Overclocking Red core Athlon - not too successful...

cookieman

Senior member
Jun 12, 2001
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Hi!

I thought that the Tunderbirds came in 2 color flavors: the blue core and the green core.
But I have bought an T-bird 1Ghz/266 that has the core colored in a red-ish way. Its not green or blue. It's red.

Has anyone of you meet such T-birds?

Can they be OC-ed well ?
Can somebody tell me what week is my Athlon?

The mark on the CPU sais:
A1000AMT3C
ASHHA 0132 UPEW
96549360463
1999 AMD.

I guess no one have met such Athlons ... :( No reference on Web on the stepping either...


Cheers,
 

DAPUNISHER

Super Moderator CPU Forum Mod and Elite Member
Super Moderator
Aug 22, 2001
31,702
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I haven,t seen the red core before but your chip is week32 of this year. The I.D. guide is here here under section11(ordering information). Sounds like a good overclocker but you'll have to tell me :)
 

cookieman

Senior member
Jun 12, 2001
381
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Thanks DAPUNISHER! You helped me a lot!

I'm already downloading the PDF.

I'll surely post my OC experinece with this T-bird...!

Cheers
 

Mingon

Diamond Member
Apr 2, 2000
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There has been some reports of red die athlons, its just the polishing that decides the colour.
 

cookieman

Senior member
Jun 12, 2001
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Mingon. Can you point me to some Web pages where this reports can be found?
Or is this kind of Athlon very new series?

Cheers,
 

Boonesmi

Lifer
Feb 19, 2001
14,448
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the color of the polish used to be a way to detect if the cpu was made in dresden, or texas, but it no longer really tells you anything (when they buy new polish it can have any random tint to it.

all new tbirds/xp/mp have copper interconnects, so they are all made in germany (dresden)

of the tbirds that are lower then 1ghz can be either texas or germany (texas will be aluminum, germany will be copper) the ones made in germany will have much more potential for overclocking

all durons are made in texas (so they are aluminum-thats why durons rarely hit big numbers once you get over 1ghz)
 

cookieman

Senior member
Jun 12, 2001
381
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Hi!

Athlon 1Ghz/266 FSB - red core - ASHHA stepping.

Well I unlocked the multiplier (soldering the L1 bridges as I did when I had the Duron) and I tryid to OC-it!

The maximum I could make it stable is 1.1Ghz at 1.85V. This Athlon do not like the overclocked hard. I noticed strange errors when I tried to OC this beast at default voltage.

Given the speed of 1.1Ghz at 1.75V or 1.775V or 1.80V did made some "rounding error" in Prime95 and some times locked hard on me when I used Windows. So I pushed the vcore to 1.825 and this made it stable but once the Explore process had failed on me once so I decided to stay at 1.85V. Since then everithing is fine: no prime Errors (ran it for 4-5 hrs) and no errors in UT.
I made my testings with my system at a minimum config. I removed the soundcard and the TVTunner card and installed a fresh version of Win98.

The PSU can handle this Athlon pretty easily, the 5V rail had never gone below 4.98 and the 12V rail is arounf 12.12.

So I guess the redcore Athlons are not so overclockable (10%) but right now I like the speed of 1.1Ghz. :)
Temps stood fine at 45-46C idle and 51-53C full load, case temp 29-30C-ambient 23-24C. CPU cooler is an WBK68 with it's 60x60x10 fan running at lowered speed -> 3600RPM combined with a duct - arctic silver used. Case carpeted to deaden the noise.

System is very-very quiet.

I used the latest Abit bios available (64).

But I still have a question: are my temps fine? Or I will be in trouble in summer when ambient is gonna rise to 27-28C ?

I guess it's time for me to update my sig :)
Cheers,
 

cookieman

Senior member
Jun 12, 2001
381
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0
Hi!

I know that everybody is talking about the XP right now but I reiterate my question about my little Athlon:
23-24C ambient, case temp 29-30C, 45-46C idle and 51-53C full load. Are my temps OK? Am I gonna be in trouble in summer ?

Thanks in advance for replies...

