Overclocking

[Plod2151]

Need some help. Never overclocked anything in my life. I have got an AMD Athlon XP3000+. Abit NF7 S vers 2 motherboard. And a gig of crucial DDR 400. Do i need any software or anything?
Anyone Help???

[misae]

No you dont need software to overclock but you can get some for your motherboard.

I would give the NVIDIA System Utility a go - it can raise your FSB within Windows..
http://www.nvidia.com/object/sysutility_1.0

Here is an Overclocking guide:
http://www.tweaktown.com/document.ph...=guide&dId=376

If you overclock and something blows up or stops working (a distinct possibility) then the only person to blame is yourself

[blockers]

To overclock your system i would only trust the BIOS. hit DEL when the lights on keyboard flash.

You will then be taken to a blue screen, with lots of options. Select the top left.

the multipler is the CPU's multipler, it may be locked on your BARTON, so change it either .5 + or - to see if it boots, if it doesnt dont worry. Either hold insert when you tunr the computer on, or turn the power off at the back.

If it does boot lower the multipler to 9 or 10. then increase the FSB. Just do it in small increminets, like 5 up to 200, then just by 1 or 2 each time. With pc3200 (running at 400 (the fsb 200x2 = 400 the RAM speed.) benchmark here, then every 10 or so benchmark again. 3dmark 2001SE i find best, but if you have a high end FX (5700 or higher) or Radeon (9600 or higher) then use 3dmark 2003.

So you now should be at 10x200 this is 2.000ghz. Increase the fsb slowly and see how far you can go on that. When it starts to not boot at all, or get stuck in loading windows, or crashs to the desktop from benchmarking you need to:
a) increase voltages
b) decrease fsb

The RAM should run at 2.6v stock (vdd voltage in the BIOS (2nd/3rd down for NF7-S.) Put this is 2.7v as safe or 2.8v if you find you can go further. If you increase the voltage and it only gets 5 more fsb into it before it starts to break again, just put it back to stock voltages, and decrease the fsb until it is stable (do 50 continous 3dmark games.) However increase leads to a big increase in fsb, such as 30fsb then it is probably ok to keep it at the higher voltage. If you find it still crashing/breaking then lower the multipler on the chip a little (as you could be too far for the chip.)

Higher voltage can lead to a shorter life for componants, and do lead to more heat. So only increase by little bits.

Once you find the max fsb then try upping the multipler. If it doesnt boot then add some more voltages, it goes up in 0.025v incremiments for NF7-S.

Once your system is as far as itll go then you may have to look at better cooling, as heat leads to instabilty.

Is it possible for you to post the code of the BARTON?

Overclocking is very annoying but worth it, lots of benchmarking, and lots of time spent tweaking.

Will

[blockers]

Sorry for this to be second but.

Before you start set the divider to 6/6 (its default 3/3) and the RAM to 11-3-3-2.5 (that is the order you should them in the BIOS.)

To test things use Sis sandra, prime95, and memtest86 search on www.google.com for these, all free.

[Turtleshell]

bravo. damn i wish id seen this before i did my project last year!!! i just wish there a\was a way to force more voltage in there!!!

[streetster]

Plod2151, what heatsink have you got, as this can be an important deciding factor on how much you can overclock, and also do you have any thermal compound (ie Arctic Silver) between the cpu core and the heatsink, as this will aid in heat transfer and perhaps allow a higher overclock),

anyhow, it seems blockers has covered quite a bit of stuff there, seems to be making up for the lack of Austin with a huge post like that , anyhow most people would say 'dont just jump in' with a high fsb, but seeing as your ram is ddr400 (ie 200mhz fsb), and you have an nf2 board, there is no reason not to start at 200mhz and work your way up , once you have reached the ceiling of your cpu (ie you cant clock it up any higher without it crashing), you could decrease the multiplier (well if its a pre week 40 barton, which i dunno depends how old it is?), and further increase the front side bus to increase bandwidth (and speed ).

good luck, and if you find that you've pushed your system too high and the computer doesnt boot, try holding 'home' or 'insert' (check the abit manual for the exact button) which should reset the bios cpu settings to default ones which will enable you to boot, or failing that find the cmos reset jumper on your motherboard and reset the cmos using that.

only other thing is to always monitor your cpu temperatures, download soemthing like MBM 5 (link) while running something like PRIME95 (link)

and ensure that they stay below 50 (ideally) or 60 (at a push), any higher and you are gonna kill your cpu really, or at least really shorten its lifespan.

mark

[atifds9]

Great post guys just the info I needed, I just got my new aero 7+ and arctic silver up and running in my sonata. I'm running at stock speeds I have twinmoss ddr 400 so if i just jump in and put my fsb to 200 I have it locked to 1:1 no 6:6 on my msi then I should hope fully be cool yes?? I have installed mbm5 to monitor temps.

Or will i be better lowering my multiplier to say 11 or 10.5 at the moment it's at default 11.5.

[blockers]

First it will be best to lower the multipler, otherwise you will be straight at 200x11.5 = 2300mhz with stock volts, so it will probably not boot.

Lower the mutlipler to 9 then put it to 200 (9x200 = 1800mhz) where it should be good at stock voltages.

Do you know if the 1800tbred is tbred A or B? if not, download CPUID (www.google.com) and run it. Then post what you find here, particularly the stepping.

Will

[serlex]

hi
i dont know some you said but, you need cooling system. it could get really hot

and good luck, hope it works

[blockers]

Turtle shell what do you want more voltage on? and what board are you runnnig?

Will

[Turtleshell]

i want more voltage on the cpu core i have it on 1.85 i think... but my system runs at 41º f!!!!!! i think i need to cool my other components....is there a way to water cool a southbridge?

[atifds9]

Hi blockers it's a tbred b , well it says tbred and the revision says b so i assume its a b, but i think i may be stopped by my mobo i've had a look in the bios but i can't find a multiplyer setting anywhere so at the minute i'm running at 11.5x, 1:1, 1.9ghz 333mhx fsb seems to be stable but with out knowing if my mobo has the multipler adjusting ability thast as far as i've pushed it current temp is 44c got a aero 7 and arctic silver 5 with fan running at about 2100rpm which is ok i think good trade of between cooling at silence,

Atif

[streetster]

motherboard review of your mobo atifds9..

When we actually tried overclocking this motherboard, it was difficult. The multiplier options would not work for us with the stock BIOS or the latest on MSI’s website. This was interesting because we have read a numerous places that this particular motherboard does unlock all thoroughbred b processors. We tried an XP2400 and a XP2800 and neither allowed us to change the multiplier

have a look at the screenshots, and read the review, you might be overlooking something obvious

mark

[atifds9]

Thank you , I must be missing it somewhere then.