degrees warmer than it was running at 2600Mhz. Going to run Y-Cruncher and have Speedfan going to log the temps to make sure I stay below 60C. Prior to overclock it peaked at 50C while stressing the CPU.

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[DaveLembke]

Just figured I'd mention that its been stable at almost 2800Mhz for about an hour and I stress tested the CPU and heatsink cooling to make sure it would level out at a safe temp. Idled around 34C and quickly shot up to 50C at beginning of CPU stress test. After 45 minutes of 100% of all 4 cores, it leveled off to 55C - 56C and was flipping back and forth.

This is 5 or 6 degrees higher that the CPU ran in temp at native clock of 2600Mhz.

Thinking I might need to invest in a better heatsink if I am going to try for 3000Mhz. I dont want the CPU to go over 60C, and i have the motherboard set to shutdown at 70C to protect the CPU from a runaway temp even though thermal throttling should kick in to protect itself.

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[DaveLembke]

Played with settings some more this afternoon. FSB is normally 200Mhz.

220Mhz FSB Windows 7 Boots, and System Crashes with CPU temp idle at 43C

219Mhz FSB Windows 7 Boots, and Passmark Benchmark Crashed during benchmark with BSOD

218Mhz FSB System not crashing, but running 59C with CPU stress test. Stopped stress test and it quickly cooled to 39C idle. Passed Benchmark with better score than native clock. Gaming Test... Started up World of Warcraft and tested out gaming at 2834Mhz to CPU rated for 2600Mhz. Gameplay was surging, jumpy frame rate where normally the framerate is a constant and smooth at native clock of 2600Mhz CPU @ 200 x 13.

217Mhz FSB System not crashing, CPU peaks around 57C with CPU stress test. After stress test for 30 minutes it quickly cooled to 38C. Tried WoW again and gameplay framerate was still surging some, but not as bad as it was with 218Mhz FSB overclock setting. CPU running at 2821Mhz.

216Mhz FSB System not crashing, CPU peaks around 56C with 30 min CPU stress test. After stress test it quickly cooled to 37C idle. Tried WoW again and gameplay framerate was finally a smooth constant without surging. CPU is at 2808Mhz.

*Looks like with my hardware combination 2808Mhz or a 208Mhz overclock is the best i can do and stay stable and not have performance issues. I guess I can live with 2.8 Ghz on a 2.6Ghz CPU. The passmark score is better with the 208Mhz overclock, and does make a noticable difference. Not insanely faster than native clock experience, but I definately notice its more snappier at running. Timed how long it takes to launch applications and I shed about 1 second off of starting of games etc..LOL  So a game that took say 5 seconds to start, is not taking like 4 seconds which is noticable. If it was something that took say 15 seconds to start and was now down to 14 seconds I dont think that would be as noticable. I dont have anything that takes that long to launch on this computer thank god..LOL

Thinking the 3.1 to 3.4Ghz Overclocks I'm reading about for the Athlon II x4 620 AM3 95Watt CPU are on newer motherboards with DDR3 and faster FSB with lesser multiplier and thats how its able to run stable above 2821Mhz, which is where my system starts to show signs of surging @ 217Mhz FSB.

As far as the surging I was getting with FSB greater than 216Mhz or 16Mhz faster than normal 200Mhz FSB, from what I read online many factors can affect this. Pretty much all hardware is tied into this timing etc and so maybe changing to a different set of RAM for example could allow for it to b set to 220Mhz FSB for DDR2-800Mhz XMS2 RAM Sticks without problems.

