Athlon xp-m 2600 best processor for overclocking on an nf7-s?

[Ymeister19]

Im curious to know if this processor is as good as everyone says, capable of 2.5 and over 400 fsb out of the box on air. Please post any feedback you have

 

[echow87]

Yup...mostly every Athlon XP-M 2600+ right now will do 2.5ghz+

And 2600+ is the way to go. I have one myself at 2800mhz with air cooling.

 

[Sonic587]

Yes, it is. However, you most certainly will not get 2.5GHz+ without raising the voltage from stock.

 

[Ymeister19]

I had allready planned on raising my stock voltage to at least 1.7v i have an slk900u and it seams to deal with heat quite nicely also have 7 case fans so i think i have the temperature well covered. Getting a 550 watt antec true power and some of that corsair xms extra low latency 3200 ram with 2-2-2-5 timings hoping to reach about 410 fsb and 2.5 ghz or better guess ill see when i get all the stuff and hook it up to my nf7-s.

 

[gplracer]

You have a good chance of getting that speed but as you know there is no guarantee. Mine does it easy. Most of the current Abit NF7-s boards top out at 210-215fsb. If you want more fsb get a DFI Infinity. I have built 15 computers with the abit board and it is a great board. It just does not overclock as well as it used to. My DFI does 250fsb with the beta bios. I usually run at 240fsb though because I have to make the timings too loose to get to 250fsb. 240fsb for me is actually faster. However I did run prime 95 at
250 x 10=2500mhz for 12 hours without an error. I use a slk800 heatsink and a 72cfm smart fan II. Good luck with yours

 

[oldman420]

i got mine to 2.4 at 1.8 vcore but heat was an issue
it runs really good at 200 x 12 though with ram at 2.5-3-3-11

 

[maluckey]

The 35 watt CPU's, regardless of their original ratings are all similar in their maximum OC. The 45 watt CPUs are also similar to the 35 watt in their overclocking potential. It's pretty hard to get a "Bad" XP-M CPU right now. The 35 watt, or 45 watt only refers to their ability to run at that voltage when not under load, not their operating voltage when in use. The Power-Now feature ramps the voltage at first sign of load to normal Barton levels. in theory, the XP-M are hand-picked for their ability to idle without much power. That's the main difference, along with the bridge setup.

Most any garden vareity 35 watt Barton will run all day at 2.5 Ghz without an issue. Many will hit 2.6 Ghz (stable) on air cooling (mine included). I can boot and enter windows at 2.7 ghz, but frequent crashes and lockups, combined with toooo high temps prevent me from using the speed.

 

[Clark504]

Can't speak about the 2600+, but I have an NF7-S v1.2, and 2 sticks of mushkin 3200 level one. Just 2 days ago got an XP-M 2500+ and an SP97 HSF. @ 1.8 volts crashes after an hour of rc5 while running 2.6Ghz, dropped the voltage to 1.775 in bios (sandra reports 1.76) and runs perfect at 2.5. stock 200 mhz on memory and 66 on AGP. at max cpu utilization runs at 48c. I'm not sure if an extra $10 spent on the cpu would help out or not.

Clark504

 

[Ymeister19]

Hmm noticed you can get them in either 45 watt or 35 watt...does one overclock better than the other?

 

[Ymeister19]

also where would my best bet to purchase the better of the two at(35 watt or 45 watt) i just want to purchase the chip where i have odds of getting the best overclockability

 

[gplracer]

It is all luck of the draw but newegg is a great place.

 

[Ymeister19]

Just read a resent post seems best speeds are coming out of 45 watt 2600+ Iqyha stepping which are availiable at excaliberpc im buying it next friday but wont have the new ram for another week after that so ill have to be patient=(

 

[Tiamat]

Originally posted by: gplracer
You have a good chance of getting that speed but as you know there is no guarantee. Mine does it easy. Most of the current Abit NF7-s boards top out at 210-215fsb. If you want more fsb get a DFI Infinity. I have built 15 computers with the abit board and it is a great board. It just does not overclock as well as it used to. My DFI does 250fsb with the beta bios. I usually run at 240fsb though because I have to make the timings too loose to get to 250fsb. 240fsb for me is actually faster. However I did run prime 95 at
250 x 10=2500mhz for 12 hours without an error. I use a slk800 heatsink and a 72cfm smart fan II. Good luck with yours

Hey, somewhat related, Is there a quick way to figure out that its the NF7-S that is keeping your OC from gettign any higher? How can you differentiate a CPU problem vs: Ram problem vs: Motherboard problem during an overclock that breeches the 200fsb mark? (How do you know for certain it isnt your cpu, or ram for instance?)

thx

 

[Shimmishim]

getting to the 200 mhz mark is no problem on the nf7-s

as for figuring out a ram problem vs cpu problem... that's easy to do

if your ram is rated for 200 mhz then run your ram at 166 mhz and up your multiplier until you max out your cpu speed.

