OCing the 3000+ Article Discussion

Guys, here is my setup... Does everything look OK from a performance standpoint? I'm a noob at overclocking new systems, haven't been in to it since overclocking my Celeron 566 @ 953.. This is a new setup using an Asus K8V board. Are my memory timings good? I had to set it to cas 2.5 otherwise the system wouldn't boot. Thanks

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It would be great if we could see the system specs on that bad boy. I decided to make theLONG overdue upgrade to a A64 instead of an XP (currently on a 1ghzTbird), and this OC seems fantastic, especially given the performance despite the lack of dual channel.

Couple questions though,

1) I'm assuming when you say you tried both air and water cooling, the water cooling was the better performer :rolleyes: What type of OC can we expect from a decent HSF?

2) Since I'm obviously a couple hardware gens back, what is up with the memory? It needed to be rolled back to stock to get the OC that high? And it seems that people OCing the A64's are doing it with timings that could be called anything but "tight." Am I just imagining, or is the usual high OC necessity of high-end RAM not necessary this time?

I always get cold feet on the upgrades, and if a potential new system can't even run current gen stuff at high ends (Farcry, the bane of my shopping existence, seems to be slowing down 3ghz/9800pros, so D3 and HL2, who knows), so more info on this OC could help a brotha' out!
 
Most likely farcry will actually run slower than Doom3/HL2 on the same system, just lak of experience developing at that level of IQ. The only difference may be HL2 being a bit more cpu intensive in singleplayer...but primarily I expect the experience to be smoother, and less reliant on high FPS on D3/HL2 than it is on farcry.

High end ram is still the best way when OC/ing athlons, especially singlechannel systems, but the option of relaxing timings or running deviders isntead of syncronous is also always there. Its jsut that at any given clock speed if you could keep the bus and mem syncronous with tight timings you will get a decent speed boost over huge deviders or lax timings...

Peace.
 
Kyle, can you tell us the bios date with the multi locks?
I just got my setup running, but the latest bios so far, 6/16/04 (15), doesn't allow multi locks... (from what I can tell....)
Thanks...
 
I see many people on the abit forum complaining that the new bios doesnt allow multi locks. You can find the discussion here
 
Guess every1 went to the abit forum. Well from what I was reading the chipset also support 1 or 2 CPU's, but I dont know if the 754 amd's are dual capable ? If this is true then I might just wait a bit longer and see if a dual solution is possible. :p
 
Ok I've made lots of research on this overclock, but apparently not quite enough
I'm ready to get the parts, except I'm still not sure what to get...I was planning on hitting a 2.4-2.5ghz with aircooling and play play Farcry, Doom3, HL2 and really have fun with it :)
I just need you guys to please read through this and guide me on this one so that I dont buy anything I'll regret later.

Help me pick out the right CPU, Motherboard and RAM for the best overclock and tell me anything else I should note:


CPU
Of all the AMD64's I've decided to get the Athlon 64 3200+ Mobile 2Ghz (Clawhammer) since it has the better 1mb cache and overclocks like the Newcastle (from what I've heard).
1- Whats the deal with the CO and CG? I know that the CG overclocks better, how do I know if the one I'm getting is a CG? serial numbers? something?
2- I hear the Mobile Athlon 64's have compatibility issues with certain types of motherboards, what should I get with it? -->


MOTHERBOARD
I'm down to 4 choices:

Abit KV8Pro - The one they used in the review, based on the VIA K8T800pro, only VIA with a AGP\PCI lock, except that it was with the beta drivers, are the drivers out yet? Does it really withstand extreme overclocking with no hassle? coz I've read in forums that it can be a real headache.....
I hear theres also a revision 1.1 released. Does it correct the problems? Is it out yet? Where can I get it from?

EPoX EP-8KDA3+ - I hear lots of good stuff, lots of features. very overclockable, but there are two versions with different prices.
EP-8KDA3+ and EP-8KDA3J.. is the "+" version just packed with a lot of features I dont need or is it really worth buying it and payin the extra $$?