The RAM I am using in this system I bought off my brother and he had them in his Core 2 Duo 2.4Ghz system that he used to run overclocked, but while he was probably able to increase the multiplier and keep the FSB the same, my multiplier is maxed out at 13x, so the only way to overclock this system is to crank up the FSB some. The fact that this motherboard allows for altering of the FSB all the way up towards 400Mhz and I am having troubles trying to reach 220Mhz without crashing tells me that either if I had better RAM etc, maybe it could run faster or Biostar added this to the Bios, the same as Auto Manufacturers place speedometers in cars that show 140MPH, and the vehicles would only be able to reach those speeds if they were racing down hill with a tail wind but otherwise would level out at 105MPH maybe with it floored and without governor getting involved at 112MPH etc as my Honda Civic is limited to..LOL

Still interested in having input on the questions if anyone has any helpful info. Although I believe the answer to #1 is to not exceed 216Mhz FSB @ 2808Mhz CPU speed. Still kind of curious as to if I can damage my RAM or not with voltage left the same as mentioned in question #2. :

Questions I have are:

#1 Any savvy over-clockers out there have any suggestions on a safe FSB to run this system at, or is it all trial and error to find the fastest you can go without crashing?

#2 I haven't altered my voltages to my RAM, so is it safe at the higher FSB or am I going to cook my RAM?

UPDATE:
Just found a cool website for reference to overlocking the Phenom II's with DDR2, following the formulas for my Athlon II which is basically the Phenom II without the 6MB of L3 Cache as found here:  http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=596023  , it looks like my main reason for instability past 216Mhz FSB is because I havent altered my North Bridge speed yet. I left my CPU-NB at 1600Mhz, and I need to bring it to 1782.8571Mhz to match that of the FSB. The formula used was ( CPU Clock * 2 ) / 3.15 ... so ( 2808 *2 ) is 5616, and that divided by 3.15 =  the 1782.8571. Playing in the bios late last night I remembered seeing this, but I left it alone. Mainly because its best to change one value at atime and test vs multiples and not know the location of the issue as well as the North Bridge only has an aluminum heatsink on it and no fan, so  while this heatsink already felt warm with native clock of 2600Mhz CPU and 1600Mhz setting for CPU-NB, I didnt touch it for fear of roasting my NB. I did however check out this feature and saw that I could overclock the Northbridge up to 2000Mhz if needed, with steps of 1600, 1800, 2000. So I will try 1800mhz for CPU-NB which is the best match for the suggestion of 1782.8571, and I might be able to push it faster with faster NB config.

Also the reason why I cant go past the 13x multiplier may be because this CPU has a locked multiplier. As found here on that site:

For those that have an unlocked multiplier, do not increase the FSB, rather increase the CPU Multiplier by a factor of one and follow the steps as written below. You do not have to worry about the FSB until later on in the game.

Overclocking has gotten way more involved since overclocking that 486DX 66 MHz to 75Mhz way back with changing FSB/Multiplier combination from (33Mhz x 2) to (25Mhz x 3). Unfortunaltely though even though that 486 did run faster, I cooked it with pushing it 9Mhz faster and it killed it.

[DaveLembke]

Looks like my assumption of keeping it below 60C as the max temp for an AMD may not be true!    Found that its best to keep it below 55C to avoid damage. I guess I might want to get a better heatsink and drop my clock down from 2808Mhz to the temp at which I was below 55C when stressing it. Had this CPU I thought just about redlined at 59C today and come to find out I was 4C hotter than max for almost 30 minutes. 

Due to the special process of how an AMD CPU is made, the max temperature of an AMD Phenom II and Athlon II is 55C.

  From here: http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=596023

Here is more on it. I thought Intel and AMD were both 60C Max.

Due to the special process of how an AMD CPU is made, the max temperature of an AMD Phenom II and Athlon II is 55C. If you want to know why, you should read the information above. Intel has a different process of making CPUs so in turn their max temperature is much different than AMD, but the difference that counts between the two is not max temperature but minimum temperature. With AMD’s special blend of silicon, the company has produced CPUs that have no Cold Bugs. Theoretically these CPUs could operate close to 0 Kelvin (absolute 0; in other terms, where atoms stop moving). While on the other hand Intel’s CPU can only operate at around -175C, but there are few that do not have a CB.

