Upgrading the CPU on an ABIT BM6

[Guest]

Have an old system, ABIT BM6 with a Cel 400@500, that I want to upgrade, but I'm not sure how much I can.

Looking at ABIT's website for <A HREF="http://www.abit-usa.com/eng/download/bios/bios-bm6.htm" target="_new">BIOS upgrades</A> it says it supports up to Celeron 600. Simple enough I guess. However, looking at the <A HREF="http://www.abit-usa.com/eng/faq/bm6.htm" target="_new">BM6 FAQ</A> it says that the BIOS doesn't support Celerons with cC0 stepping and gives this link to Intel's support site: <A HREF="http://support.intel.com/support/processors/sspec/icp.htm" target="_new">http://support.intel.com/support/processors/sspec/icp.htm</A>, which lists the various processor details.

Looking at that site it shows that the 600 comes in cB0 and cC0 steppings, how can I differentiate between the 2 when buying? I haven't noticed anything as simple as a 600 and 600A. Also, there're cB0 processors up to 700MHz, would they work with the mobo or not?

Any educated guesses, actual experiences, whatever would be helpful.

 

[Crashman]

Your best Celeron choice would be the 566, most are lower voltage (1.50v, compared to the 1.70 of the cCO), and can easily be overclocked to 850MHz with the 100MHz FSB option in BIOS.
In fact, since your motherboard supports Coppermine celerons, aka Celeron 2 (such as the 566 and 600), you could also use a PIII instead, as long as it's not cCO.
But you can also modify the stock voltage of the processor by modifying the pins if needed, so it is detected differently. The Coppermine processor can be used at nearly any voltage between 1.50v and 2.05v, depending on what is needed to run at a given speed. And all those voltages are available in .05v intervals by pin modification.

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[Guest]

Thanks for your help.

566s come in cC0 versions, too. I know in the early days of Celeron O/Cing there were sites that would let you order by the S-Spec number, anything like that still around? Or is it just going to be luck of the draw as to whether I get a chip I can use without hardware modifications?

 

[Crashman]

I guess it's the luck of the draw. I think the reason is that the motherboard supports various voltages but not 1.70v. I had that problem with my Shuttle board-it would accept the stock voltage, but when I tried to increase it to 1.75v it didn't like it, but 1.80v worked fine. So it may just be a matter of changing the detected voltage to something the board can provide, and that requires pin mods, such as wiring them together or removing them. Good luck-I think most 566's were of the 1.50v flavor, all mine have been.

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