is my CPU locked ?

[rh71]

I've O/C'd in the past but I'm no expert... I have a Barton 2800+ chip (12.5x166) that I've set to 13.0x166 for 2158MHz in the BIOS but it's only registering on My Computer --> Properties at 2.09GHz and in SiSoft Sandra as the same. If it were locked, it shouldn't allow me to change the multiplier or the FSB at all in there, correct ?

I was able to underclock it (for quite a while 12x166 since I had heat issues) in the past.

Not a huge deal, but was wondering... why ?

 

[o1die]

Yours is locked. Only the mobile bartons come unlocked. You can always change fsb, whether locked or unlocked. That only refers to the multiplier setting.

 

[rh71]

so there's only a ceiling but I can drop it as low as I want ?

Changing the FSB... what's the next logical setting to set that at ? Without frying it ? Running on 512MB PC3200.

 

[ts3433]

Your motherboard may still allow you to play with the multiplier settings even if it's locked, but they wouldn't do anything. You can still overclock by raising the FSB, though--full-on clock-locking would be prohibitively expensive to implement (or so I've heard). Just gradually increment the FSB. 176MHz FSB would get you to XP 3200+ stock clock speed, but you'd perform slightly worse because of the reduced FSB.

To tell for certain whether or not the chip is locked, you'll need to look on the processor sticker that has all the numbers on it for the week of production (they started locking them in late 2003).

 

[Spikesoldier]

some motherboards dont like a multiplier of 13 and up.

your CPU is unlocked if you can bump it down to 12 from 12.5.

i know the abit NF7 series would let you have access to the higher multipliers, but only a few board manufacturers made it that way.

iirc you need to pinmod to get access to the higher multipliers if you dont have one of these few boards.

just jack up the FSB at 12.5 and be happy

 

[Spikesoldier]

Originally posted by: o1die
Yours is locked. Only the mobile bartons come unlocked. You can always change fsb, whether locked or unlocked. That only refers to the multiplier setting.

not true. AMD put out athlon XP's with unlocked mutlipliers. as stated they started locking them in late 2003.

i know my 2200+ is unlocked.

 

[gwag]

only very early bartons were unlocked.

 

[rh71]

ok I just looked it up... I purchased my Barton 2800+ from Newegg on 3/14/04... I'm not going to pull the HSF off to find the date on the chip though. I am running it on the Abit NF7-S r2.0 board so as said above... maybe that's why I can play with the multiplier (even though it apparently isn't doing anything upward). Time to play with the FSB... thx guys.