Overclocking Addiction

[Random Variable]

It seems to be an unwritten rule amongst the online hardware community that you?re simply not a real computer expert unless you?re an overclocker. Running your system as the manufacturer recommends is for girlies and you must be a newbie if you haven?t pushed your computer just that little bit further. To join the ranks of the self-proclaimed self-satisfied hardware gurus found lurking on every newsgroup and forum on the net, you must go through the sacred rites of voltage increase, lapping, blow-hole creation and peltier installation. Only then will you have reached the giddy heights of the hardware god. Newbies throughout the web will bow down to your divine received wisdom and shower your forum posts with sycophantic and self-deprecating praise.

And it?s not helped by the online hardware sites. No motherboard or processor review is complete without detailed ?analysis? of the overclockability of the system. A motherboard that can?t overclock is summarily dismissed with contempt as a budget board (for the technically illiterate, they might as well add). Few processor reviews even care how well a processor performs at its rated speed ? the question every reviewer wants to know is ?how well does it overclock??.

A whole industry has built up around the hardcore overclocker, shrouded in a heady blend of science, pseudo-science and marketing techno-babble. Aluminum heatsinks. Copper heatsinks. Aluminum-copper heatsinks. Square heatsinks. Cylindrical heatsinks. Orbs. Orb 3?s. Super-Orbs. Blue Orbs. Golden Orbs. Heat pipes. Shims. Deltas. Volcanoes. Artic Silver. Artic Silver II. Artic Silver III. Heat spreaders. Water coolers. Peltiers. There's egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam; spam bacon sausage and spam; spam egg spam spam bacon and spam; spam sausage spam spam bacon spam tomato and spam. It?s an overclocking zoo out there, and don?t expect to earn any respect on the net unless you?re a fully paid up member of the extreme hardware posse.

Overclocking is a singularly male obsession ? a testosterone-fueled quest to become the leader of the pack. Don?t expect your wife or girlfriend to show the slightest interest in your memory bandwidth or the CFM your HSF pushes at max RPM. Overclocking is the expression of the 21st Century geek?s biological drive to become the dominant male. Machine machismo. Processor envy. To blow or to suck, that is the question. It?s the hAcKEr?z version of playground penis comparison and equally pointless. After all, as any woman will tell you, it?s not the size that matters but what you do with it.

Nor does overclocking require any great technical prowess. The rules are simple: maximize the cooling, up the voltage and tweak the BIOS. Overclocking success is a simple function of the quality of your components with a large dollop of chance thrown in. The more you spend on cooling, the more you can overclock. Until the processor burns out. It?s easy and you could teach your grandmother to do it.

But overclocking is an ultimately futile and depressing experience. The overclocker is never quite satisfied. Just one more case fan and the FSB is sure to get past the magic 203MHz. A little more lapping on the base of your PolarIce 6500GLX 16v heatsink and you?ll get your Celeron 400MHz running at 2.6GHz like that guy on the overklockerz.com forums. Only you probably won?t and you?ll then feel a little more inferior than when you started. Processor envy. And at what cost? Overclocking is rarely speed for free ? a decent heatsink and fan is $50, three or four case fans will be another $30, $5 for ArticSilver ? a total of $85, the difference between buying a Duron 1.1GHz and an AthlonXP 2100+! And that $50 fan almost certainly wouldn?t have bought you a 1GHz overclock. Furthermore, processor architecture aside, running a Duron at 2.1GHz will not be the same as running an AthlonXP 2100+. All that cooling is very loud and unless you?re very unusual, all that noise will soon begin to irritate. What?s the point in buying the latest 96 kHz 24-bit soundcard with digital speakers, only to be deafened by six fans pushing air through your case like a demented vacuum cleaner? Anything other than modest overclocking will also inevitably impact on stability, how ever hard you try. Even if it doesn?t there?s always that nagging doubt when you get that occasional blue screen of death ? is it a driver problem or that extra 5MHz?

Given that there are few applications that tax even a modest 1.2GHz Duron the whole emphasis on overclocking seems misplaced. What is the point? More thought should be placed on the whole computing experience. Silence is golden and I?d much rather have a silent computer than achieve an extra 10% out of my processor that I can?t notice anyway.

I recently removed all my case fans and just have my processor running at its stock speed. The computer?s performance ?feels? identical and yet the room is quiet and I can at last enjoy my Audigy soundcard and Digital speakers. I never want to poke around in SoftMenu III again. It?s like kicking an addiction, and it feels great to be clean. I thoroughly recommend it.

