What should I do?

A

AmF_15

n00b
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Jan 27, 2006
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I want a faster computer, (as does everyone else) "but" I'm in a bind, I just bought this computer a while back ago, say 6 months ago. I didn't know much about computers so I just went with what was a decent price. Anyways I know a little more about computers and some tiny overclocking tips, all I'm wondering is what should I upgrade or overclock to. If I overclock I need to know what is the best cooling device I should get in this situation. Thank You

COMP SPECs

X-Navigator ATX Case w/500 watt Power Supply Pic of Case
OP: Windows XP Home
CPU: Amd Athlon 64 3000+ 939 Socket
Mem: Kingson Hyper X DDR Pc3200 (256x2)(512x2)
MB: K8N Neo2 / Nvidia nForce 3 Ultra Platinum Edition
VGA: PNY Geforce 6600GT 128mb AGP
SC: Sound Blaster Audigy 2 ZS gamer

PS. I mostly play video games such as BF2 and Nascar 2003
 
I'm guessing that your motherboard only has an agp port?... I'd swap the video card out for a 6800gt or maybe one of those 7800gs cards. You'll be suprised how much faster they are than the 6600.
 
I'm very interested in updating my video card to a PCI-E as everything aftermark such as cooling mostly support only PCI-E anyways. BTW my main does have PCI slots i belive 4
Pic of Mother Board
 
Well u could just sell the mobo and vid card on ebay maybe, then get a cheap board like the Abit KN8-SLI and a new vid card - what model u get will as usual depend on how much cash you've got to spend - and your set.
 
I agree with the above post.

Definitely swap out the motherboard to an inexpensive SLI board (ABIT or Gigabyte are pretty inexpensive) and (depending on cash) get a new vid card. If possible, I would get at least a 7800gt. In the future, you can get another 7800gt and add 25-50 percent performance boost - depending on the game.

I really wouldn't stay with AGP at this time or put any money into a new AGP card. It is tech that has reached then end of its useful (for gamers) lifespan.

Good Luck!
 
Thanks for the help, well motherboards arnt that expensive might as well buy one that is worth it. I like MSI, but what is the top board right now for gaming and such.
 
Uh, I highly suggest you invest some money into a decent power supply before anything else. After that, I would go one of two paths depending on how much you can spend.

Budget: ASRock board, PCI-E card when you get some more cash, then finally some decent 2x1GB, like G.Skill.

Rolling in Cash: DFI board, 7800GTX, 2x1GB OCZ or Mushkin.

Is that 3000+ a Venice?
 
Nope I found out its the Winchester 3000+, about power supply this one I have is pretty darn nice.
 
My 3000+ winchester is running at 2520MHz, a 720MHz overclock. See what you can get out of that chip before just spending $$$ to replace it.
 
Well someone needs to walk me threw on how to overclock that bad boy, I have a cooling device on the way from new egg. Thermaltake CL-P0200 Silent 938 pic of cooler
 
Well someone needs to walk me threw on how to overclock that bad boy, I have a cooling device on the way from new egg.
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Well i am not going to say i am the world expert on OC'n, however once you've got the new mobo (and i still think the KN8-SLI is a bargain - and becuase its an Abit, it's good for OC'n), just begin by entering the Bios, usually select Standard CMOS options and u should see FSB Freqs: 200MHz,
LDT/ FSB ratio (HyperTransport Ratio): Auto - Most likely x5,
LDT/ FSB bandwith (HyperTransport Bandwith): 16/16,
CPU/ FSB ratios: Auto -Most likely x9, so try setting the LDT ratio to 3x or 4x and set the HTT/FSB freqs to 250MHz, which should give u a core of 2.25GHz, if u want u could also try raising the Vcore & LDT voltage by 0.5v as well.
 
Logan321 said:
My 3000+ winchester is running at 2520MHz, a 720MHz overclock. See what you can get out of that chip before just spending $$$ to replace it.
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werd mine hits 2.6ghz :cool:
 
Yeah... you are .05V higher than I'm running. My Zalman v7000 can't really deal with any more heat. I'd probably have to upgrade it to get any more out of this chip... and it's not really worth it. I'll just wait til I get an X2 and pci-express board.
 
