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Please advise on what to use to close Duron L1 bridges.

M

Myrddin

Member

I have ordered an Epox 8KTA3, 256 MB OCZ PC150 2/2/2 memory and a Duron 800 to replace my 5EMA+, AMD K6-2 500 & 128 MB PC100 generic ram (worse yet, 2 different sticks of 64 MB PC100 generic).

I could have gone with a 1GHz T-Bird and 128 MB PC150 2/2/2 for about the same price, but some people convinced me that having one stick of good 256 MB will be better, and later I can put a 1.2 T-Bird or something in when they come way down in price and I won't have to worry about matching RAM sticks. Whether or not that is a real issue is pretty irrelevant because I just had to pick going one way or another. Either way by the end of the year I'll have 256 MB RAM and probably a 1.2 T-Bird.

Needless to say I am quite excited, as I anticipate this upgrade to go very well with my GeForce 2 32 MB card. The first game to get dusted off will be BGII which has been sitting on my shelf because I just can't bring myself to play the game with it being choppy and most of the effects turned off. I also anticipate better enjoyment of CounterStrike (I have a cable modem too so that helps).

My understanding is that the Duron will come @ 100 FSB and will have to be unlocked in order to run at 133+ FSB by closing the L1 bridges with something like a thin graphite pencil.

My 2 questions specifically are as follows:
1. What do you use to accomplish this? The connects look fairly small and I don't want to make a mistake like just using a sharp #2 pencil if that is the wrong thing to use. I have heard people going to art stores for certain kinds of pencils, etc . . . and I am just trying to get some ideas gathered in one place so I can do this right the first time.

2. Thermal Paste. I am getting a 2-fan cooler from OCZ that I am praying praying praying won't have any size issues with the 8KTA3. I have heard earlier versions of the 8KTA series have had issues with certain cooling solutions such as the Super Orb. Anyway the picture on the OCZ web site didn't make it look particularly large or anything so hopefully it will work. Ok, the thermal paste. I believe I understand how much to put on (thin layer), but I am a bit confused as to how whether I spread a thin layer across the whole surface of the heatsink or just in the middle or what. With my K6-2 500, I put a thin layer across the whole heatsink, but with the Duron it looks like such a tactic could cause problems due to the bridges and other things on the CPU. Any advice here would be appreciated.
 
I just used a #2 pencil for mine. Just bought a pack of 10 pencils at Wal-Mart for 98 cents. Some people complain that it rubs off, but you aren't one to constantly remove your processor for any reason, then don't worry about it. Good luck.
 
BE VERY CAREFUL! I used a #2 pencil to connect the L1 Bridges. They are almost microscopic so either have a darn good pair of eyes or use a magnifine lense. Make sure that you only connect each column of L1's and not the rows. Double check and tripple check that you do not have any stray pencil marks between the rows or between each column. If you make a mistake, using rubbing alcohol wipe it off, let it dry for a few minutes and start again. Also, If you plan on overclocking you must bring down your cpu temp. The best method is probably water cooling.
 
hehe

I was going to ask the same! I just picked up a Duron 600 and when I get my mobo, I'll be doing just that...linking those L1s....hehe

Thanks for the info everbody!!

Edblor
 
If you use a pencil, which I used first, and make a mistake just erase the marking with a good eraser. No alcohol required. The problem with using a pencil is if the temp gets to hot and over time the people report the pencil wearing out and needed to be redrawn.

As for the thermal paste, I think you want thermal grease not paste which is like glue. I use goop from 3dfxcool.com. But the best product on the market is artic silver. You want the thermal compound to be non-conductive just in case it comes into contact with the L1 bridges after putting the heat sink and fan on.

Glp1
 
I am amazed at the simplicity of using a pencil to unlock the CPU. I heard AMD is trying to sue computer stores who are selling their unlocked cpu's because it is causing them to lose money. From AMD's view point. If a consumer knows that with super cooling and unlocking they can make a 1100 MHz run stable at 1400 MHz than this "power user" will probably not consider upgrading their cpu for a much longer period of time. I think AMD was stupid for letting consumers unlock the CPU but as long as they are allowing it I am going to run my cpu to the max!
 

I'll need water cooling to o/c the Duron 800? I was figuring that I could probably get up to 980 (7x140) with just the OCZ 2-fan heatsink/cooler combo, or perhaps 1GHz (7.5x133 or 7x143). I have read that it is very difficult and not particularly useful to o/c a Duron past that point, as the returns diminish. If I can't get up that high, I'll have to settle for something a shade lower, either 6.5x140 or 6.5x133.

I figure once I close the L1s, there will probably be very little, if any, reason to remove the CPU. If that is the case I assume then from the advice I've heard here that sharp #2 pencils will probably do the job and last a good while. I have also heard of use of conductive epoxy, but I probably would only investigate that if I had trouble with the graphite connections.