And yeah -> Bump,
 

MeTaLrOcKeR

Junior Member
Nov 12, 2001
22
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0
Hey there, i noticed in your sig. your running your CPU at a FSB of 138MHz...maybe your MB/CPU doesn't like FSB Overclock, try raising the Multiplier from 7.5 (1000MHz) to 8.0 or even 8.5 etc.

Check it out, see how it goes......ALSO your temps could be whats effectign tour CPU from not beign able to OC to high.....try putting an oscalating fan on the side of your case witht he sidign off...see if it makes a diff when you OC it higher..if so, you know where the problem lies.....

Anyhoo, take care...
 

cookieman

Senior member
Jun 12, 2001
381
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0
Hi!

Thanks for advices MeTaLrOcKeR-er :)

I know that this board runs well at 138FSB because I ran a OC-ed Duron in it before the Athlon. The NorthBridge HSF was also replaced so I know that it can handle the load without a hinch (memory timings are very relaxed). First I thought that myself and tried the multiplier 8x133, 8,5x133, 9x133. Once I got past 1133 Mhz it started to make errors in Prime, no matter how high I put the voltage (max 1.96vcore). And sometimes locked hard on me when in idle ?! Also the temps were not so high then because I OC-ed with the case open and the CPU stood maxed at 49C.

I remember my Duron's overclocking experience and I feel it that was better OC-able than this ASHHA T-bird. I oc-ed the Duron and used regular silicon paste, but for this T-bird I used arctic silver.

I think I did my best and I cannot get more power from this CPU. But no problem I still like the 1.1Ghz T-bird's speed.

Yesterday I did put the PAPST fan that's inside my PSU at a higher speed.
Now the temps look like this: 23-24C ambient, case temp 27-28C, 44C idle and 50-51C full load. I guess that's better now. No stability problem what so ever. I recorded from my TVTuner card 1.5 hrs compressing the stuff directly in DivX while running Prime in background to keep the CPU maxed out. Max temp was 51C. I think this is fine now. Stability Ok. I make some testing in the weekend to see how it's working.

Cheers,
 

MeTaLrOcKeR

Junior Member
Nov 12, 2001
22
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0
Sounds good cookieman.........

BTW i did have one more idea.....

DROP your Multiplier to 6.0x and Raise your FSB to 166.....(996MHz ROUNDED it will show 1000MHz)
NOW, if your rig will work at that speed......MUCH FASTER than having a FSB of 133 or 138 whether it be 1GHz OR 1.1GHz CPU Clock.........try it..... =)
 

cookieman

Senior member
Jun 12, 2001
381
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0
Hi!

I think my RAM would not run ar 166 (cheap CAS3 noname sdram 64+128 modules)... I do not know if my KT7A knows the 166 FSB. (I never was interested in this till now :) ).
I'll look at it tomorow.

Cheers and thanks,
 

Jerboy

Banned
Oct 27, 2001
5,190
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<< the color of the polish used to be a way to detect if the cpu was made in dresden, or texas, but it no longer really tells you anything (when they buy new polish it can have any random tint to it.

all new tbirds/xp/mp have copper interconnects, so they are all made in germany (dresden)

of the tbirds that are lower then 1ghz can be either texas or germany (texas will be aluminum, germany will be copper) the ones made in germany will have much more potential for overclocking

all durons are made in texas (so they are aluminum-thats why durons rarely hit big numbers once you get over 1ghz)
>>



Where are processors really made?

Does it involve more than one factory?

My processor box says "AMD ATHLON/1400-266 Assembled in Malaysia"
 

cookieman

Senior member
Jun 12, 2001
381
0
0
Hi Jerboy!

Did your CPU came with a HSF? Maybe that's were your HSF came from (Malaysia)...

Cheers,

 

Boonesmi

Lifer
Feb 19, 2001
14,448
1
81
amd only has 2 fabs one in texas and one in dresden, the one in dresden is capable of making cpu's with copper interconnects... the one in austin texas isnt.


(this is just refering to the cpu core, not the whole cpu packaging) in the days before 1ghz tbirds you could tell by the color of the die polish which fab the cpu was made in.... this is why blue and green so well known (i cant remember which one was dresden, blue or green) and texas was the other

cause the ones made in texas would rarely overclock very well because of the aluminum interconnects (this is the same reason durons rarely overclock much higher then 1ghz)