More juice out of AT BX...

[calestra]

I want to squeeze a bit more life out of my AT BX board. The manuf states P3 550 or Cely 633 as the max options, but I have been told (by salesman)that I can shove upto 933 P3 in there if I want..!?. This is due apparently to the fact that the board supports 100 fsb with 9.5 mutiplier. Now before I run out there and let someone flog me a new P3, can someone put me right on this? I am worried that the 9.5 x will only work at 66 fsb (hence the 633), is this correct? If so have any of you guys a suggestion on how best to get some more speed on the cheap - overclock a cely..?

Any advice is really appreciated....

GIGABYTE GA-6BA (100 FSB)- P2 450 - 128 PC100 - ATI EXPERT 2000 16 - IBM 75GXP 30GIG - 8X4X32 LG CDRW - 52X CREATIVE CD - AWE64 GOLD - WIN TV

 

[tweakr]

Really depends on the motherboard PCB revision - Rev.3.0 and above support coppermine CPUs, which would mean any 100mhz FSB Coppermine PIII would work fine. The box the motherboard came in should tell you this (if you still have it), otherwise I'm not sure where to find the version number on the board itself. Or, if you have a look in the online manual from gigabyte's website (HERE) - PDF format BTW, then in section 3-2, there are diagrams comparing Rev2.9 to Rev3.0.

The board does support a 9.5x multiplier, and in order to set 100mhz FSB, you just need to change one jumper on the board - again, this can be found in the manual. AFAIK, however, SECC2 PIIIs only go upto 850mhz on the 100mhz bus.

best of luck to you
tweakr

 

[juyanith]

I have been wondering the same thing, only I have a revision 1 Abit BH6. According to Abit's site, this will support up to a PIII 700. While this would be a big boost from my celeron 300A/450, I would like to go farther. [Isn't that always the case. ]

Anyway, it seems to me that extending the life of my current system for 6 months would be wise. I would like to try a T-Bird, but I don't want to buy new memory, etc. when the AMD 760 chipset is just coming out. And, add to that the worry that my power supply may not handle the AMD chip properly and I seem faced with the purchase of a entirely new system.

Does anyone know if the BH6 1.0 would handle a PIII beyond 700? Is this a question of the bios not supporting the higher muliplier or is it something else?

 

[tweakr]

juyanith - There's a good chance that your motherboard will support any PIII SECC2. However, with your older PC100 RAM, i'd look at only the 100FSB models (which I think go upto 850mhz). The multiplier's locked on Intel CPUs, so the motherboard only needs to support correct voltage and busspeed to run it...

cheers
tweakr

 

[calestra]

Hi Tweakr..

Yey, hey.. my original manual (found it in the loft covered in dust - poor show) states rev. 3.0 first ed, and I know the bios is the latest 2.9, so I guess i'm going to save myself a few quid in the upgrading process. From what I gather the 440 is still reasonably capable? - Just a thought, if I really wanted to scrimp, whats your opinion in shoving a Cely 633 in and clocking?

Thanks a lot for answering my ?

 

[tweakr]

The 440BX is about the fastest Intel chipset around, it just doesn't support standards like AGP 4x, 66mhz AGP @ 133mhz FSB, more than two USB ports etcetc. Put it this way - I just bought a NEW BX board to run my Celeron, and I'm going to put a PIII in it soon.

If you want to put a Celeron in the board, remember that you're gonna need a slocket of some sort. I don't know much about Slockets (being a PPGA and FC-PGA motherboard guy...), but some of them come with voltage adjustments (eg. Abit Slocket!!!) which are very useful if your motherboard supports them (which it sounds like it will). One of the newer Celeron633s would most likely give you 950mhz without too many problems, assuming the slocket/motherboard combination offers voltage tweaks, and you put a good heatsink/fan unit on it - something like a Taisol CEK732 , or a Globalwin Fop32.

In terms of performance, a Celeron533@800 tends to break even with a PIII-600 in games and heavy use. If you can afford it, go for a PIII - you could get an FC-PGA PIII, and again a Slocket, so that you could use the CPU in any new motherboard you buy. Otherwise, go for an SECC2 PIII (less hassle).

cheers
tweakr

 

[tweakr]

Quick Update

juyanith - I checked around, and there is a new bios out for the BH6 rev.1 that supports the Celeron700 - that means it supports a 10x multiplier at least, which should mean no problems with running a PIII greater than 700.

cheers
tweakr

 

[juyanith]

Thanks tweakr. I went ahead and flashed the latest bios and it supports multipliers over 10x so I should be safe with just about any PIII (with 100 MHz FSB, since my memory is only PC100.) This, along with an MX video card should give me a pretty dramatic game performance jump for pretty low investment.

I'm still looking forward to a new system in a few months -- most likely AMD, with new memory, etc. and this system will make a good second machine at that time. Then I'll be able to upgrade the whole system, and design it to get the most out of each part.