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Jumping ship to Northwood 1.6A, need memory advice

L

Leo V

Diamond Member
Due to an opportunity to resell my AthlonXP rig, I am using this chance to migrate to the P4 platform. Two reasons I'm switching to P4:

1) As a quiet computing enthusiast, I am not thrilled with AMD's alternatives: the hot-running .13 Tbred 'A' and the nowhere-to-be-found Tbred 'B'. Even if both existed, AMD doesn't allow distinguishing between 'A' and 'B' versions of the same speed. Thanks but no thanks.
2) I feel the P4 architecture has reached maturity and I'm very impressed.

So I bought a 1.6A on the forums which runs at 2.13 at default voltage (2.59ghz @1.65). I will probably get the Asus P4B533 mainboard, Intel 845E chipset. My question is about memory: at 133 (533) FSB, how fast can I run my memory? Any suggestions which stick I should buy? (Both price and performance matter.)
Thanks,
Leo

PS: I will report on my success making this a quiet system! 😉
 
I think that board has a 3:4 mem ratio, so you can run 133FSB@DDR333. 2.59GHz = 161FSB@DDR322 or w/3:4 ratio DDR415. Get some Corsair XMS PC2700C2 or PC3000C2, and you should be fine. They should both hit DDR415, but you could probably get faster timings with the PC3000C2.
 
WTF?! The mod posting! :Q

And editting...dare I guess that he had signed it? Perhaps the mod forgot to log out of his mod account before posting?!?!? :Q

Or maybe I'm wrong...OR MAYBE NOT!

Oh yeah, and the mod summed up what I was going to say.
 
I will stick with default voltage, so we're talking 133fsb... with a 4:3 ratio this gives 356mhz memory, or "PC2850". I am not keen on memory overclocking (how many headaches that has caused me! 😉)--I'll go ahead and get some brand PC3000 memory. Thanks for the feedback!

PS: I considered the 2.26ghz P4, but it would have cost $60 more than my 1.6A. It's too bad that Intel's future chips will hit 70watts just like AMD's. This will require keeping speed at default and lowering voltage to keep things quiet.
 
If you run 533 FSB you can run 1:1 or 3:4 mem ratio. This would be DDR266 or DDR355. The P4B533 needs to have an undocumented switch set to enable the 3:4 ratio. Get good quality PC2700 mem at a minimum. PC3200 if you want to spend a little more.
 
so what happened to Mushkins' and Crucial's memory,
I always thought they are the best (i am just abit outdated, last time I been here in the Hardware board was when ppl are still debating Via133a vs BX boards) 🙂
 
Originally posted by: Insane3D
WTF?! The mod posting! :Q
Click to expand...

You never know with those mods...they are sneaky..


They lurk, lurk, lurk...then....















**BAM**



They post. :Q:Q

😉😛
Click to expand...

I think I know which one it was too, just from the style of posting 🙂

I'd say go the 2.26B route on an Abit IT7-Max, or the "HXP" Gigabyte RDRAM board with some PC1066 - but that's just me.

 
Originally posted by: Curley
MEMORY ADVICE: RAMBUS
Click to expand...
For a debatable performance improvement, I would have to pay $30 more for a P4T533 and $60 more in memory costs for 512MB total. For this $90 difference, I could have bought a Pentium4 2.53ghz instead--if I had the extra money in the first place! 🙂
 
Originally posted by: CrazySaint
Originally posted by: Curley
MEMORY ADVICE: RAMBUS
Click to expand...

Alright, that's it! Somebody get a nice big stake (the wooden kind) - I'll get the sticks and matches, and maybe a bit of kerosene!
Click to expand...

Hahahaha!! lol! Your ship is sinking... 😀

~box

 
hey, Leo V,
since you are building a system geared towards quietness, I want to ask a few question,

what case are you using, also which HSF? (stock intel hsf seems to be the quietest of all)
 
Andy,
I will start with the retail P4 heatsink plus an undervolted 80mm Panaflo L1A. Maybe I'll get a Zalman flower later (also w/ undervolted Panaflo, I have Panaflos in my veins 😉). My article on SilentPCReview explains in detail how I built my near-silent AthlonXP rig w/ GeForce4 Ti4200. Also, Mike of SPCR has his own article on specifically building a quiet P4 1.6A rig.
 
Leo,

If you want a real quite system, why don't you use that kind of humungous heatsink used on Power Macs?
 
Charles, keep in mind that PowerPC CPU's dissipate around 10-20 watts max, while Athlons and P4's dissipate over 60 watts max. A quality large heatsink is very important, but you still have to worry about managing airflow inside the case.
 
Leo, you should look into OEM heatsinks from workstation machines. I peaked inside a Dual Xeon workstation (Either Compaq or Dell) and low and behold 2 gigantic copper-colored heatsinks with only a fan duct that sucks the air out. They had a large amount of fins small fins too.
 
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