HT link, lower is worse?

[HostileDonut]

I recently did an overclock, but I didn't know what HT link was and I set it to x1. My I got my CPU stable @ 3529Mhz with 1x HT link. I heard that HT link can stress your computer more and I have to keep my HT link below 2000Mhz for my AMD Athlon II X3 440, plus my MoBo can't handle any more. What does HT link do? Will my computer perform better with more HT link? Would I have to run another stress test if I put my HT link higher? I heard my mobo has 3 power phases. What does that mean? I don't want to break my motherboard.

 

[photonboy]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HyperTransport

It's the physical connection between your main chipset and your CPU.

I highly recommend that you life it at the DEFAULT setting. You can Google around if you wish but that's generally recommended.

Overclocking CPU:
For video encoding, usually overclocking directly affects performance (100% of CPU is often used).

For gaming, it's much more confusing, however one think is certain and that is if not one of the cores is using 100% then overclocking to that level is not needed.

I recommend you load up three of your most demanding games with the Task Manager running (CTRL-AL-DEL). Run each game for at least 5 minutes and observe the CPU history (all cores showing history). If, for example, the highest peak is 75% then lowering your CPU to 75% of its current value is fine.

Just FYI.

 

[HostileDonut]

So right now I am running my AMD Athlon II X3 440 CPU @ 3.53Ghz NB= 1882Mhz, HT link = 235Mhz. My RAM is 800Mhz. If I put my HT link to 940Mhz would it improve performance? I would then need to run another stress test right? I am pretty new to this. Plus, what does 3 power phases on my mobo mean?