MSI K8N Neo - I hear people overclocking it with outstanding results, recommended by a comrade at the abx forums too..

Asus K8v SE Deluxe - I've always been a sucker to Asus boards for their build quality and stability.

what do you think?


RAM
Okay I didnt really learn much about what RAM to get .. only thing i know is, the lower the latency the better..? in other words im a total n00b with DDR RAM.. (last time i checked out RAM was when RDRAM was on top!)
I was planning on getting 2x 512mb's at a $180-$280 price range. Whats the best RAM to get for overclocking this sucka?


Phew, I'm done guys please help me out and reply on this one I know your knowledge can save me a lot of hassle and headache.. :D
 
If you're going to get a Mobile ClawHammer, the only feasible motherboard choice right now is the MSI K8N Neo Plat. because it's the only one that can correctly recognize it and boot it at stock voltages and speed.

CG is a newer core revision...it defaults to command rate 2T instead of 1T like C0. To identify the core revision, look at the end of the stepping.

AP = C0 revision
AR = CG ClawHammer
AX = CG Newcastle

For ram, experimenting A64 users at Xtreme Resources have found that using a divider for the memory does not hurt performance. Besides if you are going to overclock you won't be going far on 1:1 anyway, you'll need to use the 133 or 166 memory setting. You might try to look at value ram at BestBuy or Circuit City and look for chips marked as Micron mT, the chips used in OCZ EB that consistently handle tRCD of 3. You'll want 2x512MB for your gaming needs. Or if you can find some Hynix D5, which is used in A-DATA Vitesta PC4000, Simpletech Nitro PC4000, and Komusa Hyperram PC4200. That will come in handy for a high 1:1 overclock (if your CPU and motherboard can handle it).

Best of luck.
 
I just bought the ASUS K8V-SE Deluxe motherboard and a64 3000+, and some corsair pc3700 ram

should the motherboard i just purchased be able to overclock well? ie. 2.4+ghz?
a response to me would be greatly appreciated.
 
Goorbag,

the board you have doesnt have AGP/PCI locks, i would think 2.2Ghz is more in the realm for this board.

I have a similar setup my SATA hard drive is on the Via controller and corrupts if i go about about 220 HTT.

Rob
 
anybody with an athlon 3000+ and the asus k8vse-deluxe mobo tried any overclocking? it would be nice to know if this board makes a good contender despite being unable to lock the agp/pci bus speed.
 
Is there a page or post with a list of all the available A64 Motherboards right now that have unlockable AGP\PCI busses?

EDIT: and compatibility with Athlon64 Mobiles.....?
 
Prophetix said:
Is there a page or post with a list of all the available A64 Motherboards right now that have unlockable AGP\PCI busses?

EDIT: and compatibility with Athlon64 Mobiles.....?
Click to expand...
i think the Abit baord in the review is the only one, and it dosnt work yet...

And you want to lock the PCI/agp bus BTW... there all unlovked right now...
 
the beta bios drivers are already out there, I saw them posted at the abit-usa.com forum many people over there are using them. But they are reported buggy so better stay away from them and wait for an official release though nobody exactly knows whether there is going to be another bios release that unlocks the locks for the kv8 v1.0 boards.

We all better hope for the best :p
 
its in the article:
Lastly, cooling has to be taken into consideration. Certainly when running voltages this high over the spec 1.5v, you want to make sure you are dumping as much heat as possible off your CPU. We used both water and air cooling. A stock Koolance Exos system was used as well as an Akasa Silver Mountain HSF from Plycon along with a high CFM fan. Keep in mind that mounting our heatsink was not stock, but we wanted to show you that "left over" AthlonXP cooling was plenty sufficient for what we were doing. Quite frankly, I think we could have used a lot less cooling and still be just fine with our OC, but I did not want to burn up our setup in the middle of testing. Better safe than sorry.
Click to expand...
 