Just to add to my comments before - If your looking to achieve a higher clock then, change the LDT ratio to x3, and try bringing the HTT/FSB freqs from 260-290 and raise Vcore another 0.5V, which should bring total vcore to about 1.53 (u can try a bit higher if unstable).

So if u get it to 290MHz @ 1.53 u can expect a core of 2.61GHz, just remember to keep the case well ventilated.

Edit:- Also its good to remember that because u have a winnie core it runs alot cooler @ 67w, compared to the newcastle which is 89w.
 
Logan321 said:
Yeah... you are .05V higher than I'm running. My Zalman v7000 can't really deal with any more heat. I'd probably have to upgrade it to get any more out of this chip... and it's not really worth it. I'll just wait til I get an X2 and pci-express board.
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are you serious? im at 2.6ghz on the stock heatsink since im too lazy to mount my hyper 6+ and im gettin another mobo soon
 
AmF_15 said:
I belive this is my powersupply. Ultra X Connect,I think it looks killer. Pic of PS
Click to expand...
ultra power supplies are absolute shit, even if they look nice. their failure rate is high and their voltages are poorly regulated. they are actually on the list of powersupplies to be avoided, over in the PSU forum.

i'm running the same motherboard, and mine was able to hit 300 MHz FSB. i think that you should get what you can out of your current gear. there are plenty of guides describing how to OC. it's time consuming to do it right.

so far as i'm concerned, the only problem with AGP is that it's being phased out. if you can't realistically afford SLI, then PCI-E doesn't bring anything to the table other than being the standard that companies are moving to.

if you are in a position to get a new and high end video card, then by all means get a new powersupply so you don't kill the card and a new motherboard as well. otherwise, don't feel bad about keeping your current rig mostly as-is, just adding an OC to the proc and RAM.
 
Cool, didnt know that, thats pretty much why I'm here asking for help. Powersupply and motherboard I can get at this time but graphic card might have to save up, my ol lady would flip out if I spent another grand for upgrades. As of now I lowered my LTD ratio at 4x and my FSB at 220, I also put the multi set to 9x it was default "startup" I think I want to wait for my Thermaltake CL-P0200 Silent 938 befor I push it further.
 
Another Question please if you dont mind, What kinda effects can a weak power supply cause while trying to overclock your cpu?

Ohh and another thing I put my cooler on today, runs great and very effective under loads, but for some reason I cant overclock over 230 FSB if I go more it wont load windows, maybe bad mobo.
 
DFI Daishi said:
ultra power supplies are absolute shit, even if they look nice. their failure rate is high and their voltages are poorly regulated. they are actually on the list of powersupplies to be avoided, over in the PSU forum.
Click to expand...

From what I've read (including posts from a PSU reviewer in the power supply forum) it was only the original series of x-connect power supplies that had problems with regulation and failures, and only certain batches.

My Ultra X-Connect is one of the original ones before they put windows in 'em and it keeps my system stable at a 720MHz overclock.

The only voltage line that's a bit off is the 3.3V one, which is at 3.1V, a whole 6% out of spec at full load. Seeing as voltage tolerances are supposed to be within 5%, it's not that far out of whack... this supply was assembled before dual core or SLI was on the market.
 
demografik said:
What's "pretty darn nice" about a generic power supply?
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LMFAO beat me to it :D
I had one of those ultras... I put it in a friends machine and got me a real PS. The Turbo Cool 510 showed me just how weak that Ultra really was. There are plenty o good PS out these days though.
 
Logan321 said:
The only voltage line that's a bit off is the 3.3V one, which is at 3.1V, a whole 6% out of spec at full load. Seeing as voltage tolerances are supposed to be within 5%, it's not that far out of whack... this supply was assembled before dual core or SLI was on the market.
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dude.....the fact that it is out past the rated regulation at all speaks poorly for the quality of those units. the enermax and antec units that i use are rated for 5% and 3% tollerancing on the 3.3 rail, respectively, and both actually stay within 3%, even under load. that's using a volt meter to probe the ATX pinblock, not software numbers fudged 20 different ways before you get to read them.

also keep in mind that if you have a 500 watt or greater ultra, it's getting 6% out even when it's only seeing maybe 400 watts of sustained strain when it's under load. i could see being okay with 6% regulation if you actually pump up the draw to it's rated max, and it flickers just over, but it's not regulating as well as it is supposed to even at only 80% of it's rated maximum load. it'd be out even more if you pushed it harder.

i don't like tom's hardware reviews for a number of reasons. one of those reasons is that they still gave an ultra supply that they reviewed an "okay" rating when it dipped down to something like 2.9 volts under load. not all reviews are created equal, and having not read reviews by the individual who you are referring to, i don't know how seriously to take their commentary.
 
