Another 3400+ question...this time a little different.

[Imyourzero]

OK, so I'm still going back and forth over which one to buy. Just when I think I've decided on Newcastle, someone comes along and says that the 1MB chips perform better and that the Newcastles are Clawhammers that didn't "make the cut" and have half of their cache disabled. Then someone else will say that Clawhammers are the ones that didn't make the MHz cut and have their clock speed reduced.

From what I've seen in benches, MOST of the time it seems that Newcastle pulls slightly ahead. It would seem that the 200 extra MHz is more beneficial to the Athlon 64 architecture than having twice the cache (and I've read that Athlons aren't nearly as cache-dependent as P4's anyway). I've seen a lot of people recommend getting a Clawhammer, overclocking to 2.4 and thus having the best of both worlds. But then I thought "Well if the Newcastle is already at 2.4 GHz, what would happen if..."

So my question is this: which would perform better between a Clawhammer o/c'ed from 2.2 to 2.4, and a Newcastle o/c'ed from 2.4 to 2.6? Or is that even possible? It seems that I have read that no matter the core, the A64's hit a ceiling around 2.5 GHz so I wonder if reaching 2.6 with a 3400+ Newcastle is even possible with air cooling. Has anyone done it?

 

[o1die]

I think you answered your own question. Overclocking is never a sure thing. I'll take the extra 200 mhz anyday.

 

[BW86]

well ive gotten to 2.5 on the stock heatsink. im pretty sure you can get to 2.6 with a better heatink.

 

[TStep]

I have not been watching the Newcastle vs Clawhammer overclocking results too carefully, but if neither variety shows better overclocking results than the other, and if:

-- both are very likely to hit 2.4, maybe 2.5, and slim chance of 2.6
-- and you are going to overclock anyway, which is the luck of the draw

then I'd take the extra cache, because that is a sure thing, so long as teh xtra cache does not affect the possible max overclock. If the xtra cache is likely to affect the max overclock possibilities, then I would choose the variety that is most likely to attain the max oc.

 

[igblack]

how do u overclock an amd 64 3400+ i have one and everytime i go to set the "fsb" higher, it shows up as like the chip is running at like 900mhz, when it should be running stock at 2.4ghz????

then when i try to rase the fsb over 800mhz it like fails and wont post?? i dont no what to do with it and the multiplyer is locked so i cant change that.


some advice or insturction would be nice


thanks