Help me with voltage problem..

[Jojo1971]

p4 2.5 @ 3.0GHz (120fsb) @ default voltage (1.525)...Using motherboard monitor, my +12V rail shows 11.37V. I have a POWMAX (?) 500W..Im using 3 HDD, I ATA Controller Card 2 Optical Drives, 1 Radeon8500, 1 NIC, 1 IEE94 Card, 1 SB Audigy...Motherboard is P4B533 with XMS 3500 512 MB.. Is this something I should be worried about? Will it have a great impact on my overclocking? If I have to change my PSU, which brand would you recommend ?

 

[Duvie]

It could as the p4 is reliant on the +12v rail.....Generally you want the rail to be within 5% of the actual setting...IE +12v means you should be11.4-12.6...so yes you have crossed that threshold....It is likely do to all the drives you have connected.

What have you used to monitor it???

Is that at idle??? What does it do as it loads??? Mine after all my ocing is 11.8v but when I load it it actually rises to 11.94...Does yours rise and if so how much???

I like the Antec 430 for you....Antec 430..


The powmax specs for a 500watt look good as it has 25amps on the 12v rail so I am not sure the problem....The enermax and Antecs are 2 reliable and heavily used p4 power supplies around here...

 

[Jojo1971]

im using motherboard monitor 5 from http://mbm.livewiredev.com/ ..is this a good monitoring tool?

 

[Duvie]

Generally yes, but definitely cross reference it to the pcprobe program bundled with the Asus product....


As a test you can try disconnecting some of the drives and see if the +12v rail goes up....

 

[Jojo1971]

i tried to enter bios and checked hardware monitor which showed 11.84-11.90V.. then went back to motherboard monitor5 and checked it again .. later found out i picked the wrong "sensor".. it's fixed now,, thanks alot duvie..

Now that my setup seems ready for high fsb, im gonna get rid of this 2.5 (my quest for 3.0 GHz is over ) and try either a 1.6 ($168), 1.8 ($140) or 2.26 ($192).. Which do you think i should order next..Is it worth sacrificing 200+ mhz ( if i hit 2.7-2.8) in exchange of higher fsb? Im planning to get rid of my radeon 8500 too and get the radeon 9700...So which setup would give the radeon9700 higher 3dmark2001 ? 2.7-2.8 with high fsb or 3.0 with low fsb? I know you guys are the gurus here so by giving me suggestions that lessens the rma newegg is getting from me...

 

[ScrewFace]

At 2.7GHz or 2.8GHz with a substantially higher fsb it's going to slightly outperform a 3GHz Pentium4. Go with the 1.6AGHz as I've seen these chips overclock to 2.7GHz-2.8GHz quite frequently.

 

[Duvie]

Well IMO it isn;t that much of a spread.....I do get higher ALU numbers in sandra at 166fsb for 2.65ghz then the default 2.66 does but all the other numbers are the same....I think it is closer to 100mhz...But remember memory speed is key as DDR unless at higher pc3500+ numbers does not deliver the bandwidth to feed a processor at even 400fsb.

Low fsb I would go with an rdram system, or a sis chipset for higher mem ratio....

High fsb I would go DDR and likely the 2.26ghz....current ones should only get to around 2.7-2.9ghz....I think a system at 2.8ghz could be as fast if you have 166x4=664mhz fsb and couple that with 440mhz ddr or a DCDDR mobo when they appear....

Otherwise stick with what you have and jack ratio up to 3:4 and run cas2,2,2,6 (most aggressive timings)...You are still at default vcore and can likely go up another 150-200 more mhz to a safe 1.65vcore...YOu could get to 125-127fsb so your memory could be still pc2700+ with cas 2 settings. Lock the agp/pci, and wait for the c1 stepping chips in the lower speed processors to arrive. I think you will want a chip that still gets to 2.8-2.9ghz minimum and at current the b0 2.26 and 1.8 may not be assured of that...

 

[Jojo1971]

well i ordered a refurbished 2.26 yesterday from newegg for $139 (couldnt resist the price) and p4b533-vm for $69... should be here by thursday..if i still dont get a satisfying result, im gonna sell it to my friend and try the 2.5 again with rdram setup..