for ram, use a lower multiplier making sure you have not hit the max cpu speed and start upping your fsb slowly

on the abit nf7-s, anything higher than pc3500 will be overkill for the board...

most boards top out around 220 to 225 mhz on the nf7-s

if you happen to have ram that can run high fsb's at low vdimm voltages (less than 2.9) so you don't need a vdimm or vtt mod, then you will need to do the L12 mod.

when mobiles first boot up, they boot up at 6 x 100 or something like that...

you have to trick your motherboard into thinking that you have a 200 mhz fsb processor rather than a 133 mhz fsb processor (which is actually the default for the XP's).. for some reason, when your comp boots up at 133 mhz fsb, the NB has some issues where it'll run tighter timings or something on the NB which causes the board to max out around that 220 mark...

by tricking it into thinking its a 200 mhz fsb processor, the NB relaxes its timings (not talking about ram timings please get this clear) or something (not exactly sure on this) and allows you to hit higher fsb's

everyone that has done a success L12 mod has gotten their chip from the 220-225 range to over 230 mhz... 240 isn't a problem...

the nf7-s is an incredible board with the L12 mod (at the least)

 

[Ymeister19]

Will 210 fsb be reachable without the L12 mod, and if not how do i go about this mod?

 

[Shimmishim]

210 is very attainable w/o the mod

but dont[ get anything more than pc3500 if 210 is all you want

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: Ymeister19
Will 210 fsb be reachable without the L12 mod, and if not how do i go about this mod?

As noted above 210 s/n be a problem.

Go here to read about the L12 mod Link to L12 Mod To find the L12 mod, look to your left and click on "overclocking" at the site.

Some of the BIOS modded by "tic tac" include the L12 mod. I.e., with these BIOS there is no need to do the wire trick. There are links to his modded BIOS at the both the nForcersHQ.com and abit.com forums (look for the NForce mobo section).

 

[DKlein]

I have an nf7-s rev2 with a XP-M 2600+. I managed to get a 219 max FSB, and 211x12 for a max CPU OC of 2.53GHz. Doesn't seem too uncommon.

 

[maluckey]

I agree...

I can hit a max FSB of 228 without any mods at all, on the "poor performing" V2.0 with the colored RAM slots. My biggest stumbling block was the APIC. I had to disable it to go higher than 212 Mhz FSB. Once disabled, I was able to hit a stable 228 Mhz FSB at 2-2-2-11 timings, interface enabled, and 3:3 ratio.

I can now run at 215 x 11.5 for intense gaming without a hitch, without any mods, with 2-2-2-11, interface enabled, 3:3 ratio, on an Abit D25 BIOS. The L-12 mod gave me nothing at all, other than the time lost doing it.

It is my opinion, and only an opinion mind you.....but after trying the L-12 mod on a few different NF7-S v2.0 and Mobile Bartons. I got nothing that couldn't be duplicated without the L-12 mod on any of the 3 boards I tried it on. Many times, reseating the HS/fan combo will get you out of the instability issues that so many see. They reseat the HS/fan after doing the L-12 "mod", reset the BIOS, and viola! Everything's fine. They credit the L-12 mod, when it was likely a poorly seated HS/fan, or a BIOS that needed resetting. Perhaps it's like to old myth of 40 Mhz maximum PCI bus or you will corrupt your data. That myth had been repeated so many times that it was almost a fact, except that it's not true either....

I can't speak for everyone, but not one of my three V2.0 boards is currently modded, and all can hit over 220 Mhz FSB. All of them have had issues with APIC and high FSB speeds, and all are air-cooled.

Granted, my experience has ONLY been with the V2.0 and Mobile Bartons.

I would like to see a scientific explanation of the L-12, explaining it's anecdotal success if anyone has the link.

 

[Toro 45]

Originally posted by: maluckey
The 35 watt CPU's, regardless of their original ratings are all similar in their maximum OC. The 45 watt CPUs are also similar to the 35 watt in their overclocking potential. It's pretty hard to get a "Bad" XP-M CPU right now. The 35 watt, or 45 watt only refers to their ability to run at that voltage when not under load, not their operating voltage when in use. The Power-Now feature ramps the voltage at first sign of load to normal Barton levels. in theory, the XP-M are hand-picked for their ability to idle without much power. That's the main difference, along with the bridge setup.

Most any garden vareity 35 watt Barton will run all day at 2.5 Ghz without an issue. Many will hit 2.6 Ghz (stable) on air cooling (mine included). I can boot and enter windows at 2.7 ghz, but frequent crashes and lockups, combined with toooo high temps prevent me from using the speed.

So your saying an 35W XP-M2000 has just as good a chance for a 2.5ghz OC as a 45W XP-M2600 ? Sorry for the obvious question but I've only been researching this topic a short while and lots of guys were recommending the 2600 for the easy OC.