AmF_15 said:
Another Question please if you dont mind, What kinda effects can a weak power supply cause while trying to overclock your cpu?
Click to expand...
the most common effect is to make your system unstable when under load for long periods of time.

quick story: a guy that i hardly know from school was asking why anyone would buy a super-expensive power supply like an enermax. i don't regard enermax supplies as "expensive" but whatever, he did. he was picking up a pile of new stuff to replace his old, outdated, P3 setup. he had already found a good deal on a 6800 card, and he got a DFI board, and he got a sempron and some value ram as well. he was complaining about how expensive powersupplies are these days. he expected me to agree with him that expensive PSUs are a waste, since i'm running a cheap CPU overclocked to hell rather than a more expensive proc.

well, i disagreed with him and told him to save up and get a real PSU. he ignored my advice and picked up an ahainx supply, the particular unit looking kind of like a spoof of an antec neo. he said that because they looked the same, they really were made at the same facility in china and that his cheap supply was such a bargain because it was perfectly good.

he then put everything together and started overclocking the system as much as he could. he didn't worry too much about stability as long as he could play his games for an hour or so at a time. several weeks passed and he asked me to help troubleshoot his system. as soon as i walked into the room, i smelled burned electronics. he's a smoker, so i guess that he didn't notice it. power the system: screen shows nothing but plaid. strip the case, take the cooler off of the VGA card: scorch marks where some of the traces around the Vreg should have been. i pointed them out, told him his $20CDN PSU had killed his several hundred dollar vid card, and that's about all there was to it. there's a bit more to the story, but that's the end of the relevent part.

ahainx is even worse than ultra, but having read stories about what a bad PSU can do, online and having heard a friend of a friend story, i have always insisted on a good, name-brand PSU for any computer that i build. having recently seen that card, i feel justified in my position.

i'd have a PCP&C supply if i could afford one. they are the best. i'm not a total snob, there are plenty of other GOOD supplies out there, and i think that i'm using one of them. i just admit that it's not the BEST.
 
AmF_15 said:
Ohh and another thing I put my cooler on today, runs great and very effective under loads, but for some reason I cant overclock over 230 FSB if I go more it wont load windows, maybe bad mobo.
Click to expand...


What is current Vcore? what r the memory settings (also check under DRAM config the "DRAM Freqs set (MHz):" it should say 200 (DRAM/FSB: 1/01) - what this means is it(the RAM) is set to a operate at the same speed (1:1 ratio) as your FSB (u can change this to 5:6 or even 1:2 when OC'n much higher say to 300 FSB) , now if u want to figure out whether it could be the ram not handling the increased speed do the following - lower the cpu multiplier ratio to x8 or x7 and try increasing the FSB again to above 230 and if it can boot then u'll know its not the ram causing the issue.

If you'r still finding it an issue to boot into windows with x9 & 230 after testing the ram and raising Vcore by 0.5, then try x8 and 250, which will still give u 2GHz core, (also u may want to raise LDT Voltage by 0.5 as necessary in order to maintain stablity) after that u can try getting to x8 & 275 which would give u 2.2GHz.

Also i recommend u read this http://i4memory.com/showthread.php?t=327.
 
Well I had an adventure last night, I went into the bios to see what my setting where and when I tried to go back to windows it would act like Windows was loading and reboot the computer over and over again. So I ended up re-installing Windows XP and losing everything. Anyways...... my settings as I see in the bios follows. Question about the memory problem, the reboot before my comp messed up I used 7x with 250FSB and it wouldn't boot. Put everything back to normal settings and it still didn't boot.....and you know the rest.

Memory:
Max Memclock (MHz)- Auto-
1T/2T Mem. Time- 2t
CAS# Latency- Auto
RAS# to CAS# delay- Auto
Min RAS# actice time- Auto
Row Precharge Time- Auto

--------
HT Frequency -3x
CPU FSB-228
Adjust CPU Vid- StartUp
CPU Voltage- By CPU Vid
Memory Voltage- Auto
AGP Voltage- 1.50v
 
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