Hi all,

I wasn't sure where to put this thread so I put it here, sorry if its in the wrong place, anyway...

I want to overclock my cpu but don't want to burnout any of my components, my processer is a amd 2600+ (barton core I think, whats the difference?), its running at 1.9 ghz at the moment, has standard heatsink and fan that came with it. I have a 230v psu (didn't know if you needed to know that or not), and has 512mb(333mhz) kensington ram.

I have core centre for my mobo which is a MSI KT6 Delta, I can see by turning up the fsb the cpu speed goes up, but how much can I turn it up safely without buying anything else and how much with buying stuff and what would I need.

Thanks to all who reply

I would recommend trying to do a search on google for the particular processor you are using and see what other's might have done with it. It is usually not good to OC a CPU but it can be done and done safely.

On the other hand it is guaranteed to reduce the life of the CPU and possibly reduce the life of some of your other components depending on how much you turn it up. You will also find that at a certain point the system becomes unstable and won't run at all.

I'm not sure how many of us around here actually OC our CPU's and if you have equally good components then you really won't see much of a difference.

I tend to switch back and forth depending on what I'm doing and usually don't see much of a difference in performance. This is also because my CPU will only OC to around 2200+ (Athlon 2000+) and still remain stable.

how did you do yours??

I have a pentium IV 2.4Ghz which I sometimes overclock to 3.0Ghz (also using Core center) and I am yet to notice a difference in everyday use (gaming is a different story). So is it worth it? Depends on what you do...

Overclocking is not an excast sience, since procs that seem identical might overclock differently. I know of oc's having an identical chip as me, some get it to 3.5 without losing stability, others crash well before the 3.0 point.

Moral of the story: read up, see what might be possible with your system and advance in small small step, see how far you can go with it. Modern procs have built in failsafes that should protect them from damages. ("should" is of course not the same as: "will absolutely").

Good luck!

I recently bought an Athlon XP-M 2500+ chip which I have been able to overclock to 2.4Ghz without any headaches.

The four main tips I can think of are

1. Make sure your heatsink and fan are rated to take the equivalent processor you plan to overclock too. i.e if you intend to oc your processor so that it runs at the same speed as an XP3000 then your heatsink and fan should be rated to take that.

2. Remember to up your core voltage in the bios BUT NOT TOO MUCH!!
When I had my old XP2500+ I generally needed to increase the core voltage to 1.75v in order to get it to 2.2Ghz(XP3200 equivalent)

3. learn the location of your CMOS reset jumper!! There has been more than a few occaisions where I have pushed too far and the system refuses to boot. By using the CMOS reset jumper you will reset your bios to its "factory settings" and be able to reboot and try again but with lower settings.

4. If your not sure how far you can push it, make small increases until you get a result you are happy with.

The main stumbling block you will find with your Barton core XP2600+ is that you wont be able to change the multiplier much before it refuses to boot. All Barton core processors (except the mobile ones) have locked multipliers. You will, however, be able to increase the Front Side Bus (FSB). Your second stumbling block here is your memory. I used to have 333Mhz memory like yourself but I was running an FSB of 200Mhz which normally requires 400Mhz memory. Obviously 333Mhz WONT run at 400Mhz but I was able to tell my Motherboard (an Asus A7N8X Deluxe) to run the memory at 83% of the FSB (83% of 400 being 333). You could leave it to set the memory speed by "SPD". The SPD is a little chip on each memory stick that can be read by the mobo in order to set the right speed and timings. Personally I wouldnt leave it at this setting as I have seen my mobo produce incorrect readings on more than one occaision.

As for equipment that will help you to overclock? First and foremost GOOD COOLING!! You could spend a few hundred pounds or dollars on a water cooling solution but this isnt necessary. Have a look around for one of the higher Thermaltake models, the Cooler Master Aero series or my personal preferance Zalman (check out www.zalmanusa.com for more info).

If you want to make the most out of your overclocked processor a RAM upgrade may be a good idea. My recent overclocking experiments with my new Mobile Athlon produced scores of just under 6000 in 3D Mark and 39000 in Aquamark (my default settings produced 5500 and 35000 respectively). 1gig of PC3200 Kingmax RAM later and the scores have increased to 6300 and 43000 respectively.

As has already been mentioned you probably wont notice a major difference in day to day computing tasks (email, word processing, browsing etc) but when playing Games there should be a noticeable improvement in loading times and frame rates.

First of all thank you guys or gals for the advise.

so what would you recommend my first step be, what spec of kit do you think I will need? cpu fan and heatsink I understand. Will my 230v psu be alright?

I can change the voltage from the core centre, but which one do I change vcore, memory voltage or agp voltage?

at the moment my cpu fsb is set to 167mhz(* 11.5 = 1920mhz) is this correct for my ram? If I put the fsb upto 200 I would get 2300mhz, which I would be happy with or could I go further?

PSU - Its not the voltage rating you need to worry about, its the watts. Look on the side to see what its rated at. Anything above 300W and you should be fine as this is the requirement to run all Athlon XP based systems.

The vcore setting is the one for your CPU and should be increased a little. The default for your processor is 1.65v so to begin with I would increase it to 1.7v leave the other two alone.

As for your fsb/multiplier, try a small increase first. Set your FSB to 200, but make sure you can reduce your memory speed to 333Mhz, and set your multiplier to 10.5. This will give you a speed of 2100Mhz (and should be recognised as an XP2800 when you boot up). Test it for a little while and if possible get some temperature readings. This will tell you if you need to bring in some better parts.

