Overclocking, anyone?

[Morpheus]

Going more than 200 MHz over on CPU makes my pc unstable. Anyone overclocking more than that?

[Fragman]

no i only go upto 188Mhz

[Shackled Phoenix]

Custom build a cooling system like my friends.... using his air conditioner he's gotten his up nearly 600MHZ

yeah he actually has done it.. i've seen it... and drooled over it.... if it wasn't for the extremely loud HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM MMMMM coming from the airconditioner.

[Karmashock]

if you're going to OC, then get a water cooler... don't play around. Also note that the cpu will not last as long if OCed... no matter how much you cool it, that's fact.

[Shackled Phoenix]

the guy has the money to use a freaking airconditioner to OC his already badassed processor.... He dun seem to care if he burns it out.

[Karmashock]

then just get a water cooler... it's as cool as anything, looks nice, and is QUITE!

[Papa Smurf]

If you are in the uk i would recommend these people for your cooling system they have great customer service i have never had any complaints;

http://www.overclock.co.uk/customer/home.php

[LardGibs]

A few tips. You haven't said what you're running, but I assume it's athlon xp?


1) Voltage. gotta bump the voltage, decent mobos can, HP mobos... no. Some hardcore OC boards like Abit (what I drive :D) can go to 2.3 V (OC suicide btw) Bump CPU voltage 5-15% with little fear.

2) Cooling. this can be intimidating, but getting an aftermarket heatsink/fan or the more complex waterblock will improve results WHEN PROPERLY INSTALLED with decent thermal compound

3) Bandwidth. An easy way to improve the overall performance, esp. for midrange machines based on 2000+/2400+ sets is to overclock the front side bus to 300, 333, 366, 400. Others will tell you to do 383 fsb or similar but I disagree, keep it synchronous with everything else going on like pci bus, memory, etc. A failsafe method for me has been to bump fsb to 400 mhz, recompute the multiplier to maintain original speed, and bump cpu voltage the 5-15% to maintain stability

4) Stability. What is stability? I suggest prime95 or some similar burn in program, 1hr is promising, 24 hours is bullet proof but I go with 1hr because I don't need 100% stable on my house of cards.

If you have intel prescott, forget it. Presshot is overclocked at the factory by INTEL:thumbdown

I have no experience with AMD64 oc'ing but have done a couple of athlon xp's.

quid pro quo: system chipset is a variable also, you might not be able to hit 400 fsb with Via KT400 chipsets if early revison, but Nforce2 is vg chipset.

Right now I run AMD Athlon XP-M, multiplier unlocked Barton, with a 20 cfm squirrel cage blower, at some 1.75 V and 2.2 GHz/400 FSB on a NF7-S. The only time it gets unstable is when the video card is working hard and dumping another 100W into the case. Very noisy but for the money? $100 cpu o/c'd to $400 territory.

[Morpheus]

Running XP2000+, every time I get over 1.88 GHz, system randomly reboots. Since I have Asus mb, I monitor the temp through AsusProb, and it doesn't overheat. I bupmed CPU voltage to 1.80 though, since the default is 1.750. Also running watercooling system, but everything is standard.
My memory is running at turbo mode, but not overclocked. FSB is something I didn't play with yet. Is it adjustable in BIOS?

[LardGibs]

almost certainly on an Asus.

If you tell me the model number and/or tech specs I will try and estimate how far you might be able to get.

The reality is though if your board is recent enough KT400 or newer, it will be multiplier unlocked. If it isn't then you can't change FSB easily unless you want to modify the motherboard cpu socket, which there are plenty of guides for on teh web.

If the default voltage on your cpu is already 1.75 then it might be an old enough Thunderbird to not have any headroom in it. what temp do you run with the watercooling, and tell me if it's on die sensor or thermistor underneath if you know.

Another setting that I have had varying success with is increasing the north bridge chipset voltage, typically 1.5 to 1.6, for fsb/ram overclocks.

Finally, once you cough up your model number, consider one of these, it's what I upgraded to. You probably can afford it 8)
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduct.asp?submit=property&DEPA=0
then you'll get a nice cheap Barton and some more overclocking potential. If you have a good board and watercooling that works properly, you could hit 2.5 GHz...

So, the way to go is change fsb to 333, ram to 333, and cpu multiplier to maintain the same core frequency and see if you can stabilize that. If so, push to 400 if possible. This will give you more impressive results than the measly 200 mhz you're getting.

Oh and one more thing. What some people don't understand is that as the voltage to the CPU is increased, the amount of power consumed is increased. If the frequency of the CPU is increased, the amount of power consumed is increased. This means that if you pull too many amps on the 12 V rail out of your power supply, the computer can ..... randomly reboot. I have a 350W antec which is probably doing 400W now, but it's an antec :D If you have chinese noname sheite, bin it ASAP.

[Morpheus]

Motherboard is rather old, A7V333. I haven't upgraded BIOS either, never really needed it. I suppose I got to download Sandra to see the CPU model, "family 6 model 6 stepping 2" doesn't really tell me anything. Right now CPU is running at 1.87GHz, 58C on CPU, 30C on mb. I have all my fans hooked to speed controllers, so that I can easily adjust them to find the middle line between the noise and temp - usually turn them down if I leave pc overnight, and bump them all the way up when playing.
And I also have a Zantec 420W PSU with automatic variable fan control, so that shouldn't be a problem.

The sensor is the thermistor, both of them actually. Looked at the BIOS and didn't see anything for FSB speed. The settings are : 12.5 multiplyer, 150/37 for CPU/PCI frequency.

[Fragman]

I have a thermal take fan on a Barton 2500+ oc to 188 MHz fsb and it runs at 50

Water cooling is like 400$ good cooling but its too fucking expensive

[LardGibs]

:google: AMD Athlon(tm) XP 2000+ (Palomino)

John; Your 1900+ is most likely a Palomino which will run at 12x133.3 for
1.6GHz apec' - if it has an AGOGA or earlier stepping code, then the most it
is capable of will be close to 1.8GHz - it should do 12x150 for 1.8GHz
easily enough without any unlocking tricks & as long as you have good
cooling. If it has an AGOIA code (last of the Palominos) then it should do
1.9GHz okay with good cooling & an overvolt to circa 1.85V- ie. 12x158 for
1.9GHz...I don't think you're going to get more out of it. If you are multiplier unlocked (most probably on KT333 from Asus) I would get a $80 XP-M, or more if you can afford it, then you can put the watercooling to good use. You can mod the mobo for multiplier even if you can't do it in BIOS but at that level of hassle consider getting a $70 nforce 2 mobo as part of the package.

[Morpheus]

The multiplyer is unlocked, but every time I go up on it, even if I bring the frequency down to keep the same result, pc won't boot. I'll stick with this setup for a while, give me some time and I'm thinking about going AMD 64 and trying out that Windows XP 64 I got my hands on.....

And Frag, I got cheap water cooling - only $120(check that website I posted in the other thread). It still works much better than any regular fans.

[Abyss]

My 1700+ is 355Mhz over its rated factory speed. With the stock heatsink and fan! I'm not sure if I should overclock it too hell before I buy a new mobo and cpu or give it to someone less fortunate.