Wow. amazing result you had there. I remember unlocking my old ATI GPU from 8 pipes to 16 a few years ago, so I guess the same applies. Luck + BIOS + volts. Not sure I could recommend it for builds for friends unless the success rate was quite high. Sounds like it would be a lot of tweaking and hassle testing. They were binned as x2's for a reason after all.
Get yourself a cup of bang for buck !
- Thread starter PhoenixUK
- Start date
I'd agree, but I'd be more interested in apps work day to day uses which is where the I5 would shine more. Still...good stuff for the price indeed.
What AMD seems to be doing recently is that they just grab a 965/955 and lock 2 cores to make 550/555 to meet the market demand when they can't keep up with it - so not always the reason is because they're faulty : ).
Looks like they've been in a rush with the 555 release as I've yet to find one that doesn't unlock.
And regarding the i5, hard to say shine more, I think the best it gets is around 10-15% diff in only few ocassions which again I don't think you'll be able to tell without benchmark.
Anyways, brb, get ready for next push on clock ! : )
Managed to squeeze one more FSB for extra HT/NB @ 1.47.
I need to work out why my mobo is undervolting and vdroping so much tho, I can set 1.55 in BIOS but it will work out as 1.48 and sometimes drop to 1.42-1.44 under load which isn't good for stability :/.
Anyways, a screenie here with 20 runs of IBT / 4.5hr prime blend finished:
2782 HT/NB
1712mhz RAM
3745mhz clock
Could push one multi higher for 3.95ghz but it crashes when temps hit 50-52c (again temps limiting me here with cheap cooling + poor airflow).
Either way, maximum HT/NB gives better boost than maximum clock so I think I'll stick with this keeping this nice & cool for 24/7 use.
Might upload some benchs later when I get more time.
I need to work out why my mobo is undervolting and vdroping so much tho, I can set 1.55 in BIOS but it will work out as 1.48 and sometimes drop to 1.42-1.44 under load which isn't good for stability :/.
Anyways, a screenie here with 20 runs of IBT / 4.5hr prime blend finished:
2782 HT/NB
1712mhz RAM
3745mhz clock
Could push one multi higher for 3.95ghz but it crashes when temps hit 50-52c (again temps limiting me here with cheap cooling + poor airflow).
Either way, maximum HT/NB gives better boost than maximum clock so I think I'll stick with this keeping this nice & cool for 24/7 use.
Might upload some benchs later when I get more time.
How old as in?
If you mean the release date, they came out just around 2-3 weeks ago.
It's the upgrade version of the old 550 with 100mhz clock bump and on the new c3 silicon that's been used for 965BE so it's bit better for OC.
I'm not using stock cooler, I run it on the Zalman 9700 that I picked up off ocUK from the deal for 17.99 last week.
http://overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-026-ZA
Grab one fast if you still can, those were going for 40quid not long ago.
Not as good as the newest stuff out there but it's not far behind.
And it also looks from my little research that all the first batches unlock successfuly as I haven't found a single person or review yet in which they didn't unlock so probably AMD just rushed for release due to i3 coming out so they just took a bunch of 965BE's and disabled 2 cores and lowered multi.
Even when not unlocked, this chip is still amazing as they seem to do ¬4ghz mark quite easily as a dual.
I'm sure I could get 3.9-4 quad stable with bit better cooling and if my mobo didn't have such a terrible vdrop (setting 1.525 in BIOS results in 1.47 and under load drops to 1.45-1.42 -_ - , will have to check on that ).
From my testing it looks like I can get any clock up to 4 - 4.2 stable as long as temps are under 50c (which obviously doesn't happen with my cooling, but hey, for this price I can't complain).
So instead of high clocks I aimed for maximum ht/nb which gives me similar performance, 3.7 with high HT is better than 4.0 with 2000ht.