Ancient X2 setup > Core2 setup questions

Dutch Guy · 15 Jan 2008 at 11:49

With the current low prices and the fact I found a possible buyer for my system I have been thinking about finally going to a Core2 system (I know

) but I have a few questions.

This is what I came up with:
CPU: Core2 Duo E6550
Mobo: Intel P35 chipset (Abit IP35) or Nforce650 (Asus P5N-E SLI)
Memory: OCZ 2GB DDR2-800 Kit 4-4-4-15

- I will be overclocking using watercooling and my aim is 3Ghz – 3.4Ghz, will the components be able to do that or will I need a different mobo and/or faster memory like DDR2-1066?
- Will I get a lot of trouble getting the mobo to run at 450Mhz or should I get a CPU with a lower FSB like 800Mhz or 1066Mhz to get a higher multiplier? (I think 450Mhz is needed with a 7x multiplier)
- I will be using 32bit XP and Vista, is there a good reason to get 4GB of memory or will that just be wasted?

Dutch Guy · 15 Jan 2008 at 13:12

I know that the upcoming 8x00 CPU's will be faster but as I don't use the computer that often it has to be sort of a budget solution so I guess that those are too expensive.

I thought about a E2200 but they have a lot less cache (2x512MB vs 2x 2048KB) and I think that does make quite a difference, or not?

Dutch Guy · 15 Jan 2008 at 13:14

semi-pro waster said:
4gb Ram would still give you about 3.5gb in XP (depending on the amount of Ram you have on your GPU)

Why does the GPU memory have an effect?

Dutch Guy · 16 Jan 2008 at 08:58

Thanks for the comparison links, unfortunately IMO the difference is big enough to possibly make the extra cache worth it.

Dutch Guy · 16 Jan 2008 at 10:27

Am I right in thinking that the memory can never be the bottleneck when overclocking thanks to the dividers on the mobo?

Default is 2:3 but if the FSB is too high you can run at 1:1 and if that is too high you can run at 5:4, or do the dividers often give problems?

Dutch Guy · 16 Jan 2008 at 11:51

melbourne720 said:
The FSB is limited by the speed of the memory on Intel boards (Nvidia board don't have this issue). e.g. my rig, I have PC6400 RAM, with a stock speed of 400MHz (800MHz DDR2). With the RAM running at 1:1 against the FSB, i.e. the same speed as the FSB, my CPU can go up 400 x 9 = 3.6GHz. If I want to raise my FSB faster than that, I will have overclock my RAM.

So yes, memory can bottleneck the FSB because the memory cannot run slower than the FSB on intel boards.

So the much safer option is to get a CPU with a multiplier like 9x, 10x or 11x so that the FSB when overclocking will be well below 400Mhz?

The other option is to get PC8500 memory but that is much more expensive.