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Overclocking
MURC is full of warm, fuzzy, feel-good people who have helped me through many problems so I will stick my neck out against the Intel police and reveal my experiences to all of you considering overclocking.
The following advice is but a tiny aspect of overclocking but it is guaranteed to work and if followed strictly, also guaranteed to do no damage as it conforms to all the important rules as if you were not overclocking at all.
Stuff you MUST have:
A P III 450.
A BX motherboard with available clock timings running a few settings more than 133mhz and adjustable voltage settings(preferably a famous name board made in the last 6 months or so).
PC 133 RAM.
An ALPHA P III cooler.
Two or three extra fans in your case.
A decent quality graphics card (not image quality but assembly and components-Matrox cards are the best here for handling increased AGP bus speeds).
Even if you buy a new motherboard, P III 450, 128M PC 133 RAM, and ALPHA cooler, this should cost you less than two thirds of just a new P III 600 chip.
Put all the stuff together, set your BIOS to 4.5 x 133, 2.2V and enjoy performance about 10% better than a standard P III 600 system, subjectively maybe what a P III 700 would achieve.
Everything except the video card will be running at standard specs (the BX chipset is rated at 100mhz but is fine on modern quality boards at 133) and on my system the CPU temperature is about three degrees cooler than the standard CPU/heatsink at 450 mhz!. I have an Asus P3Bf that is the only board I am aware of with a BIOS utilising a CPU on-core heat sensing micro diode put there by Intel on all their chips from the Celeron PPGA and P III onwards for super accurate core temperature measurement.
If you have a non-Matrox video card, it might stumble,(RIVA TNT 2's are notorious), but some real cheapies are actually fine.
If you have none of the above equipment, an alternative is to wait until a P III 600 becomes cheap anyway, but a bit of maths can work out for yourself how much bang for your buck you want now.
The P III 450 is preferred as anything higher, ie a P III 500 at 5 x 133, is very unlikely to succeed. Doing it my way, you stay at standard bus speeds for your hard drives etc, etc. Also, your temperature is under control which is the main problem with overclocking. My overclocked CPU will probably therefore last longer than a standard one would have. A Tennmax cooler will PROBABLY be OK and is cheaper, but the ALPHA is awesome. Different motherboards will give different results, some might need 2.1V and others 2.3V, and I think there is an Abit that has an AGP divider ratio that will even keep your video card at a standard bus speed even at 133mhz (half versus two thirds of 133 mhz).
If you have some experience in building computers or want to start now, and want to save some dollars and achieve personal satisfaction as well, I heartily recommend overclocking but do not say I didn't warn you to follow the rules when something goes wrong and Intel/ + others will not honour their warranties.
Get that P III 450 whilst still available!!!
The following advice is but a tiny aspect of overclocking but it is guaranteed to work and if followed strictly, also guaranteed to do no damage as it conforms to all the important rules as if you were not overclocking at all.
Stuff you MUST have:
A P III 450.
A BX motherboard with available clock timings running a few settings more than 133mhz and adjustable voltage settings(preferably a famous name board made in the last 6 months or so).
PC 133 RAM.
An ALPHA P III cooler.
Two or three extra fans in your case.
A decent quality graphics card (not image quality but assembly and components-Matrox cards are the best here for handling increased AGP bus speeds).
Even if you buy a new motherboard, P III 450, 128M PC 133 RAM, and ALPHA cooler, this should cost you less than two thirds of just a new P III 600 chip.
Put all the stuff together, set your BIOS to 4.5 x 133, 2.2V and enjoy performance about 10% better than a standard P III 600 system, subjectively maybe what a P III 700 would achieve.
Everything except the video card will be running at standard specs (the BX chipset is rated at 100mhz but is fine on modern quality boards at 133) and on my system the CPU temperature is about three degrees cooler than the standard CPU/heatsink at 450 mhz!. I have an Asus P3Bf that is the only board I am aware of with a BIOS utilising a CPU on-core heat sensing micro diode put there by Intel on all their chips from the Celeron PPGA and P III onwards for super accurate core temperature measurement.
If you have a non-Matrox video card, it might stumble,(RIVA TNT 2's are notorious), but some real cheapies are actually fine.
If you have none of the above equipment, an alternative is to wait until a P III 600 becomes cheap anyway, but a bit of maths can work out for yourself how much bang for your buck you want now.
The P III 450 is preferred as anything higher, ie a P III 500 at 5 x 133, is very unlikely to succeed. Doing it my way, you stay at standard bus speeds for your hard drives etc, etc. Also, your temperature is under control which is the main problem with overclocking. My overclocked CPU will probably therefore last longer than a standard one would have. A Tennmax cooler will PROBABLY be OK and is cheaper, but the ALPHA is awesome. Different motherboards will give different results, some might need 2.1V and others 2.3V, and I think there is an Abit that has an AGP divider ratio that will even keep your video card at a standard bus speed even at 133mhz (half versus two thirds of 133 mhz).
If you have some experience in building computers or want to start now, and want to save some dollars and achieve personal satisfaction as well, I heartily recommend overclocking but do not say I didn't warn you to follow the rules when something goes wrong and Intel/ + others will not honour their warranties.
Get that P III 450 whilst still available!!!
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