Was there ever a thoro xp1600+ ??

[unacceptable_risk]

Hi , I have a XP 1600+ cpu, I have clocked the fsb up 1 step to 136.02/272.05 mhz giving me 1.428.

How far would you guys recommend pressing on with the chip locked? How hot do you consider too hot for happyness?

And did they ever make a thoro A or B 1600+ / what are my unlocking options??

Many thanx in advance
UR:confused:

[Drake]

Anything 60C or above is too hot for me.

I'd take the FSB as far as the PCI/AGP bus will let you go, within voltage and heat limitations. I wouldn't run the PCI/AGP bus more than 1MHz out of spec, but that's my personal boundry.

I am unsure as to whether the 1600+ is being remade as a thoroughbred processor, but I know for sure the 1700+ and above are.

[unacceptable_risk]

Thanks Drake,

What is the best way to track my pci/agp speeds?

I should've mentioned that I run an aopen ak73v with 256 nobrand sd

In the bios the multiplyer is dulled out and unchangeable

Cheers

UR

[Jokester]

Im sure about that board but i think with my new one although i

havent got it yet. you can lock the AGP/PCI bus...

[Drake]

Aye, the A7N8X comes with a permanantly locked PCI/AGP bus.

If your mobo uses dividers, thats how you check your PCI/AGP bus overclock. At 133MHz FSB the divider should be 4:2:1, so with a 136MHz FSB you get a PCI/AGP freqency of 34/68MHz, which is 1MHz out of spec.

[unacceptable_risk]

Wow, seriously.

How do I manipulate those figures to allow for a higher fsb speed without stretching the pci agp bus any further?

Also If the bios has an auto setting for this, is it trustworthy?

I will power down to check what settings are available.

UR

[Drake]

If your FSB frequency selection menu has two numbers, i.e. 133/33 or something of the sort, then you probably don't have a way to change the divider manually. Otherwise, just keep it 34MHz or below.

[mdzcpa]

Originally posted by unacceptable_risk
How do I manipulate those figures to allow for a higher fsb speed without stretching the pci agp bus any further?

Also If the bios has an auto setting for this, is it trustworthy?




All you need to do is adjust the FSB to whatever you want. The PCI bus automatically stays at 33mhz. There is no adjsutment for it.

For the AGP bus, all you need to do is select the AGP bus rate of 66mhz. That will lock it there.

Have fun:)

[unacceptable_risk]

thanks guys,

How do I go about unlocking the 1600+ is it a similar process to the 1800+??

And Do you guys have any favorite Overclockers Drool Mobo's that you would care to mention? Or Brands that are currently considered good performers?

All assistance is welcome.

UR:)

[mdzcpa]

Originally posted by unacceptable_risk
How do I go about unlocking the 1600+ is it a similar process to the 1800+??

It depends on whether both are Tbreds. If they are Tbreds, just close the 5th L3 bridge. If they are older Palimino cores, you need to close all 5 L1 bridges.


And Do you guys have any favorite Overclockers Drool Mobo's that you would care to mention? Or Brands that are currently considered good performers?

Well, my new favorite overclockers mobo is the Abit KD7-E.

The KD7-E is based on the "new" KT333 chipset which is basically the the KT400 chipset, except that AGPx8 support has been removed. The up side to this is that you have all the good features that come with the KD7 (KT400 mobo) such as the 8x VLink bus, USB 2.0, enhanced memory controller, excellent CPU and DDR voltage choices, unofficial DDR 400 support, and no need to unlock Tbred processors to get at all the multipliers (just drop it in and select the one you want...very nice). The downsides of the KD7-E are the lack of AGPx8 and any on board features.

The KD7 is based on the KT400 chipset and has everything the KD7-E has plus AGPx8 support, and on board sound and LAN. The only hitch is that if you have an AGP x8 card, the KD7 will force AGP x8...no other selections in the BIOS are there.

Im my situation, I chose the KD7-E primarily as a pure overclocking mobo. Because of the difficulties in getting the Radeon 9700 Pro to play nice when highly overclocked in any AGPx8 motherboards, the AGPx4 of the KD7-E was the answer. In additon, the fact that the KD7-E offers no on board features makes it a better pure overclocking board. Right now I have had two KD7-E boards with Radeon 9700s run above 200mhz with stability (one mine, one for a customer).

I cannot comment about any other experiences but my own, but I can say that this is the best overclocking mobo I have ever used....and I've used a few.

So it boils down to your intended use for the board, features, and price. If you want an all around board the KD7 is more feature rich. If you want to save some cash and get a lean overclockers board, I would recommend the KD7-E.

If you are into more of an all around mobo, with a lttle less focus on overclocking, I suggest you also consider an NF2 mobo. From my own experiences, and what Ive seen on the forums, they do no overclock as smoothly as the KT333/Kt400, but they put up better numbers clock for clock. So you can get some great performance running lower FSB speeds. That's not to say the NF2 mobos cannot overclock well....some get them to really fly. But most seem to lose stability for long term use above in the 188-194 range.

