Upgrading E7300 on P5QL PRO for virtualization

[brancusi]

Hiya

I have what used to be a "Titan Spirit GT" based system from overclockers which is based on the Asus P5QL PRO motherboard (running BIOS 0502) with an Intel Core Duo E7300 at 2.66GHz.

I now require hardware virtualization and have discovered this processor doesn't support it but that the E7400 and beyond do.

I can see from the Asus site that they support this processor with a BIOS upgrade, so my question is, is it just as simple as buying a new processor and plugging it in after I've upgraded the BIOS?

What about things like FSB speed - the current system runs at 800Mhz but the E7400 seems to like 1066Mhz -- does the BIOS just sort all this out on boot or is the job actually more complex than I'm imagining.

Overclockers seem to have the E7500 in stock - would that work OK too?

Advice appreciated

Roger
London

 

[RJC]

Looking here the E7500 does not have VT, You need the E8XXX or some E6XXX range.

 

[brancusi]

But according to this bit of intel the E7500 does ...

http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=36503

But it seems the AT80571PH0773ML does whereas the AT80571PH0773M does not. No idea why! Actually the one on sale at overclockers, BX80571E7500 does too according to this sheet.

 

[RJC]

They don't make it easy

In that case ignore what I said above.

In regards to the BIOS update - Just update the BIOS, insert new cpu, reset CMOS and then boot, check the BIOS that all details are correct, your all set to go

 

[brancusi]

Thanks! That sounds do-able OK ... I'll see if funds will stretch to a new processor for my birthday!