The conductive pen looks very interesting! Are there any stores like Radio Shack that might carry them? I hate to place an online order w/shipping for a $10 item if it is available locally. I'll probably just hit Radio Shack on the way home and see what they have.

Finally I have seen people solder the L1s. Since I have no experience with that, I will leave that one totally alone 🙂

Thanks everyone for the advice, and keep it coming if you have something else to add. I will start checking the house for a good magnifying glass, something my wife probably has stashed away somewhere.
 
You don't need water cooling for a Duron. You won't gain much speed by water cooling, though it may make your processor last 10 years instead of 6. Check out my AMD rig. I'm .ust using a HSF similar to the Globalwin FOP-32, and I can push a 600 to 1070. I run it at 1000 just to be safe. Also FSB overclocking isn't as effective on the AMDs as multiplier overclocking. You should try 1000 (10X100) @ 1.85 Core voltage. The reason it is 10X100 instead of 10X133 is because the memory runs at 133 and the CPU runs at 100 on a seperate bus from the memory.
 
LordSandMan we are now talking about the KT133a chipset where the CPU bus is synched with the memory bus, i.e. the CPU and memory both run at 133+ (266) FSB. Thereby 7x143 would be a good bit faster than 10x100, assuming you have memory that can handle a FSB of 143.

With the KT133a chipset, FSB clocking *is* much more effective than multiplier overclocking, because you have access to much higher bus speeds. XBit and other sites have reported being able to run KT133a chipset boards at 150 MHz FSB! Believe me you will see good performance gains if you have RAM and other components capable of operating at 150 MHz FSB.

But thanks for the input, the more the merrier!
 
Myrrdin, you seem a little confused about the FSB speed of duron motherboards. The default FSB is 100MHz not 133MHz. So for a duron 700MHz processor the settings are 7X100. I oc my duron 700 to 900 by increasing the multiplier to 9 and leaving the FSB speed at 100. You can however run the memory at either 100 or 133 depending on your bios settings. At least this is my understanding, anyone please feel free to correct any misconceptions I may have.


Okay, disregard the above statement about the FSB speeds. I just checked out the via website and the KT7a chipset does indeed run at a FSB speed of 133/266 instead of the 100/200 that the KT7 runs at.

Glp1
 
My understanding is that the KT133a chipset motherboards allow for FSB overclocking. If that is an incorrect assumption someone let me know asap. You use the L1 bridge closing to reduce the multiplier to run at a higher FSB speed, such as 7x143=1000.

If my understanding is incorrect, someone also needs to explain to me how XBit and other sites are running Durons at 133+ FSB all the way up to 150 MHz! See:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/

Which has a news link to the exact article:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/#979287098

They report 150 Mhz FSB with the 8KTA3, the exact same mobo shipping to me as we speak.
 
I didn't know KT133A boards were available yet. At any rate, from what I heard a while ago, you need a 133Mhz bus processor. I would assume putting a 100Mhz bus processor in a KT133A board would still work but only at 100Mhz. I also heard that like 1 out of 20 100Mhz bus processors could actually handle 133. I can't guarnatee this information is accurate, it's just what I recall seeing on some websites 2-3 months ago.
 

http://www.hardocp.com/reviews/mainboards/abit/kt7a/index.html

LSM, check the HardOCP article address above or the XBit address mentioned a couple posts back. The AMD CPUs they are using are 100 FSB parts running beyond spec. The KT7A HardOCP review starts as follows:

"I know there are a lot of you reading this review for just one reason. You want to know if we can use our current 100MHz bus AMD CPUs on these new 133MHz bus boards. Well, if that is why you are here, let me save you a little time..."

And he then shows a WCPUID report of T-Bird 750 running at 8x140. Keep in mind, this is a 100 MHz FSB part running at 140 FSB. The reviewer also seems to believe this applies to Durons as well when he says:

"It is certainly fit to follow in the footsteps of the KT7. And, of course, allowing us to OC our TBirds and Durons on a 133MHz bus is a great bonus!"

This seems to fit what XBit claims about running Durons at higher FSB speeds.

The test for me, of course, will be when I get my own Duron 800 and Epox 8KTA3 next week. The RAM will surely be able to clock up well past 133 so the CPU will be the testing factor.

 
Myrddin,

Your assumptions are absolutely correct regarding the KT133A chipset. Normal (100FSB TBIRDS/DURONS) are overclocking very well using 133 and higher FSB. As posted, FSB overclocking results in improved performance over the same speed at 100FSB. Kyle showed some benchmarks using 100FSB with 133 memory and as a comparison 133FSB with 133 memory. I would say that 145FSB with decent memory would be OK but higher FSB gets into the overclocking of the PCI and AGP buses. While the AGP should be no problems, higher than default PCI can be an issue depending on your other system components.
 
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