Overclocking Help

[DOHCrazy]

Excuse my ignorance and im sure this kinda question has been asked over and over before, But I need to find a Good guide to overclocking. Ive found a few but none have made me comfortable enough to actually try it. My system specs are: AMD Barton 2500+...Asus A7N8X Delux...Saphire 9600 pro... Corsair matched 256x2 pc 3200...Thermaltake X3... and a 420 Watt Powersupply. The CPU heatsink also has Artic Silver 3 Thermal on it... Right now im runnin stock speeds and when playing 1st person shooter (ie. MOH, RTCW) The CPU temps dotn get above 43*C. I know that this Processor and motherboard combonation are over clock friendly i jsut need a good guide to doing it. Thanx in advance for all your help!

 

[pIII_Man]

well all the options for overclocking are in your bios...so heres what ya do...go into your bios and find the menu where all of the cpu speeds and things like that are. Now drop the multiplyer to 8x and then raise your FSB in incriments of 5 (restart after each increase) then run windows if it seems stable then go back and raise it (the fsb) a little higher. After you find the maximum fsb that your cpu will run stable at then start increasing the multiplyer in .5x incriments until you encounter instability...don't be afraid to increase your core voltage by .15 volts...keep an eye on your temperatures however...don't let the cpu go over 55c under load.

There is no smell better than fried silicon

 

[DOHCrazy]

That was the most amazing display on a FOrum i have ever seen... I posted and got a Dr.Pepper and you had replied...

Ok, well i know HOW to change all those settings so i think im gona go try... Y am i turning the multiplier down to 8x first though? quick explination is all i need...lol

Thanx bro

P.S. What is a good program i can use to put my machine under load... Ive heard of them before..jsut dont know where to get them or any names!

AMD Barton 2500+
A7N8X Delux
Corsair Matched 256x2 PC3200 w/ Platinum Heat Spreaders
Saphire Radeon 9600 pro
Thermaltake X3
Thermaltake 420 PS
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by DOHCrazy on 07/17/03 02:26 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[ChipDeath]

Just to add a couple of points:
Make sure you lock the AGP bus at 66Mhz before you start tweaking the FSB, or you might start encountering problems well before you reach the speed limit of all the other components.
Also make sure your memory is set to 100% (synch) with the CPU FSB, so it gets faster too...

you may need to increase your memory timings to get your RAM to run at higher speed, but because it's PC3200, you should be able to run it at factory timings up to 200Mhz, and possibly even lower.


[EDIT]
The multiplier issue is because you need to find the max speed of the RAM, Northbridge, and other components, before you start finding the MHZ limit of the CPU itself. as total speed is Always Multi X FSB, if you just whack the FSB up loads you might hit a wall caused by the CPU before you find the limit of the other components, and a higher FSB is more desirable than a higher CPU Mhz, on the whole...
[/EDIT]

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$hit Happens. I just wish it would happen to someone else for a change.<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by ChipDeath on 07/17/03 07:29 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[pIII_Man]

Prime95 and sisoftware Sandra are both good

Why drop the multiplyer...well first what we are trying to do is find the max fsb that your cpu can run at (so you get better memory bandwith)...so in order to do this we must make sure that the cpu is out of the loop so to speak...at 8x the cpu will run fine at just about any fsb....then we start increasing the multiplyer after we have found the max fsb speed so that we can find the max cpu speed...that way we get the best of both worlds...memory bandwith and processing power.

[EDIT]
Awww...chipdeath ya bbeat me to the post hehe...

I would recomend against playing with mem timmings...just cause your starting out...but many times a faster mem speed at $hitty timmings performs the same as a good mem speed at really low timmings.

There is no smell better than fried silicon <P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by pIII_Man on 07/17/03 02:36 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[DOHCrazy]

But since i have pc3200 i should be okay without having to change it right?

And do i go about locking the AGP at 66MHZ in the bios? And After i lock it and get everythign overclocked... do i Unlock it? otr set it at suthin different ..or what?

AMD Barton 2500+
A7N8X Delux
Corsair Matched 256x2 PC3200 w/ Platinum Heat Spreaders
Saphire Radeon 9600 pro
Thermaltake X3
Thermaltake 420 PS
<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by DOHCrazy on 07/17/03 02:41 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[ChipDeath]

Oopsie... I was going to mention the <b>crap timings & high speed</b> versus <b>good timings & low speed</b> issue, but forgot that... :redface:

<pre>Guess we're even then...</pre><p>

Anyway I was only suggesting the timings as a way of finding out if it's the RAM that's stopping it getting past a certain speed, or an overheating Northbridge/etc - i.e. if it works at CL3 but not at CL2, then it's the RAM....

---
$hit Happens. I just wish it would happen to someone else for a change.

 

[pIII_Man]

No problem chipdeath

Yes with pc3200 especially from corsair you should be able to get your ram pretty damn high w/o messing with timmings.

About locking agp...you leave it locked...if you unlock it your pci and agp buses will run out of spec...

There is no smell better than fried silicon