Whats the best air cooler I can get for (or less than) $50 for overclocking a 3200+ Clawhammer?
 
Ok I checked out the fans and umm I got candidates so far:

Alpha PAL8150
Thermalright SLK-948U
Zalman CNPS7000A-ALCU Ultra Quiet CPU Cooler

Help me pick out the right one, one thats really cool, at the same time quiet and has a fast, extremely fast RPM..
 
The Zalman is quiet when turned down a little, and a little noisy flat out.

But i dont think u will find a quiet HSF at High rpm.

Maybe try getting an ultra silent fan and putting it on a thermalright would serve your needs.

Rob
 
I had a Zalman CNPS7000A-AlCu for 6 months...I had it on full speed 24/7 and it was dead silent. There is no way you will be able to hear it over your case fans. The included fan controller is useless, you don't need to turn it down. The Zalman will match a Thermalright heatsink with a quiet fan. For max oc'ing, just go with a Thermalright and a more noisy high RPM fan. The Alpha is based off the old school Socket A version. It cools pretty well but needs a fairly noisy fan to do so. It would make a good video card cooler though.
 
I have mine on full speed. I can barely hear it. I also have 2x120 case fans on 7 volts. This system is almost as quiet as my watercooled system.
 
Guess my system is just a damn lot quieter than yours then !

I had speed fan throttle it down to 50% when it was running cool, and it was still the loudest fan in my system, the other Vantec Stealths were only running at 1100rpm.

I could hardly hear both my computers running in the room when they are on so maybe that is why, i really mean SILENCE!

But yes it is quieter than any other HSF i had before.

Rob
 
I think Thermalright is the way to go, with a good fast fan.. It cools real well I hear and looks like an anvil, gotta love that :D
 
SO,
Whats the best 92mm fan that fits with the Thermalright Heatsink SLK948U (in terms of price\rpm\db's)..?
Not only that, but I'm seein people all over the place using Arctic Silver Thermal compound. Does it really make that world of difference than the compound included with the Thermalright? :confused:
 
I bought a KV8 Pro and an AMD 64 3000+ (newcastle) recently, just like the setup in the article. I downloaded the most recent BIOS from Abit-USA, which has been out since 06/02/2004, and the FIXED AGP/PCI option is available and is working perfectly. I am really confused as too why people are still saying the BIOS isn't out yet. As far as I can tell it had been out for almost 2 weeks when Kyle did the article!

Anyway, I just have the afformentioned MB, a 1GB stick of some basically generic PC3200 RAM in my system, and the CPU with stock cooling. (I am getting a better aircooling system shortly from frozenCPU). I have no other special cooling in the system, just a pretty standard setup with 3 total intake fans and 3 outtakes as well (counting the powersupply).

Anyway, once I got the board setup and everything installed I locked the AGP/PCI settings and then had no problems running with default RAM settings at an FSB of 220. This gave me a 2200mhz CPU and 440mhz RAM. I ran Prime95 for about an hour without problems at this setting, so my RAM can take a lot more OC'ing than I expected it would.

I didn't try going higher with the RAM since I figured that 220/440 would be enough no matter what I did, so I dropped it to a base of 333 and then ramped my FSB up to 240. I only raised my CPU voltage to 1.625 to do this. I probably could have stayed at 1.6, but I figured I may as well up it a little just in case. I also lowered my RAM CAS latency to 2.5 (from 3), and lowered all the other RAM settings by 1 step each as well (can't recall the final numbers).

I ran Prime95 without errors for about 6 hours at this setting, and have since ran EQ for 3 days straight without turning the system off without a hint of a glitch (I have TONS of Acrylia I am trying to unload so I spend a lot of time in the Bazaar).

I have not yet tried higher settings, I am waiting for my new cooling setup to arrive. I figure there is no point in pushing things until I have my final cooling system in place.

