help - motherboard question

[mercutio80]

I am looking to get a new CPU and a new motherboard and from what i here the AMD (Durron/Athlon) setup is superior to the Intel (Celeron) one. What i need to know is the specs a motherboard must have to be overclockable. If the motherboard only supports up to a 500 mHz CPU then you can't put a 600 mHz CPU in it but you can put a 500 mHz CPU in and then overclock to well over that speed. Is this correct? What makes that possible and why can't you just stick a faster CPU in the motherboard?

 

[office boy]

Read some reviews, Anandtech has hundreds of motherboard review to choose from...
Plus they have an editors pick section to help you find the cream of the crop.

 

[blurredvisionx]

The only specs a motherboard has to have to be overclockable is the ability to do so. What I mean is just find out if they give you the tools needed to overclock. If so, there you go. If you do and how much you overclock is up to you.

 

[Henry Kuo]

There are mainly two ways to o/c AMD chips. one is by incresing the FSB, and secondly by changing the multiplier settings.

changing the multipler (provided that the cpu is capable of that) is a way better solution for o/c AMD chips, where you can get a much higher clock speed. So my suggestion would look for a motherboard that has multiplier settings. Two most known ones are ASUS A7V and ABIT KT7. There is a third one coming out (how'd I know? Look at my sig. and keep an eye on AnandTech this coming week! 🙂🙂).

for your information, most of the KT133 motherboards nowadays support almost all AMD chips out there. Even if they don't support now, a simple BIOS flash by the company will do it. Don't worry too much on that.