 

[Red Dawn]

It seems to be an unwritten rule amongst the online hardware community that you?re simply not a real computer expert unless you?re an overclocker

Yeah right.

 

[Chaotic42]

Where did this come from?

 

[apoppin]

Where was this long-winded quote stolen from?

What's the point?

 

[Random Variable]

Originally posted by: Chaotic42
Where did this come from?

Here

There was a link to the editorial on Overlockers Australia

 

[Red Dawn]

I only overclock if I don't have to make it jump through hoops to be stable.

 

[kami]

Well, I gave up on hardcore overclocking because I hate the extra noise. Right now I got my 1800+ running at 1900+ (same voltage) and my Ti4200 running at Ti4400 speeds. Nothing major at all...

 

[tweakmm]

Overclocking isn't worth the extra noise

 

[Random Variable]

Originally posted by: apoppin
Where was this long-winded quote stolen from?

What's the point?

I knew someone would be offended.

 

[ElFenix]

Originally posted by: tweakmm
Overclocking isn't worth the extra noise

insane3d would say, "what extra noise?"

 

[Geekbabe]

Speed is so cheap now,why bother ? Unless of course it's an intel cpu that'll do the dance right out of the box with stock cooling and often without even having to bump up the voltage ?

Maybe I'm getting old but spending $50 or more on cooling solultions to wring a few more bins of speed out of a cpu isn't my thing anymore

 

[ElFenix]

the 1600+ can often reach 1750 actual MHz (166 bus) at regular voltage... thats a nice overclock. $55 well spent.

 

[Red Dawn]

the 1600+ can often reach 1750 actual MHz (166 bus) at regular voltage... thats a nice overclock. $55 well spent.

Yeah but doing so doesn't make you a Computer expert.

 

[ElFenix]

Originally posted by: Red Dawn

the 1600+ can often reach 1750 actual MHz (166 bus) at regular voltage... thats a nice overclock. $55 well spent.

Yeah but doing so doesn't make you a Computer expert.

no, but its a worthwhile overclock.

 

[Geekbabe]

Originally posted by: ElFenix
the 1600+ can often reach 1750 actual MHz (166 bus) at regular voltage... thats a nice overclock. $55 well spent.

150 mhz increase in speed was a nice overclock back in the day of the C300A when cpu'ds went for bigger money,given a choice between spending $50 on heavy duty cooling and worrying about stabilty issues or just buying a faster cpu,I'll buy the faster chip, of course,at the default speeds cpu's are running at now, I doubt you'e going to notice 150 mhz speed increase unless you're an FPS junkie.

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: Vespasian

Originally posted by: apoppin
Where was this long-winded quote stolen from?

What's the point?

I knew someone would be offended.

Offended . . . NOT. It's just a ridiculous exaggeration.

And where's it from?


Found your link . . . It's a crappy editorial.

 

[kami]

Originally posted by: baffled2

Originally posted by: ElFenix
the 1600+ can often reach 1750 actual MHz (166 bus) at regular voltage... thats a nice overclock. $55 well spent.

150 mhz increase in speed was a nice overclock back in the day of the C300A when cpu'ds went for bigger money,given a choice between spending $50 on heavy duty cooling and worrying about stabilty issues or just buying a faster cpu,I'll buy the faster chip, of course,at the default speeds cpu's are running at now, I doubt you'e going to notice 150 mhz speed increase unless you're an FPS junkie.

1600+ is like 1.4ghz isn't it? so it's a 350mhz overclock

 

[Geekbabe]

Originally posted by: kami

Originally posted by: baffled2

Originally posted by: ElFenix
the 1600+ can often reach 1750 actual MHz (166 bus) at regular voltage... thats a nice overclock. $55 well spent.

150 mhz increase in speed was a nice overclock back in the day of the C300A when cpu'ds went for bigger money,given a choice between spending $50 on heavy duty cooling and worrying about stabilty issues or just buying a faster cpu,I'll buy the faster chip, of course,at the default speeds cpu's are running at now, I doubt you'e going to notice 150 mhz speed increase unless you're an FPS junkie.

