I've currently got an asus A7V8X-X and a 2800 barton, (old but sorts me out) I can understand that this is a equivilant of 2.8 pentium.. and have done some digging around with regards to overclocking.. I've read that the original 2800 ran at 2.25Ghz but the barton (mine incl) runs at 2.083.. and the barton is locked.. why is this? and could i overclock it to sommit higher easily? or will it start to roast?
Original 2800 had 256k L2 cache, Barton has 512k. Either that or the original ran at 266fsb and your barton runs at 333. One, the other, or a combination of both means the lower clock speed is off-set by the increase in performance using a different combination of other stuff.
Normal speed for an XP2800 @333MHz is 2080MHz (2800+ 12.5 X 166 2080MHz) If your chip is older than week 39 of year 2003 then the multiplier is unlocked and you can change that along with the FSB. If it is a chip newer than week 39 of year 2003 then the multiplier will be superlocked leaving you with FSB alterations as the only overclocking option, which is not that bad tbh if your cooling is up to the task. ie 12.5 x200 - 2500MHz, this is a speed most Bartons are capable of as long as they get enough voltage and cooling.
AFAIK its cache only, the fastest 266 chip was the 2600. Dont recall any 2800's based on the t/bred core though, thought the fastest was the 2700... As for the speed rating, its based on the Athlon thunderbird rather than the Intel cpu's. It just so happens however that the Intel and thunderbird parts are similar clock for clock. AMD appear to have wondered off the naming scheme slightly though, the 3200 on 754 for example is faster than a 3200 on Socket A. As for overclocking, as long as your temps are good (under ~55) then you can increase voltages and clock speeds as you wish. Just increase the FSB in 5mhz jumps and se how far you can push it. Might well be able to reach 190-200 fsb happily on stock (ish) volts
That motherboard isn't well known as an overclockers board. No PCI/AGP lock or Vdimm adjustments if I remember correctly. But these might not bother you as you aren't going for any speed records or anything You could pick up a 2nd hand NF7-S v2 for really cheap now, which would be much more friendly for someone looking to get into overclocking. Just my opinion
oh ok.. odd that although its faster its slower (comprede?) Its currently running at 47 degrees with a Thermalright cooler and panaflo 80mm fan... thats after playing HL2 or running 3dmk03 (dont know if thats considered loaded or not) How do i find out the age of the chip to see if its old or new? Im gonna tinker with the FSB settings tonight and see how high i can get it.. will this damage the chip at all? Ill watch the temps to see they hit 60 or higher (i know the mobo has a switch off at 70 degrees, although i dont know how reliable the temp readings are)
The simple way to find out if it's locked or not, is to change the multiplier in the BIOS and then BOOT into windows and check using CPU-Z (CPU-Z is a small program that will give FSB, Multiplier readings etc) Other than that you would need to remove the heatsink and read the number on the black sticker on the CPU. As far as damage, the system will close dowwn before any damage is done, the most you will likely come up against is reseting the BIOS if you can't reboot. AMD processors are able to survive over 90°c.
Just a word of warning, i wouldnt mess with the FSB speeds on that motherboard too much, afaik it doesnt have PCI or AGP locksa, which means that an increase in FSb will also overclock the graphics card and any PCI cards in your system I found this in a board review: "Even if you are able to hit this high of a FSB for your processor, the PCI bus will be effected since there is no way to lock the AGP/PCI clocks. This is sure to disappoint more than a few people out there." So just take it easy and check that you arent frying your other cards!