Anyway back on to topic. Why give you all this information? Why create a background instead of saying that NO MATTER WHAT the Phenom II and Athlon II will not increase in speed after reaching 55C on loaded temperatures. Let me repeat that, all Phenom IIs and Athlon IIs will not increase their speed (overclock) and more once the loaded temperature on the cores reaches 55C. The understanding is all explained above, but here is the summation. Due to high amount of energy produced by the CPU, and the special blend of silicon used by AMD, the CPU will not be able to operate any higher than 55C or it will literally start to get into a range of extreme temperatures that could cause the CPU to catch fire.

If you find yourself stuck at some point while trying to overclock your CPU, take a look at the temperature and see where you are at. If you are close to that 55C sweet spot, you have gone too far, and the only way to go faster, is to decrease the temperature of the CPU itself.

[patio]

Dave this is probably the longest you have talked to yourself since you joined up here...
      

[DaveLembke]

  LOL ... Added more info as I was trying out different settings and researching further. There were Crickets here until you stated that...LOL  But YES, I believe this is the longest I have gone chatting to self. Due to edit/timeout period, i had to add new info in posts to self 

[patio]

If i had more experience OC'ing i'd gladly help...
Best of Luck burnin that beast in though.

[DaveLembke]

If i had more experience OC'ing i'd gladly help...
Best of Luck burnin that beast in though.

Thanks Patio! 

The good thing is that if I cook this system, I have 13 other computers not in use and 7 of which I can turn into a gaming rig quickly, transferring over PCIe video card and installing video driver and games of choice. ( 9 of them were ones people threw away and 8 of them easy fixes PSU, HDD, Seized CPU Fan, Virus/Malware, too little RAM only requiring a quick upgrade from good spare parts I have on hand from other gutted systems I come across or are offered to me for disposal etc, and the only one I really had to work hard to get working was the eMachine that drivers were hard to come by which looked like someone drop kicked the tower down a flight of stairs but yet its 60GB HDD was still surprisingly in good working order with no bad sectors, but it had a bad PSU and only a wimpy Celeron 2Ghz with 128MB RAM. I extracted the good guts MB, HDD, and DVD ROM, and migrated it into a better case upgraded it to P4 2Ghz and 1GB RAM and its now my WHS box to FTP Videos back home when on long trips and limited free wifi bandwidth that is about 2x the speed of dial-up and $25 a day if you want High Speed 4 Meg connection vs barely enough to surf the web, and god forbid there is any flash / videos on the yahoo news page you want to read etc..LOL )

[Calum]

I've had 3.4-3.6 out of this and similar CPUs before, without going for max OC.
Keep the NB frequency around 1800, the Phenoms usually take higher speeds whereas the Athlons like it a bit lower.
Have you played with voltages yet?  What voltage is the CPU running at the minute?
Try dropping the memory multiplier down if you can, to avoid running into issues with running the memory above spec.
When overclocking, it's best to isolate each factor, so I tend to overclock the CPU first, then see what memory speed and timings I can run (may have to drop the CPU clock back slightly) then on AMD systems try and increase the NB speed.
Also, try dropping the CPU multiplier down (you can't raise it as the CPU is locked but you can lower it if your board supports it) and raise the FSB, some CPUs prefer certain multipliers so you may find it's not stable at 13x220 but it is at 12x260 for example.
Finally, I'm not sure what sensor Speedfan is reading, AMD CPUs tend to have a "CPU" temp and a "Core" temp which aren't always related.  The best utility I've found for AMD temperature readings is Coretemp.

[DaveLembke]

Thanks for all the info Calum.

I did see an option to drop the multiplier for the CPU to 12.5, 12, 11.5, 11, etc and left it at 13x. Currenty 13 x 215Mhz until I get a better heatsink because I dont want to cook the CPU if I can avoid it. The aluminum heatsink I have is rated for a 65W CPU, and came bundled with a low end 45W Dual-Core and my CPU is a 95W. I have this one on order to replace the large solid block of aluminum: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103064

CPU voltage according to BIOS is around 1.23 - 1.3 volts

I did see where I could modify the memory timing etc but left that alone. Also saw where I could adjust the voltage to the RAM, but my RAM is running at 1.9V and only options are to drive the RAM with higher voltages of 2.0, 2.1 etc, which I found interesting because I am pretty certain that some DDR2 sticks like 1.8V, and I am guessing if those are used with this MB that maybe it would be over voltaged by .1V since 1.9V is the lowest available setting.