1600+ is like 1.4ghz isn't it? so it's a 350mhz overclock

It's still nowhere near the value of an OC as the C300A was,not if you factor in heat,stabilty and noise worries

it's not worth it for anyone except die hard gamers .There's much to be said for a quiet,stable system,partcularly when you've got to provide the support for it.


OTHO,I am itching to build a P4, a,straight out of the box big overclock is too tempting to pass up at least attempting

 

[Random Variable]

Originally posted by: apoppin

Originally posted by: Vespasian

Originally posted by: apoppin
Where was this long-winded quote stolen from?

What's the point?

I knew someone would be offended.

Offended . . . NOT. It's just a ridiculous exaggeration.

And where's it from?

Found your link . . . It's a crappy editorial.

Why do defensive?

 

[ElFenix]

Originally posted by: kami

Originally posted by: baffled2

Originally posted by: ElFenix
the 1600+ can often reach 1750 actual MHz (166 bus) at regular voltage... thats a nice overclock. $55 well spent.

150 mhz increase in speed was a nice overclock back in the day of the C300A when cpu'ds went for bigger money,given a choice between spending $50 on heavy duty cooling and worrying about stabilty issues or just buying a faster cpu,I'll buy the faster chip, of course,at the default speeds cpu's are running at now, I doubt you'e going to notice 150 mhz speed increase unless you're an FPS junkie.

1600+ is like 1.4ghz isn't it? so it's a 350mhz overclock

25% overclock on both FSB and core both, definitely nothing to sneeze at.

you could probably do it with a $10 GC 68 too.

as i debunked over in general hardware an athlon running 70 watts puts out no more and no less heat than a pentium 4 running 70 watts, so "heat" is really a far-blown out of proportion thing.

slap an l1a on that gc 68 at it will be darn silent. insane3d has his perfectly stable with 2 fans, i think. stable, fast, quiet.

 

[apoppin]

Why so defensive?

The article is CRAP. Aside from this being an editorial - (read: stupid OPINION) - it appears to be from a failed O/C'er.

Instead of upgrading my system from a 1.2Ghz Tually Celeron to an expensive P4 system, I "bought" an extra 25% performance increase by simply increasing my FSB from 100 to 125 to 1.5Ghz. A 5% voltage increase insures stability and NO extra fans or noise whatsoever.

Believe me the diffference is very noticeable - so much so, I set my upgrading plans into the future (saving big bucks for now).

 

[Geekbabe]

Originally posted by: apoppin
Aside from this being an editorial - (read: stupid OPINION) - it appears to be from a failed o/c'er.

Instead of upgrading my system from a 1.2Ghz Tually Celeron to an expensive P4 system, I "bought" an extra 25% performance increase by simply increasing my FSB from 100 to 125 to 1.5Ghz. A 5% voltage increase insures stability and NO extra fans or noise whatsoever.

Believe me the diffference is very noticeable - so much so, I set my upgrading plans into the future (saving big bucks for now).

Increasing the FSB does give a very noticable increase in system speed, it's even nicer that you can usually do it with stock cooling,gotta love intel for that


I like AMD ,run an Athlon myself but whenever sonebody talks to me about buyiong a system,they don't want to hear about AMD,they want intel

 

[Deleted member 4644]

The quote is retarded. He simply doesnt understand. First of all, I have a 1ghz Athlon running at 1.5ghz. It cost me all of 30$ for my slightly upgraded HSF. Second of all, people who go overboard usually *like* what they are *doing*. They enjoy tweaking their computer, and they understand that it may actually cost the same as if they had bought a faster orginal CPU.

For one thing, overclocking is a great way for people to learn more about their computers. Why he is attacking that I dont know. Its like saying "people who paint their houses off-white are crazy, I only like white houses". Just because he doesnt like fan noise, doesnt mean that EVERYone shouldnt like fan noise... err something like that

 

[brtspears2]

Interseting, I don't seem to spend as much on overclocking than they say. All the costs are part of building a new computer. Why bother to O/C a duron when XP's are as cheap as sand?

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: baffled2


Increasing the FSB does give a very noticable increase in system speed, it's even nicer that you can usually do it with stock cooling,gotta love intel for that

If I were EXTREME (like the editor hints at), I would go for the +33% FSB increase to 1.6Ghz. But THEN, I would NEED to overvolt +20% and require an extreme (read: loud or wet) cooling solution.

There is usually a "sweet spot" where O/C'ing a CPU gives noticeable performance increases without sacrificing ANYthing.