Whew...my fingers are tired.

[unacceptable_risk]

Wow, thanks for the thoughts.

I was just browsing the asus catalogue and enjoying the feature list on the A7N8X Deluxe, Then to look at prices for a massive fright before finding this http://cgi.ebay.com.au/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2086326388 which was very interesting and bidworthy.

However, I am completely wrapped in the Bare Bones Abit KD7-E idea. All of those features I can well live without. Im still kicking an old tnt2 m64 32m along(don,t laugh) I probably will only upgrade to an mx series GF4 anyway.

So it sounds perfect, as I am quite keen to watercool a big chip and clock it hard, with some fast ram.:D

I'll be off to find out more about these abit boards and prices, I think I might throw a bargain bid at the ebay one[Hmmm Gigabit onboard.....Streuth] just so I can feel like I tried to get it.

Great advice thank you muchly

UR:)

[mdzcpa]

Glad to help.

There are many opinions about which boards are best, so consider everything. Everyone has different needs and perpsectives. I do tend to select my boards carefully based on my personal intended use....which is why the KD7-E was such a good fit for me in my situation. That and $90 for a high end overclockering board is hard to beat.

Good luck with your decision.

[dicki]

Originally posted by mdzcpa



All you need to do is adjust the FSB to whatever you want. The PCI bus automatically stays at 33mhz. There is no adjsutment for it.

For the AGP bus, all you need to do is select the AGP bus rate of 66mhz. That will lock it there.

Have fun:)

eh? did i miss something? in the olden days (i admit i'm a bit out of touch) the fsb, pci and agp were all linked using dividers... so does the new nforce have 2 seperate clock generators? if so what does this do to information transfer between the cpu and the rest of the computer surely it would get out of sync? i thought the whole idea of fsb clocking was to over clock the whole computer...

[MrP]

dicki,

in theory the nforce 2 has 4 clock gens. (i think!)

1 for the FSB
1 for the mem
1 for the PCI
1 for the agp

however, most boards seem to be locking the PCI/AGP at 33/66 so it wont change, although some are letting you set the value to whatever you want.

oh, i think i have just seen XP1800's with the tbred "B" core on www.aira.co.uk, has anyone had a play with these yet?

toodles

[mdzcpa]

dicki,

It seems MrP has answered you question:)

For the NF2 there are 2 fully adjustable clocks...the FSB and the AGP. The PCI is on a seperate clock, but locked down to 33mhz as MrP has said. The memory is run off the FSB as a % (eg 80%, Sync, 120%, etc).

[Drake]

mx series GF4What you will miss by getting an MX is not worth it. No pixel shader support and only DX 8.1. A Radeon 8500LE/9000 should run the same price (maybe ~$10 higher) and give you near twice the performance.

[unacceptable_risk]

Full on,

Obviously I've got some reading to do. Sounds like the mx range is rubbish. I havn't looked at it all much, but I thought the ti's just had a faster gpu.

I learn something every-day. Perhaps you could explain what the ati cards have to offer over the nvidia cards. I believe that I read in other postings that your quite the ati fan Drake.

I am very interested to know how they differ, and how games go with ati cards and drivers, etc.

Wow I might even get back into games with a half- decent card.

_UR_

[MrP]

all the current ATI cards are directx 9 compatable.

also for the most part they are much faster than the nvidia chip they are aimed at. the only problem being is that with them being so new, they are more expensive.

IE if your in the market for a card around $100 you can buy a geforce 4 ti 4200, or for a little more you can get a radeon 9500 pro which is much much faster esp when you are using anti alising (makes the screen much much nicer by removeing any jagged lines)

if i were you, read loads of reviews of the kit thats in your price range, or that your interested in, good articles will often explain the technology and what it does, otherwise look at the FAQ's at a a site like www.anandtech.com

toodles

[Drake]

Aye, I'm an ATi fan boy, but by all means I'm just suggesting a card other than an MX series. A Ti-4200 would suit you (but the 9000 is cheaper, and is a DX9 card :p). A 9500 Pro would be around $150, and that'd be my card of choice. I, however, am waiting for the GFFX to come out and see if ATi prices plummit at all.

[unacceptable_risk]

Krikey, I wish I was spending pounds,

By the time I convert to $US , I'd still be shopping for a $200AU unit + postage.

Down at the local bargain shed, a gf2 mx440 64m tvout is $89AU, $179 gets me the gf4 mx equiv.

I would have to fork out $320 for a bodgy brand GF4 TI 4200, probably with only 64m ddr.

A half decent gf4 ti is $600 and its easy to spend $800 - $900 on something nice.

So the card that I'm interested in is not in my price range at the moment.

I just checked the ati prices here, $230 for a 9100 pro, $450 for a 9500. I would seriously consider the 9100 if it is up to it.

_UR_