Interesting about statement of not stable at 13 x 220, but stable at 12 x 260. *This now makes sense as to why the FSB can be adjusted much higher that I observed in the bios config options.

Seen some people claiming 555Mhz and faster out of these Corsair XMS2 DDR2 800 sticks. Linked is my RAM I have installed. I bought these 2nd hand off my youngest brother as part of a motherboard bundle and then I split up the parts to use in other systems. He had these in an ASUS motherboard with SLI and Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4Ghz socket 775 CPU that he had overclocked to 3.2Ghz. So these sticks have probably already been overclocked in the past. Sold the ASUS motherboard for $50 and so, the RAM and CPU only cost me $40 or $20 for each pretty much. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145176

Left my brother a message on facebook to see if he can recall what he had for memory settings when he had the Core 2 Duo overclocked. Maybe he can share with me the sweet spot in the memory config he used. Although he had to use a $90 heatsink to keep that Core 2 Duo from melt down. The heatsink stood a good 6 inches off the CPU with large copper fins and copper tube looped at its core with a 80mm fan mounted center to that. He had a monster computer case that was about 2x as wide as a normal computer tower and almost 2x longer as well. With all the bling inside of LED glow and tidy cable management etc which was seen through the clear plastic side panel. I have a hard time spending that kind of crazy money on a computer case. Most ever spent on a computer case to date was $30 only because it came with a 500 watt PSU and had 5 star/egg ratings..lol And the case I am using for this main system is my old Compaq S6030NX case which I had since 2003. And gutted it to upgrade it in 2008 when original Athlon XP 2800+ / motherboard died.

[Calum]

Check the voltage using CPU-Z while the CPU is under load.  There's something called vdroop that needs to be taken into cosndieration - this is the difference between the voltage you set, e.g. 1.3V, and the voltage the chip receives, e.g. 1.215V.  The voltage you set is never what the CPU receives due to the power circuitry on the motherboard.

I only mention the RAM speed because, with modern CPUs, the memory controller is on the CPU itself, so increasing the memory speed puts more stress on the CPU.  For example, on one of my old rigs I could run the CPU at 4GHz and the memory at 1866MHz, or the CPU at 4.2GHz and the memory at 1600MHz. 

The TX3 is a decent cooler, certainly better than the stock AMD cooler.  The aluminium one is no good for overclocking, the "upgraded" heatpipe model which comes with most Phenoms is better, but even a $20 aftermarket cooler like the TX3 still blows it out of the water.

As for the memory voltage, standard DDR2 voltage is 1.8V, but there's a tolerance built in meaning almost all DDR2 modules will take 2.1V with no issues, some will take higher.  Most XMS usually runs 2.1V, yours are 1.8V modules though, correct.  No need to increase the voltages unless you start overclocking it, and most of the time overclocking the memory is a waste of time.  You'll see the biggest gains from overclocking the CPU, then the NB frequency.

Be aware you may not get a massive overclock on this setup because your board isn't designed with high overclocks in mind.  In fact I've just had a quick look at the specs and it's only spec'd to take 95W CPUs, which is a sign of low rated MOSFETs on the board.  I would therefore be very wary of increasing the voltage from stock, or leaving the voltage on auto which means the board will increase the voltage anyway, due to the very real risk of fire or popping a MOSFET.

[DaveLembke]

Be aware you may not get a massive overclock on this setup because your board isn't designed with high overclocks in mind.

