Yea I want to hear some OverClock stats too. For any other geeks out there who care...
I dropped out of folding for a day while I tried my hand at overclocking for the first time. Spent half the day at ExtremeOverclockers forums learning about it. Then another half day trouble shooting. Turns out my Albatron 865PE ProII MB has a bug (confirmed while googling the topic) that prevents you from Overclocking while using SATA drives (I have 2 SATA, 2 IDE). The BIOS’s AGP//PCI/SRC frequency lock does not work correctly. Grrr...! The rig would hanging at POST screen when I went over FSB of 202Mhz. I had to rearrange my 4 drives which included moving my c: (XP home) from the SATA to one of the IDE’s. Thanks to Norton Ghost, that was not a big deal. So when overclocking, I can’t use my SATA drives…have to unplug them or it hangs at POST screen even with the XP system on the IDE drive. Have to save up for a new MB!
Since it’s my first try, I am overclocking the 3.0Ghz at a conservative 3.495Ghz. Just enough to fully utilize my DDR466 Corsair 1Gig ram. I’ll let it run like this for a week before seeing how close I can get to 4Ghz! Doubt I can get there with my current fan since I already run at at 58-deg with the below settings.
- CPU is an old P4 Northwood 3.0C. (3.0Ghz).
- FSB=233Mhz. 33Mhz over default 200Mhz FSB. That's 233Mhz*2=466 to utilize the DDR466 PC3700 RAM.
- Memory timing at 3-4-4-8 (don’t fully understand this part, but that's what the mem specs say it can do and many at the forums run this setting)
- Bumped vcore voltage up 1 notch from default (I think it is 1.52??)
- Per a freeware utility (SpeedFan), CPU seems stay at 58-deg while folding. The unloaded CPU temp is 46-47. - Aftermarket CPU Sync/Fan is a Zalman NPS7000B
I stopped the fold that was running before overclocking. It was taking about 20min/frame. This should be a big point Fold, as most only take 3-6min/frame. Anyway, after Overclocking to 3.4+Ghz, that same fold is taking 13min/frame..woohoo! I learned a lot yesterday thanks to this Folding project. I probably would not have messed with overclocking if not for this project and my new found need for speed.
Sweeeeeeeet. 7min a frame savings! WU-hooooo
Have to save up for a new MB!
Word up!
Spent half the day at ExtremeOverclockers forums learning about it.
Yeah, when I need a serious geek fix, Extremoverclockers is perfect. Then I'm over to Anandtech costing everything out. However, I've got a serious case of the lazies right now. To start my next rig, I need Linux and well, the geek skills...they be rusty.
Thanks for the inspiration!!!