Overclocking confusion

[Mike1949]

Question: I have a AMD 2600 XP+ Barton, a Shuttle AN35/Ultra and 1 gig of PQI PC3200 Turbo ram. I have read that all of this hardware loves to be over clocked.
In my mobo bios there are 4 settings under ?advanced chipset options?
___Optimal:____
FSB Freq. 166mhz
CPU interface ?Optimal?
Memory Freq. ?Auto?
Resulting Freq. ?Auto?
Memory Timings. ?Optimal?
T(ras) 7
T(rcd)4
T(rp)4
Cas Latency 2.0
At the boot screen it says my fsb is 400 mhz

____Aggressive___
FSB 166
CPU interface ?Aggressive?
Mem Freq. ?auto?
Resulting Freq. ?auto?
Mem Timing. ? aggressive?
T(ras)7
T(rcd)3
T(rp)3
Cas Latency 2.0
At the boot screen it says my DDR is ?Performance Enabled?


___Turbo____
FSB 166
CPU Aggressive
Mem Freq?auto?
Resulting Freq. ?auto?
Mem Timings. ?Turbo?
T(ras)6
T(rcd)2
T(rp)2
Cas Latency 2.0
The boot screen says my FSB is 333mhz


I don?t mess with Expert.
The one time I raised the fsb to 200mhz in Expert it raised my CPU speed to 2.3 but it wouldn?t load any programs like 3D benchmarks so I reset it to Optimal again

On 3D Benchmark2005 there is a difference of maybe 250 points between Optimal and Aggressive. 4300 in Optimal and 4570 with Aggressive. Aggressive and Turbo have nearly identical scores.
I have tried different settings in Half-Life 2 and get an increase of 6-8 fps with Aggressive or Turbo over Optimal.
Here?s where I?m confused: I have read and been told that the higher the FSB the faster the computer will work. But when I increase the bios performance setting from Optimal up to Aggressive , my CPU speed goes from 1.91mhz to1.92mhz but my FSB goes down to 333mhz.
What does this do exactly and is there a way to increase my fps without screwing up my computer?

 

[amol]

"OC it till it fries, buy another one, then OC it a little bit less"

Sorry, I just HAD to put that there

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: Mike1949
The one time I raised the fsb to 200mhz in Expert it raised my CPU speed to 2.3 but it wouldn?t load any programs like 3D benchmarks so I reset it to Optimal again

On 3D Benchmark2005 there is a difference of maybe 250 points between Optimal and Aggressive. 4300 in Optimal and 4570 with Aggressive. Aggressive and Turbo have nearly identical scores.
I have tried different settings in Half-Life 2 and get an increase of 6-8 fps with Aggressive or Turbo over Optimal. These settings are for your ram's timings timings. Generally, the "smaller" the number, the faster the ram will perform. This has nothing directly to do with the FSB speed.

Here?s where I?m confused: I have read and been told that the higher the FSB the faster the computer will work. Yes, this generally true. The exception is usually when selecting a ram command rate of 2T to reach higher FSB speeds. In other words, a PC with a FSB of 200 with a 1T rate will be faster than a PC at 210 FSB with a 2T rate. IIRC, on most NF2 mobo's the CPU interface is where you choose a rate of 1T or 2T. On the NF7-S I have, the choices are "enabled" (rate of 1T) or "disabled" (for 2T). I have a shuttle like your's. but the manual is at home. Hence, I can't say for sure what "optimal" or "aggressive" means on this mobo, and am puzzled since your post indicates that this settings affects the cpu's FSB speed? See if your BIOS has a setting for "cpu/dram ratio". This should be set to "auto" or 1:1 as you want the cpu and ram to run at the same frequency for best performance But when I increase the bios performance setting from Optimal up to Aggressive , my CPU speed goes from 1.91mhz to1.92mhz but my FSB goes down to 333mhz.
What does this do exactly and is there a way to increase my fps without screwing up my computer? Yes, first OC the cpu to the highest stably FSB speed while still keeping your cpu's load temp under 60c. Also post the vid card you have as that can be OC'd as well as has a direct impact on gamming performance too.

Hi Mike,

I left a message at your other post too.