Long happy life but now it's dead!

[phsstpok]

My trusty Duron 600 just gave up the ghost. 3 years and 11 months of overclocked service and now it's gone. Died quietly in it's sleep. Worked one day and not the next (to my nephew's dismay).

That little processor took a lot of abuse. 68% overclock (1007 Mhz), torture testing (no fan, 75 degree C temps), extreme torture testing (forgot the fan, 85 degrees C - cooked dust smells bad), core crusher clips (no damage in spite of carelessness).

It was a champ.

RIP

<b>[UPDATE]</b>
It's not dead but it's been retired (for now).

I'm done playing. 1112 Mhz (8 * 139) is the best I could squeeze out of the old Duron 600.

<b>56K, slow and steady does not win the race on internet!</b><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by phsstpok on 10/10/03 02:39 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[speeduk]

Heh. That was one mean son of a tough piece of silicon.

<A HREF="http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k1=7000747" target="_new"> 3D-2001 </A>
<A HREF="http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k3=1284380" target="_new"> 3D-03 </A>
<font color=red> 120% overclocker </font color=red> (cheapskate)

 

[phsstpok]

Yeah, for the first two years of it's life I ran it at 1007 Mhz, 1.85 volt (0.35V over stock), with a mediocre HSF, at 46-51 degrees.

After that I put it in semi-retirement by setting it up for my newphew. Downclocked it to 900 Mhz (only a 50% overclock). Slapped on a better heatsink with a much quieter fan. It was still working hard at 50-55 degrees but only 1.7 volt.

Don't know if the higher temps killed it. There is no visible damage but it doesn't work in any of my motherboards. I just assume some of the pathways failed.

<b>56K, slow and steady does not win the race on internet!</b>

 

[phsstpok]

Not as tough as I thought.

It only lasted 2 years (not 3) and 11 months. Just looked at the Duron's date code, manufactured week 25, 2000.

<b>56K, slow and steady does not win the race on internet!</b>

 

[scottchen]

That's pretty good, I assume you're going to buy a new 2500+?

-Intel PIV 2.4C @ 3.84G -Asus P4P800 -OCZ Copper 2x256 4000EL memory @ 275mhz 3-4-4-8 -Sapphire 9800pro @ 490/780 -SB audigy -80G Maxtor Diamond Plus9 Ultra ATA-133 hdd -450 Enermax PSU

 

[phsstpok]

Nope, no XP2500+ for me. The Tbred 1700+ at 2.1 Ghz will hold me for a while.

I'm sitting on old hardware and don't have the spare scratch for a complete upgrade. I need at least a video card, motherboard, memory, and a bigger hard drive. My PSU is marginal.

I wouldn't be doing anything until Doom 3 comes out anyway. (I wasn't a big HL fan so HL2 doesn't thrill me, at least not yet). I'll decide what runs Doom 3 pretty well and build a system accordingly. I think the options will be very good in 04Q1.

<b>56K, slow and steady does not win the race on internet!</b>

 

[scottchen]

Yeah buy a good old 9800pro after 9800XT comes out for about 3 months, then the price of 9800pro would definently be dropped by a lot.

-Intel PIV 2.4C @ 3.84G -Asus P4P800 -OCZ Copper 2x256 4000EL memory @ 275mhz 3-4-4-8 -Sapphire 9800pro @ 490/780 -SB audigy -80G Maxtor Diamond Plus9 Ultra ATA-133 hdd -450 Enermax PSU

 

[phsstpok]

9800XT doesn't seem like enough of an improvement to keep the PRO around. I wonder if the PRO will be phased out leaving the 9800 non-pro and 9800XT.

Actually I was really thinking that 04Q1 will be a good time for CPUs. AMD64s will be selling. WindowsXP-64 will be available. Prescott will be out and if it isn't a great performer at current speeds it will probably ramp up in speed pretty quickly. This might mean some great values for P4 2.8C and 3.0C as well as the AMD 32-bit line.

<b>56K, slow and steady does not win the race on internet!</b>

 

[phsstpok]

It's alive!!!

I was thinking about the Duron again and realized I never got the "Unworkable CPU" error and alarm so I took another look. The bridges were dusted over and the L7 bridges had been modified using only the pencil trick.

Giving it one last chance I washed off the dust with isopropyl alcohol and redid the L7 bridges. I redid the L7 bridges to set a 1.85 volt default. Hopefully the Duron would POST.

Well the redone default voltage didn't take but the Duron came alive!

I'm going to see how far the ol' Duron will really overclock. My goal is 100% overclock. The reason I think I can push it further is my current motherboard has higher VCore voltage available and I also have a much better heatsink than when I last used the Duron.

In the original PC the best I could do is 9.5 x 106 Mhz (chipset limitation) = 1007 Mhz. So far I've POSTed at 1125 Mhz (7.5 * 150 Mhz) with 2.05 volts but it crashes in BIOS. I'll try 2.15 volts. This is the max I can go unless I can get the L7 bridges fixed to 1.85 volt. Then I would be able to increase to 2.25 volts.

1200 Mhz is no big deal today but lacking any new hardware it is fun to play again.


<b>56K, slow and steady does not win the race on internet!</b>

 

[scottchen]

LOL, you really want to kill that chip.

-Intel PIV 2.4C @ 3.84G -Asus P4P800 -OCZ Copper 2x256 4000EL memory @ 275mhz 3-4-4-8 -Sapphire 9800pro @ 490/780 -SB audigy -80G Maxtor Diamond Plus9 Ultra ATA-133 hdd -450 Enermax PSU

 

[phsstpok]

[chuckles] The d*mn thing is indestructable.

Been running Seti@home for 1.5 hours. The Duron is overclocked to 1104 Mhz (8 x 138, 84% overclock), 2.15 volts, air cooled. Temp is only 42 degrees C.

I'm about to switch to Toast which is designed to load Athlons/Durons with the max instruction rate. (It says something about 23 instructions in 8.04 cycles). Anyway, Toast really heats an Athlon.

<b>56K, slow and steady does not win the race on internet!</b><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by phsstpok on 10/06/03 00:01 AM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[addiarmadar]

Well dont feel bad buddy. That Duron Chip is now in better place.

F-DISK-Format-Reinstal DO DA!! DO DA!!