Can my system be OC'd at all?

I am a complete novice at overclocking. I didn't build my system for overclocking- it is basically a budget system where I tried to get the most bang for my buck with Newegg deals, combo's, etc., but now that it's built and I've been using it, curiosity has been getting to me. Should I be able to overclock this system at all?

Here are the important parts:

GIGABYTE GA-MA770-UD3 AM2+/AM2 AMD 770 ATX AMD Motherboard - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128376

AMD Athlon 64 X2 5200+ Brisbane 2.7GHz 2 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket AM2 65W Dual-Core Processor - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819103218
(link is to the OEM- Newegg doesn't seem to have the retail one any more)

SAPPHIRE 100245HDMI Radeon HD 4850 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814102824

So far the small experiments I have done have been pretty unsuccessful. I have tried to bump up the CPU a bit using AMD Overdrive, but even a small amount of tweaking has caused instability.

I have also tried to speed up the HD 4850, but that has not been very successful either. I am using pretty roomy Antec case with a 92mm front fan and a 120mm rear fan. I have the stock cooler that cam with the CPU. The 4850 seems to create a lot of heat.

I have been thinking about getting a different cooler for it. The one you link to appears to be very good for the price. Also, the reviewers claim that it can be installed without removing the motherboard.

With a budget of around $50 would I get my money's worth if I spend a little more? If so, what would be a good recommendation for around $50?

EDIT: okay, let's be honest- if I'm going to spend the money/effort buying and installing an aftermarket cooler I'd like one that looks cool.

I use a 30.00$ AC freezer pro and I am VERY happy......

*cough cough*

Check out my sig.

Also, with the 15 dollar rebate, the cooler price drops down to 15, which is an absolute steal for this cooler.

I have the dark knight, and I'm even thinking of picking this up for this price, just to mess around a bit with different coolers.

Yeah, im thinking about putting the 92 mm on my NB

Eh, its 10 bucks....

For the 550 ..... Going to see if I can get it to 4Ghz.....

My NB is the sh*$!!! Never goes over 60c no matter what I do.....I will send ya a picture when I get home....

Nice man^

ill upload some pics of the most recent build...Im using the stock cooler to cool the ram. LOL.

Here are the pics...

for the temp probe, the top temp is the ambient and the bottom is the temp of the heatsink fins.

I wouldn't bank on the idea of getting your MIR back, I never recieved my rebate for my Sunbeamtech Transformer case, and they do their rebates in house. I even tried sending emails to their customer support (since they don't have phone support, I think companies really need to get back to phone support, the email support generally sucks), but I never received any emails back from them.

Well ditto, if you can spend $50 bucks on a cooler then what you need to consider is if your case is big enough for a 120mm cooler. You may want to take a look at

XIGMATEK Dark Knight-S1283V
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233029

or

Sunbeam CR-CCTF 120 mm Core-Contact Freezer
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835207004

You should be able to get to 3.0GHz with the stock cooler, or just shy of it if you have a G1 rather than G2 Brisbane, but past that how far you get is just going to depend on your sample.

Can I ask how you are keeping the stock intel cooler on the ram? Or is it just not attached and sitting there.

Always looking for ways to do something with old parts... haha

I should have guessed as much. Where exactly did you attach them?

On topic, I believe the Schythe Mugen is quite decent as well as the CM hyper 212

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835185093

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835103040

The Sunbeam CC is hard to beet for the price, especially when you consider that Frostytech has it rated higher than the Xigma DK. I think the Xigma Dk and the Mugen ii look better though, but *shrug*

well I have had the same kind of trouble trying to overclock my x2 6000+...even if i raise the fsb to 210, the computer fails the memory tests in AOD...dont really know if its because of my ram or what...someone told me to lower the HT link to 4x (rather than 5x) but that still didnt seem to help stability...can anyone help me out?

well its using the default voltage right now (1.35v)...I thought it would at least be able to OC a tiny bit before having to feed it more juice...

ummm...let see

I have a Biostar TA770 A2+ mobo (non SE version)
AMD X2 6000+
ATI HD4850 512mb
4gb DDR2 800 G. Skill
...



let me know what other pics you need?

As far as that screen-shot goes you are fine but have changed anything in the bios since you got that motherboard?

Have you changed your RAM (memory) settings from Auto to manual? You have to change the RAM timings in the Bios if you want a stable system... Normally I am not able to overclock at all if I don't change a bunch of settings in the Bios when I fire up the rig for the first time...

Well if you look at the bottom right corner of the screen-shot, you will see where it says :

Cas Latency : 5 clocks
Ras To Cas : 5 clocks
etc.....

Once those values are changed save and reboot

On a side note : when you change your timing you have to make sure your ram frequency is at 400Mhz (DDR2 800Mhz)

Before you use all those programs you must go into your bios and make sure the settings are correct. You can't just go and overclock strait to AOD and leave all your Bios settings on Auto.... At least make sure your memory timings are correct before you do anything with AOD. That way you will get a better and more stable overclock...

I would first suggest that you read this before you overclock at all :

<:::::::::+AMD Guide to Overclocking+::::::::::>

http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] ,2161.html

Like I said, you need to educate yourself first on the basics in order for you to understand the source of your issue. Its may not be easy for you to read a couple of pages and learn, but it will help you answer all those questions that you ask yourself when you hit a wall and dont know what to do....

In a little over a month here on Toms I have learned so many things that I did not know before and thanks to that I can answer more and more questions w/o any hesitation. So in all what I am trying to make you understand is that you cannot just overclock " out of the box"... You need to make sure ALL your settings and values are correct (RAM, CPU, Voltage,etc) before you even think about overclocking...