The best part of a setup like this is that you can set the system up with uGuru to OC only when gaming or doing other more CPU dependent stuff. So you can underclock for web browsing and Overclock for everything fun, and do it all automatically. You have to love that! Also with the KV8 PRO and other new Abit boards you can use 3rd eye. (http://www.abit-usa.com/news/2004/20040708.php) Making it a simple press of a button to switch CPU speeds. You don't even have to take the time to chose which programs to setup for OC'ing, and you don't have to leave your game to OC either!

So anyway, currently with STOCK cooling I am running a 400mhz OC on the CPU without breaking a sweat, the board isn't even beginning to cringe at the 40mhz FSB OC, and my relatively generic RAM doesn't complain a bit about being OC'ed as much as 40mhz.

This is one Awesome Motherboard/CPU combo!
 
Prophetix said:
SO,
Whats the best 92mm fan that fits with the Thermalright Heatsink SLK948U (in terms of price\rpm\db's)..?
Not only that, but I'm seein people all over the place using Arctic Silver Thermal compound. Does it really make that world of difference than the compound included with the Thermalright? :confused:
Click to expand...

lol there are tons of these kind of threads. and yes lol artic silver 5 completely owns any other TIM...the generic stuff sucks. use ceramique for sub-ambient temps.
 
I have the KV8 Pro with working locks, but the newest BIOS (15) breaks the multipliers and locks.
 
arentol said:
I am really confused as too why people are still saying the BIOS isn't out yet. As far as I can tell it had been out for almost 2 weeks when Kyle did the article!
Click to expand...

You are fortunate to have a version 1.1 board. I ordered three on 6/25 from Newegg and all of them are ver1.0. From what I've read, ver1.0 and beta BIOS 1.5 will work but the new release version BIOS 1.5 removes the AGP/PCI lock for all ver1.0's.

I just learned of this today after happening by Abit and noticing they had a forum. Surprised and disappointed I am to say the least. I haven't checked this out for myself on my boards but from others experiences, I don't have functional boards for what I bought them for :(
 
ok i believe this was asked but never answered:

what's the diff between the board on the topic (kv8 pro) and the ABIT KV8 MAX3 K8T800??

seems the same (k8t800 etc...) just with the crazy cooling thing sata and that jazz...

does it have the option for locks ?

tks!
 
Double Jesus said:
ok i believe this was asked but never answered:

what's the diff between the board on the topic (kv8 pro) and the ABIT KV8 MAX3 K8T800??

seems the same (k8t800 etc...) just with the crazy cooling thing sata and that jazz...

does it have the option for locks ?

tks!
Click to expand...
The kV8 MAX 3 uses the KVt800 chipset, with no PCI locks, the KV8pro uses the KVT800pro chipset with PCI locks....that is the major diffrence, the rest if just features i think..

The KV8T800 and the KV8T800pro are not the same chipsets...
 
Kyle, if your still reading this tread... what version was the board you reviewed... 1.0 or 1.1?
 
I just updated the two boards I have in operation (one still in box) to the new v1.5 BIOS and POOF, there goes the AGP/PCI lock just like others were experiencing. Looks like I'll be giving Newegg AND Abit some calls on Monday. What has me wondering is that Newegg had listed that all support will be through Abit, not them, when I purchased them *sigh* I hope I don't end up taking it in the shorts on this.

Just FYI, these boards were ordered on 6/25. Maybe I should have waited just a little bit longer...
 
With a A64 3000+ oc'd to 2.4 ghz or higher, would an x800 xt bottleneck? I definately want an x800 xt but in that case, I'd be on a budget for a cpu; OC'ing the A64 3000+ seemed very attractive to me. Will this overclock prove to be nice for ultimate gaming?
 
I'm running a rig quite similar to that and I can verify that it is indeed a very good gaming setup. That x800 xt would only sweeten the deal. :)
 
With the beta 15 bios, if your 1.0 version of the Kv8 Pro does not support AGP/PCI lock are you SOL? Or do the bios still work?

Also does any one have a link the the beta 15 bios

Thank you in advance
 
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