Overclocking Info

XCougar · 23 Jul 2007 at 20:43

Hi, first post for me but I have been browsing here for a couple of months.

I need some help understanding overclocking. I have read the guide and im pretty sure how to overclock but I wonder if anyone can help me understand just what is going on when overclocking. Like I know having faster RAM is needed for overclocking but how exactly does this increase cpu speed? Is this sorta like engines and gears?

I currently have a AMD Sempron 2500+, ATI Radeon 256mb 9250, just over 1gb of ddr 400/333 ram.

I plan to buy a e2140 or e2160, is there any difference between the two if I intend to overclock it anyway? I have heard that there is a e2180 coming out with a higher multiplier...? Also what sort of speed ram should i buy for this type of overclock? Im on a pretty tight budget but wanted to know what budget motherboards are good for overclocking.

Im going to be using a new system mostly for games and wanted to know how would I tell if a game supports dual core so that both cpus are utalized and not just one working and one being idle.

I was looking at the new dual cores with 1333 fsb, does anyone know what these will be capable of once overclocked?

a lot of questions, and I have tried to figure it out myself and using the forums but I would really appreciate help.

Thanks =)

Angilion · 23 Jul 2007 at 21:11

A couple of answers:

i) You don't necessarily need faster memory when overclocking your CPU, because you can set it to run at various ratios to the FSB. It will help, though, because it will give you more flexibility.

Say, for example, you have 266MHz stock Intel FSB("1066"), 266MHz stock DDR2 RAM ("DDR2-533")and memory ratios of 1:1, 5:6 and 2:3.

You o/c the FSB to 360MHz, given a CPU clock of 2.52GHz.

Your available memory speeds are 360MHz, 300MHz and 240MHz.

If your memory can't reach 300MHz, you either have to run it at 240 (2:3 ration) or reduce your FSB (and therefore your CPU speed) far enough for the 5:6 ratio to result in a speed your memory can run at. Either way, performance will be reduce.

ii) Since you're overclocking, you can't be sure if you'd get better results with a 2140 or a 2160. Variations between individual chips make it impossible to tell without buying one of each and testing them both, and even the then results are only true for those specific two chips. A 2160 would probably be a better choice with a cheaper board, as the higher multiplier will allow higher CPU speed if the limit is the FSB speed that the board is capable of.

XCougar · 24 Jul 2007 at 21:05

Thanks for info...can anyone else explain the rest? =)

paradigm · 24 Jul 2007 at 21:53

Angilion said:
ii) Since you're overclocking, you can't be sure if you'd get better results with a 2140 or a 2160. Variations between individual chips make it impossible to tell without buying one of each and testing them both, and even the then results are only true for those specific two chips. A 2160 would probably be a better choice with a cheaper board, as the higher multiplier will allow higher CPU speed if the limit is the FSB speed that the board is capable of.

Well, out of the chips I have had and had the job os setting up for mates, the E2140's have nearly always hit higher FSB's especially on the better boards.

My E2160 for instance would only hit 3.2GHz (355FSB), whereas my little E2140 will blast all the way up to 422FSB.

Buy the cheapest fastest RAM you can get, PC2-8500 is what I have coupled with my E2140, giving me some blistering RAM bandwidth (memory clocked at 607MHz at the moment!).

Just dont scrimp on the motherboard, get a P35 chipset based board, I favour the Abit IP35, but then I may be a little biased there, the gigabyte and asus offerings are also good.