A word of warning - if you cannot see any obvious way to reduce the memory speed in relation to the FSB, it is not a good idea to increase the FSB if you cannot maintain the correct memory frequency. If this is the case then you will need to swap your current memory for some 400Mhz PC3200 RAM if you are really intent on overclocking your PC.

The thing to ask yourself at this point is "Do I really need to do this??". Overclocking when done properly is a relatively safe and easy way of getting that little bit extra from your machine. However, you must be sure that you are doing the right thing and that you are confident that you can restore your machine if it wont boot because you have pushed it too far.

my processer is a amd 2600+ (barton core I think, whats the difference?) ... I can change the voltage from the core centre, but which one do I change vcore, memory voltage or agp voltage?Ok, it looks like you're new at this. No offense, but you really need to read up on overclocking a lot more before you attempt it. Turning up your FSB is just too easy these days, and it's not something I would recommend to anyone who doesn't even know what "Vcore" means.

I suggest spending some time at OC'ing websites like Overclockers.com (www.overclockers.com) and look at their articles. They also have a nice search system where you can look up other people's success with your particular CPU and the settings & heatsink they used. You'll also need to think about your total cooling solution. Not just on the CPU, but also the rest of the case, and the ambient temp of the room.

One thing I will say right now - cranking your FSB from 167 to 200 all at once is probably not going to work.

Your right saphalline it is all too easy to crank the FSB from 166 to 200 but I have experienced no problems at all with the two XP2500's that I have had the pleasure to thrash so far, and many of my friends have had no problems either.

So long as it is possible to "throttle back" the memory to 166Mhz in the BIOS (due to PC2700 RAM being used) it would be very unusual for Barton core processors NOT to boot with the FSB set to 200Mhz. OK if the multiplier is set to more than 11 you will experience problems but thats because Barton's are locked (unlike my new XP-M :D).

Having said that you are right about reading up on it first - allways a very good idea.

I have been doing some research over at overclockers.com and I came to the conclusion I couldn't raise my fsb otherwise it wouldn't be the same speed as my memory. I thought, I want to raise the multiplier but didn't know how, through the core centre I have.

I think my processer is a barton, (thats what the guy that built it said it was). So if you say the multipier is locked, how can I overclock? And the multiplier is over 11, its 11.5.

So you wouldn't recommend me to raise the fsb to 200 then? And if I did it wouldn't be in snyc the the memory I have, would it?

Please help, I want more power. Curse those who speak of less, (sorry).

I have had a look at the instruction manual for your KT6 Delta Motherboard and it is possible to set the memory frequency independently of the FSB in the BIOS.

From the main BIOS menu, first go to the Advanced Chipset Features Page and select DRAM TIMING CONTROL. On this screen should be the option "SDRAM Frequency" which will be set to Auto by default. You can change this to the appropriate speed for your memory which is 333Mhz.

Once you have done this you can go back to the main menu and select Frequency/Voltage Control. This screen has all the options you need to overclock your processor - CPU FSB Clock, CPU Ratio (this is the multiplier) and CPU Vcore (V).

Going back to your processor, if you want to be sure which one you have, download a utility called cpu-z. This will identify your processor type and what the current FSB/multiplier settings are (which I think you know already).

One thing I keep telling people who are new to this, if you are not confident you know what you are doing or you wouldnt know how to recover the situation if it goes bad DONT DO IT! It's not worth the risk of screwing up just to get what will amount to a minor performance boost.

Please help, I want more power. Curse those who speak of less, (sorry).

Knowledge is power, but it takes time to accrue.

Yes my cpu is a barton, checked with cpuid, thanks.

Dont really understand the changing memory speed to 333mhz, because it is already 333mhz. I just said it was 166mhz in my last post because according to the faq on overclockers.com they reckon you have to halve it because it is DDR ram. So an fsb of 166 is in sync with 333mhz(166mhz) memory speed, making the ratio 1:1. Is this not correct?

Couldn't I just ramp up my multiplier to 15, so it would be 166(fsb) * 15(multiplier) = 2490mhz?

Also someone said I would only be able to tell a difference playing games, which im happy with.

I have read in the manual if after changing bios settings and the computer doesn't boot-up I can reset the cmos jumper, I havn't done this before but the explanation seems pretty simple, is it?

Questions questions, sorry but if I dont ask I wouldn't learn. :confused:

Forgot one thing, my cpu temp is 50c-53c, when im just surfing the web and doing stuff like this. Case temp is 45c-46c is this normal??

Whats the actual air temperature? Unless it's summer I'd say those temps are a little high for just regular use.

Before doing any overclocking I would suggest improving your cooling situation.

Did you just use the standard thermal material with the heatsink or did you use something like arctic silver?

Hmm, is this all a goof or what?

No you cant just push the multiplier to 15 for two reasons.

1. The Barton core processors have their multipliers locked against this

2. The resulting speed would be too high anyway and your system wont boot.

Your memory may be set at 333 (as you rightly point out 2x166 near as dammit) but if you increase your FSB then your memory speed will increase in line with it. For example if you increased your FSB to 200 (like I have) then the resulting memory frequency will be 400Mhz and your memory will not work at this speed. The instructions I posted earlier will set the memory frequency seperately to the FSB so that when you do increase the FSB the memory frequency stays fixed at the right value.

Those temperatures are way higher than they should be which makes me think that they are in fact false readings, especially the case temperature. Unless you are living in the sahara desert there is no way your case temp should be that high!!

Apart from the CPU cooler do you have any other fans in your system??