Decided to OC (finally) - a few questions...

[dannyaa]

Hey guys, I've never OC'ed before although I've been building systems for quite a while... I read through the "A64 OC guide" but I noticed its a bit old and I had some more questions and was hoping to get some more direct feedback...

I'm looking at buying a 3500+ Venice, and from what I hear they are easy to overclock. I have never overclocked before but I know generally what it involves.

I wanted your recommendations on how I should go about putting together a system for this.

* I AM NOT INTERESTED IN "EXTREME" OVERCLOCKING! I want to know what I need for just a decent/basic overclock... air cooled and without questionable stability, etc. *


* What s939/SLI mobo do you recommend? Asus A8N-SLI? Or The Deluxe model? Or Should I go Epox or DFI or other?

* RAM - I've heard I may need to change some settings on the RAM to overclock. I am looking for great RAM that is very fast, steady/reliable by default but will also overclock well. I have always gone Corsair or Kingston in the past. What do you recommend & why?

* HSF... what do you recommend as my HSF? I was thinking of buying either the OEM 3500/3800+ and then adding a better HSF, although I have heard the stock/retail HSF is good as well... anyway, advice?
I've been thinking of the Thermalright XP90-C along with some Artic Silver 5 Thermal Compound... but what fan should I get with it?




* Case/PSU - I like the Antec P180 (the one with the PSU mounted at the bottom). I was thinking of going with the Antec Truepower 2.0 550watt PSU... Any disagreements here?

* Do I need a better chipset-cooler? I remember reading something about Thermalright making an NB-1 heatsink for motherboard's chipset to keep it cooler during overclocking... what's that all about?

* Anything else I have forgotten to consider?



Also, I was wondering what a SAFE and "hassle-free" so to speak OC would be for the Venice 3500+ (running stock @ 2.2)? Is it as easy as just having good cooling/power (case, psu, HSF) and the right mobo, and then just changing the multiplier up...?



Thanks for your time/patience... it's much appreciated!


Dan


P4c 3.2Ghz NWood / ABIT AI7 / 1GB XMS-Pro DDR 3200 / BFG GF-6800GT 256mb / Antec 380W

A64 3000 Venice / Epox 9npa-U / 1GB HyperX DDR 3200 / XFX GF-6600GT 128mb / Antec 330W<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by dannyaa on 10/09/05 07:26 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[reader850]

I'd go with the DFI if you don't mind potentially spending a lot of time tweaking it. Otherwise, consider ABit or Epox. My system is similar to what you are building. It was initially difficult to get the memory to cooperate. I spent a lot of time in the DFI forums. But it was a fun experience. Here is what I have:

DFI NF4 Ultra D – official bios 3/10
Venice 3500+ @1.36v 212 x 11 : ThermalRight XP 90 w stock Vantec Stealth fan AS5 idle 25C, load 39C
OCZ PC3200 Plat Rev2 (2X512) : 2-2-6-2 (1T) @2.8V 2.0-2-6-2-8-12-2-2-1-2-2560-auto-enable-auto-0-7-2-7.0-auto-32-disable-16x-7x-disable (my best bios settings)
ATI X800XL
Turtle Beach Santa Cruz sound card
SATA 320 GB Western Digital hard drive
Antex TX 1088 case with 120 mm Antex exhaust fan, 2 Vantex Stealth 80mm intake fans
TruePower 2.0 480W power supply
Samsung 16X DVD Writer, old CD-R, old floppy, old ZIP
Win XP Home SP2
ViewSonic G90f & IBM C71 monitors
Creative T5400 5.1 speakers & Kinyo headphones

You don't need the copper XP90c; it is only a little more effective than the regular XP90, costs more and weighs a lot more. I wanted the P180 case, but they weren't selling it yet. My case is fine, but the P180 is excellent. You don't need a chipset cooler if not extreme overclocking. My 2.33 GHz speed is plenty fast and very conservative, runs very cool. I'll probably try dividers to take the speed up higher for the fun of it some day. I personally think the best strategy is to get the best memory OC you can achieve with the lowest possible memory latencies (mine are 2-2-6-2), then increase the GHz using dividers. A64s do best with low memory latencies.

 

[dannyaa]

Thanks so much for the help.

So you do not recommend the ASUS board?
Why might the DFI potentially take a lot of time tweaking? Will it take a lot of tweaking time even with no OC'ing?

For a DFI board I was thinking the nF4 SLI Infinity mobo for $122, I didn't see any difference between that and the much pricey $190 Lanparty NF4-SLI... am I missing anything important? Anyway here was the DFI I was looking at...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813136164

But yeah & Asus A8N-SLI = not recommended?

---------------------

So... with the good air-cooling + HSF + components here...

Athlon64 3500+ Venice(2.2ghz) w/XP-90 & fan & artic silver 5 thermalpaste
DFI/Asus(?) mobo
2GB (2x1024) Pc3200 OCZ Platinum RAM
Antec 550w TruePower PSU
Antec P180 case

Should it be relatively easy & safe to get a 2.4ghz OC? (thats the a64 4000+ performance level)? Or would that be considered "extreme"?


Thanks again - very much appreciated...



P4c 3.2Ghz NWood / ABIT AI7 / 1GB XMS-Pro DDR 3200 / BFG GF-6800GT 256mb / Antec 380W

A64 3000 Venice / Epox 9npa-U / 1GB HyperX DDR 3200 / XFX GF-6600GT 128mb / Antec 330W

 

[liquidpaper007]

If your going to overclock get the 3700+ sandiego or the 3200+ venice

if you overclock the sandiego 3700+ 200mhz then you pretty much have a 4000+.

the 3500+ only has 512L2cache.

(\__/)
(='.'=)
(")_(") bunny pwns j00

 

[reader850]

Take Wusy's advice, don't get Asus. Before buying DFI, which I think is the best but not the easiest choice, read their user forums for a few hours and you'll get a flavor for the fun and headaches you might encounter. Go to www.dfi-street.com/forum/index.php, and after reading the rules, brows through the posts under nVidia nForce 4 and take a look in the AMD Overclocking section. There are some very informative Stickys in these sections. You might even find my old post outlining the frustrations I had. Your rig might fire up with no problems at all, but then you'd miss a lot of the fun of testing for a working combination, then refining the settings for best performance. The DFI boards are supposed to be of equal quality, just pick the one with the features you want. Read up on memory recommendations before you buy. These days, I personally would get two sticks of 1GB DDR 400 (PC3200) with timings of 2-3-2-5 or better. Your proposed choice of OCZ would be great. I got 2x512 OCZ EL Platinum Rev 2 DDR SDRAM DDR400 with timings of 2-2-2-5. It wouldn't pass memtest or load windows at SPD (auto) timings, so I was frustrated for a while. With trial and error (upped the voltage a little and worked down to 2-2-6-2 at 212 fsb [2-2-6-2 in the DFI's bios = 2-2-2-6, just a different order]), I got it stable and fast, and now love my board & memory. With the XP-90 in that P180 case, you should make 2.4GHz easily, with low temps & low noise. One caution -- I've seen discussions of the new E6 stepping for Venice which supposedly may not O/C well. Mine is the original E3 stepping. Many are recommending the 3700 San Diego instead of the Venice. The extra cache means very little, but it seems to be a very good overclocker. $50 more might be worth it, not for the cache but for OC-ability. I'll leave the E3 vs E6 issue to you, as I don't know how significant it really is. Seems illogical that a newer stepping would be worse.

 

[ChipDeath]

I want to know what I need for just a decent/basic overclock... air cooled and without questionable stability, etc. *

Hehe. Famous last words...

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