Yah, I was thinking this motherboard was going to limit the ceiling for OC abilities. But impressed though that its bios has the features on this low cost Biostar MB. I got lucky when my friend upgraded to Phenom II x6 and gave me this CPU for free for helping him build up his 6-core system, and it actually being supported by this motherboard which was originally purchased with a Sempron X2 2200 CPU. Looked into the 6-core Phenom, but this motherboard doesnt support it so, someday I will probably end up getting the 8-core with a new motherboard, ram etc.

In fact I've just had a quick look at the specs and it's only spec'd to take 95W CPUs, which is a sign of low rated MOSFETs on the board.  I would therefore be very wary of increasing the voltage from stock, or leaving the voltage on auto which means the board will increase the voltage anyway, due to the very real risk of fire or popping a MOSFET.

Interesting... didnt think a motherboard would be designed with user configurable values that could send it into dangerous to motherboard component operation. I was thinking the worst I would do would be to kill the CPU or RAM. And figured the Northbridge, which is directly soldered to the motherboard must be able to take the higher frequency if allowed to be set to higher.

Check the voltage using CPU-Z while the CPU is under load.  There's something called vdroop that needs to be taken into cosndieration - this is the difference between the voltage you set, e.g. 1.3V, and the voltage the chip receives, e.g. 1.215V.  The voltage you set is never what the CPU receives due to the power circuitry on the motherboard.

Will check this out when I get home from work. Didn't think it would drop much if adequate amps are present behind its volts, but after all it is very thin traces etc for the CPU, so I can see it being a little squishy in actual voltage getting to the CPU under high demand.

The TX3 is a decent cooler, certainly better than the stock AMD cooler.  The aluminium one is no good for overclocking, the "upgraded" heatpipe model which comes with most Phenoms is better, but even a $20 aftermarket cooler like the TX3 still blows it out of the water.

Yah, the heatsink was a big concern back when I installed this quadcore in place of the prior dual-core. The Heatsink is rated for 65Watts and I skimped and tried out the 65watt heatsink on the 95watt CPU instead of spending any money. And the solid chunk of aluminum with mounted fan works for this CPU at 2.6Ghz native clock without any risk of an overheat, so I havent upgraded the heatsink until now with wanting to go faster.

As for the memory voltage, standard DDR2 voltage is 1.8V, but there's a tolerance built in meaning almost all DDR2 modules will take 2.1V with no issues, some will take higher.  Most XMS usually runs 2.1V, yours are 1.8V modules though, correct.  No need to increase the voltages unless you start overclocking it, and most of the time overclocking the memory is a waste of time.  You'll see the biggest gains from overclocking the CPU, then the NB frequency.

I will have to look up the RAM to see if they state its voltage. Sometimes its stated on the sticks themselves, but I dont recall if I saw 1.8V on them or not. Also good to hear that XMS usually runs at 2.1V, so I have some room to bring it up .2V if needed.

*Thanks for all your knowledgeable info on this Calum! Greatly Appreciated!! 

[Calum]

Interesting... didnt think a motherboard would be designed with user configurable values that could send it into dangerous to motherboard component operation. I was thinking the worst I would do would be to kill the CPU or RAM. And figured the Northbridge, which is directly soldered to the motherboard must be able to take the higher frequency if allowed to be set to higher.

There isn't much of the traditional northbridge left on the board any more, most of its old functions are now integrated into the CPU.  The frequency isn't an issue - it's the voltage and power draw that can pop the power circuitry.

Will check this out when I get home from work. Didn't think it would drop much if adequate amps are present behind its volts, but after all it is very thin traces etc for the CPU, so I can see it being a little squishy in actual voltage getting to the CPU under high demand.

At those speeds and voltages - most likely it won't drop much.  Vdroop is a fact of life though and is present on all motherboards no matter how high or low end.  On some, it's controllable with a feature called load line calibration, however this isn't perfect and has problems of its own - it can cause voltage spikes, raise the voltage way beyond what it's set to, etc.  So, it always depends on the board and CPU as to what voltage to use and whether you use load line calibration if it's available.

