Please Help - Major Overclocking Differences With 2 Different P3V4Xs

[rpr]

My former P3V4X was rock solid with a 600E at 900Mhz. This board was an early version with the ICS clock gen chip (I did not need to cool it) and I was using BIOS 1003. I recently shorted it out (completely my fault, nothing to do with the overclocking), so I picked up another P3V4X. This newer board appears to have a Winbond ICS clock gen chip and BIOS 1005. I can only run this board at 800Mhz. It won't even post at 900Mhz!

I have not changed anything on this system other than the newer version of the P3V4X with the different clock gen chip and the newer BIOS. Does this surprise anybody or are the newer P3V4X boards known to have overclocking limitations. Could the BIOS be the problem? Should I try to flash the 1005 back to 1003?

I was so happy with my 600E at 900MHZ. How do I get it back? Any help will be greatly appreciated. Tx.

 

[AndyHui]

They don't produce the P3V4Xs with the ICS clock generator anymore.....the new boards are all Winbond chips...but there are still a few ICS gen P3V4Xs still floating around.

The obvious limitation is the lower number of FSBs available....only 16 on the Winbond instead of 32 on the ICS. You could use the same trick that people used to increase stability with the ICS generator.....put a heatsink on it. Try that and see if you can get back to 900MHz. You might also want to try the new 1006 beta BIOS.

 

[rpr]

The Winbond clock gen chip isn't even warm to the touch. I can't even post at 900 anymore since changing the board. Typically, if it's a heat issue, you will initially post but then have problems as the heat builds up in the weak link. So I don't think it's a heat issue. Any other suggestions?