Help an old P4 1.6a get the best out of his system

[lchyi]

Okay, I just replaced my RAM to Kingston HyperX 2700 DDR33 512 (I have two, but I'm running one because I think 2 sticks makes it slower). The funny thing is, I experienced strange happenings in Windows and have had to format once and repair twice and now my rig together is running slower than before. Here's what I have OC'ed and I want some inputs on what I should OC to.

Motherboard: P4B533-V

Processor: Pentium 4 1.6Aghz 400FSB
Clock Multiple: 16x
CPU External Frequency: 125mhz (with old generic RAM I had this to 138mhz!)
Memory Frequency: 333mhz
AGP/PCI Frequency: Auto (can go from 66.66/33.33 to 100+/66+ but should I even mess with this?)
VCore: 1.625V (motherboard kind of overvolts to about 1.700V)
DDR Reference Voltage: 2.65V (2.85 is the max)
AGP VDDQ: Auto (1.5-1.7)

RAM: Kingston Hyper-X PC2700 CL2
CAS Latency: 2.5
RAS-CAS: 2
Precharge: 2
Active: 6
Idle Timer: Auto (what is this?)
Turbo: Disabled (even more curious, though I've never had good experiences with this enabled)
DRAM Refresh: Auto (again, I have no idea)
Graphics Aperture: 256mb (what is this supposed to be set at?)

Anyway those stats are as complete is I can give out and I know I can juice more from this computer than that. Also, I want to see if my RAM can go any higher than 333mhz. And I hate it that I bought CL2 RAM but can only run stable at CL2.5! Oh well, I thought I heard great reviews about Hyper-X stuff, maybe I'm just doing something wrong. Thanks.

 

[thermite88]

Originally posted by: lchyi
Okay, I just replaced my RAM to Kingston HyperX 2700 DDR33 512

Memory Frequency: 333mhz

CAS Latency: 2.5
RAS-CAS: 2
Precharge: 2
Active: 6
Idle Timer: Auto (what is this?)
Turbo: Disabled (even more curious, though I've never had good experiences with this enabled)
DRAM Refresh: Auto (again, I have no idea)
Graphics Aperture: 256mb (what is this supposed to be set at?)

These are very good results. If you want to overclock the CPU more, do not set the memory frequency higher than the CPU FSB. Use the CPU/MEM ratio 1:1 setting or something similar. You are currently using a higher bus frequency for memory than the CPU.

I ran a pair of PC2700 on a Asus P4B266 with a 1.6A. Before I changed the memory, I can only OC to 140FSB with PC2100. Now, the 1.6 is running rock stable at 2.7GHz using 170FSB. Which means that the PC2700 is running at 340 MHz, overclock only slightly over its 333 MHz rating. The timing is 2-2-2-5.

Set the Graphic Aperture at 64 or 128 MB.

 

[lchyi]

Whoa, 2.7ghz, what kind of cooling did that? Right now I get anywhere from 38-52c (full load from Prime95). I have a ThermalRight SLK something or other and a Sunon fan running at 3100rpm. 170fsb must run extremely hot... \

EDIT: Oh one more thing. What is the benefit of having a gig of RAM if you can't tweak them as fast? This is of course assuming you're not a server or a big graphics artist.

 

[onza]

i think u hit it, for the 1gig of ram that is....

if you dont do much, 1gig is overkill... but what am i too say, more is better

 

[lchyi]

What can a typical 1.6Aghz processor OC to, I didn't think it'd be possible to get it over 150 FSB. Well, this is with air cooling. Also, what fan should I get for overclocking? It seems like anything over 3600RPM is going to be too loud. I have a Vantec Tornado, but no way am I gonna stick that vacuum cleaner back in my case. I can hear that thing from China.

 

[Corporate Thug]

typically you should get 800-1000 Mhz oc on 1.6A

 

[thermite88]

Originally posted by: lchyi
Whoa, 2.7ghz, what kind of cooling did that? Right now I get anywhere from 38-52c (full load from Prime95). I have a ThermalRight SLK something or other and a Sunon fan running at 3100rpm. 170fsb must run extremely hot... \.

The 1.6A is running stable at 2.7GHz using 170FSB. I up the Vcore to 1.66 volt and use a Zalman CNPS7000-AlCu cooler. I picked one up from a local vendor for $34 plus tax. It is one of the best cooling investment that I made, but also the second most expensive (to my old Alpha for P3).

The Zalman keep the 1.6A at 33°C idle and 44°C at full load. Same result whether the load is by SANDRA or Prime95. The temperature is reported by SANDRA.

I had the AVC Sunflower cooler before and got temperatures similar to yours. The system will run up to 6 cycles in SANDRA torture test and quite. With Zalman, it can run the torture test indefinitely.

 

[lchyi]

If the system doesn't boot after 158fsb or so, does that mean that it's overheating or that my chip just doesn't push that high? It boots around 150-155, but doesn't get into Windows, and 142-48 will give me Windows stop error screens, and so far I haven't had a problem with 140fsb. But still, that's running my memory at 2.5CL 2-3-6, DDR280 (eeeewwww for a CAS2 rated DDR333 Hyper-X) vcore to 1.65v, 2.75 vram. I just want to know if I need to invest in a better cooling solution or not.