I will have to look up the RAM to see if they state its voltage. Sometimes its stated on the sticks themselves, but I dont recall if I saw 1.8V on them or not. Also good to hear that XMS usually runs at 2.1V, so I have some room to bring it up .2V if needed.

Your RAM is specced at 1.8V, most DDR2 XMS is specced at 2.1V.  2.1V is still pretty much within spec for all DDR2 memory though, if I remember correctly there's either 10 or 15% voltage leeway over the official standard of 1.8V.  Certainly with DDR3, standard spec is 1.5V and 1.65V is still within spec for the memory, though not always for the memory controllers on the CPUs.  This isn't a concern with your Athlon though.

[Computer_Commando]

I've recently started overclocking my Pentium D-925-3.0GHz because I was searching for the root cause to the pre-POST boot loop which occurs about 75% of the time, whether overclocked or not.  Once it POSTs, it's stable at 20% over, i.e. 240MHz bus speed.  My BIOS allows adjusting DRAM multiplier to keep it's bus speed at or near 200MHz.  DRAM is DDR2 PC2-6400 (400Mhz) with integral heatsinks.  Manually set the voltage of the DRAM to 1.8V

CPU heatsink is similar to the Cooler Master you linked to.  http://www.arctic.ac/en/p/cooling/cpu/4/freezer-7-pro-rev.-2.html?c=2181

Temp normally hovers around 30degC. in normal use.  If running stress test, it will rise to 40-50 very quickly & PWM fan will speed up to compensate.

This Gigabyte motherboard was used when I got it, previous owner probably gave up on it because of the boot loop issue.  They were gamers, so don't know what they did to damage it, onboard ethernet chip was dead.

For real-time fan & temp monitoring, use HWInfo32 or 64.

[DaveLembke]

This Gigabyte motherboard was used when I got it, previous owner probably gave up on it because of the boot loop issue.  They were gamers, so don't know what they did to damage it, onboard ethernet chip was dead.

Only time I have ever seen ethernet chips killed was a group of systems that were struck by lightning in which lightning that hit the building, traveled up the Cat5 and burned out everything connected to it, but the Cat5 cable was not damaged, so we ended up just having to replace 3 computers, one 8-port switch, and 2 P.O.S registers that also had blown ethernet ports at this gas station/store. The company was throwing away these 3 computers as a total loss, and I took one of them home with my bosses ok to do so and fixed it via adding a NIC card to it. It was a HP Desktop DC5000 SFF with Pentium 4 3Ghz.

As far as wrong stuff plugged into RJ45 port, nothing yet has blown the ethernet that I have come across. A user once had their A + B USB 2.0 cables A side plugged into the USB 2.0 port and then had their B side plugged into the RJ45 jack of the ethernet and I had a quick laugh when troubleshooting why their printer wasnt working at my last job. I guess the cable popped out and the user resorted to trying to figure out where the cable went and it fit perfect into the RJ45 jack and stuck in there on its own, almost a perfect fit.

Also seen RJ11 phone cords etc plugged into them without burning out ethernet. The only thing I havent seen yet is the UPS battery backup USB to RJ45 communication cable for the APC parachute software battery backup monitor service cable looped back into system. But I cant see 5VDC being a problem for the ethernet, when the analog phone line is much higher, especially if connected to ethernet and an incoming phone call occurs.

I was searching for the root cause to the pre-POST boot loop which occurs about 75% of the time, whether overclocked or not.

The only time I had a system act like that with a boot loop, that was not software related such as windows BSOD and reboot etc, was when the power supply was too weak for the system. I am guessing you have already looked at PSU voltages, especially at initial cold boot to see if any of the power rails are lagging to come to full voltage strength. I had a power supply about 2 years ago that someone here helped me diagnose as a bad power rail at cold boot. I was getting boot loops with it. Replaced the so called 500 watt golden power cheapo PSU which was probably more like a falsely labelled 300watt with a new 460 watt cooler master PSU and the problem was resolved.

Thanks for heads up on the heatsink being a good match to needs.