AMD Athlon XP 2700+ Overclocking HELP

[dan101]

Ok I have a AMD Athlon XP 2700+ with Thermaltake Volcano 9 and Artic Silver 3 and it runs 38C (100Fahrenheit roughly). I use the Asus A7N8X-Deluxe motherboard and 1gb of Corsair pc3200 ddr cas2 ram. Well I've had trouble with running the cpu at 166mhz fsb, so I adjusted it to 167fsb and its been running fine. Well I want to overclock to around 2.25 so it would be equivalent to the 2800+ I really am a n00b at overclocking so any assistance in this matter will be GREATLY appreciated!!! my email is danielcikra@ameritech.net if you wish to email me instead of posting here.

Dan

 

[LCARS]

You can run it up to 170FSB no problem... that's a nice round number. If you wanna run it up any higher than around 180mhz then you will have to do some micro-surgery on the CPU and get a watercooling system.
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by LCARS on 01/09/03 05:49 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[dan101]

IT DIDNT WORK THE COMP WOULDNT EVEN START HAD TO CLEAR CMOS, THANK BUDDY >:|

 

[lhgpoobaa]

Well that means something is up.
Not enough voltage or cooling probably.
I assume that you have locked your PCI/AGP speeds?

<b><i>The Very Hungry Caterpillar</i> - George W. Bush's favorite childhood book.
Note: This book was first published a year after Mr Bush graduated from College.</b>

 

[LCARS]

I did alittle research on your mainboard.

It apprears to be pretty solid, with quotes like "best ever" and "catered to the enthusiast" and "Savor the Gusto"

Yeah, sounds like the core voltage is too low- or the switches for the FSB aren't set at 166FSB or set to Auto. It could be a number of things, consult the book of Asus.

I did run into a possibly relevant tidbit: "NVIDIA recommends running the front side and memory busses <b>synchronously</b>."

 

[svol]

I think that NVidia gives that warning for better performance... it is known that async FSB and memory speeds can degrade the performance.

My PC eats so much money that I'm in 'desperate' need of it to buy PC3500 RAM, help Svol with his OC project!
--- PM me for information.

 

[roncarney]

I think that if you can run it fine at 167, bumping it to 170 should be no problem at all.
That only increases your speed from 2166 (13x166) to 2210, which isnt even one step up to the 2800+ equivalent of 2250.
There are many many accounts of the A7N8X getting much better OC's than that. Make sure your running either 1001C bios, or 1002.001 beta. The rest are very hard to work with.
Also, if your 1GB of ram is in 2 sticks (which I am assuming it is) make sure they are in slots 1 and 3, as numbered from closest to the CPU is slot 1, then 2, then the brown/black slot is 3.

Another VERY IMPORTANT factor is cooling, obviously. What CPU cooler/heatsink do you have?
And, the Northbridge passive cooler is known to occasionaly have inadequate contact with the northbridge chip itself. Either verify the seating/contact of the stock heatsink (its the silver one with the 2 black pins holding it on, to the lower right of the processor)
OR
Buy something like the Vantec Iceberg active chipset cooler.

rc


Marge: Homer, stop picking at your head
Homer: Aw Marge, Im so sweet and tasty!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ralph Wiggum: I bent my wookie!

 

[roncarney]

Oops I see your heatsink/fan is the Volcano 9. That should keep you MORE Than cool enough to hit 2250, at LEAST. Check that Northbridge! And BIOS!

Marge: Homer, stop picking at your head
Homer: Aw Marge, Im so sweet and tasty!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ralph Wiggum: I bent my wookie!

 

[svol]

Also, if your 1GB of ram is in 2 sticks (which I am assuming it is) make sure they are in slots 1 and 3, as numbered from closest to the CPU is slot 1, then 2, then the brown/black slot is 3.

Uhm, why? This will only degrade performance because dual channel will be disabled (IIRC slot 1 and 2 combined gives dual channel).


My dual-PSU PC is so powerfull that the neighbourhood dimms when I turn it on

 

[roncarney]

According to ASUS, using the 2 blue slots will utilize the Dual DDR Channel; HOWEVER, every thing I have seen has indicated better performance and/or stability fomr utilizing slots 1+3 or 2+3

Marge: Homer, stop picking at your head
Homer: Aw Marge, Im so sweet and tasty!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ralph Wiggum: I bent my wookie!

 

[roncarney]

CORRECTION:
I was wrong on the slots, the first one is black, then 2 and 3 are blue. I was positive mine was the way I had said earlier; will check when I get home.
Regardless, 2 blue slots (2+3?) = Dual DDR

Marge: Homer, stop picking at your head
Homer: Aw Marge, Im so sweet and tasty!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ralph Wiggum: I bent my wookie!

 

[roncarney]

The Dual DDR is possible because the nForce 2 chipset has 2 banks, one that is comprised of slots 1+2, and the other is slot 3. So utilizing EITHER slots 1 OR 2, and slot 3, will yield Dual DDR performance

Marge: Homer, stop picking at your head
Homer: Aw Marge, Im so sweet and tasty!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ralph Wiggum: I bent my wookie!

 

[kekebene]

Now that we're on the topic, here's my own question...

I'm all confused now !! I just ordered an XP 2800 and was looking around on the web for the "how to unlock the clock multiplier"... So far, I've read:

- All the L1 bridges are already closed (and no further action is required)
- The L1 bridges can be closed like the old TBird with just a pencil
- Just the last L3 bridge needs to be closed and has the "valley" to be filled.

So, would any of you know WHICH IS IT for the XP 2800 !?. And if any, will I need to "fill in the gap" ?

Thanks !

 

[svol]

All the L1 bridges are closed. The pencil trick is absolute useless with the Athlon XP. Closing your last L3 bridge can sometimes unlock the mutiplier. You have to do this the following way: first fill the gap between the bridge pins with something non-conductive like nail polish. Then close the bridge with silver paint/glue.
You can also draw a line of silver paint around the gap so you don't have to close him.

My dual-PSU PC is so powerfull that the neighbourhood dimms when I turn it on