Quick question on BH6 and OC'ing

[Bomba]

Hi there,

I've been out of the OC'ing scene for over a year now (see what happens when you get married...) and my trusty BH6 v.1 and C300 oc'd to 450 is getting kind of slow.

I would really appreciate it if I could get some opinions on the best (i.e. fastest, price/performance, and most reliably overclockable) chip I should go out and buy.

I'm leaning towards the Celeron 633 because reading on this board it looks like it can regularly be OC'd to 950...

On a related note, should the chip be:
- retail vs. OEM
- include a heatsink (related to retail/OEM status?)
- specific shipment (i.e. Malay, etc...)
- any other tips?

Thanks in advance!

-Bomba

 

[snichols]

I've got a BX6 2, a little newer than yours, but you can still put one of those Abit slotkets on the BH6. The BH6 does have the 100Mhz bus, right? A Globalwin will only set you back around $20-$25. I have a 566@850 no problem, but you might want to go with that 633. I would go retail, they seem to get better results. For that matter, the fan/heatsink on the retail version is not that bad.

Good Luck

 

[CyberBlade]

I'm in the same situation, (BH6 v. 1 OC'd Cel300A to 450), but I thought that the celeron 600's were unstable when OC'd. True or false, I haven't been following these boards and am looking for as much info as possible. I'm having a hard time finding a Cel 566.

 

[Nack]

I am running a BH6 with a PIII 700/100 @ 933MHz/133 with default voltage. It is a great combination if your SDRAM will run at 133 MHz FSB and you get a lucky PIII. I recommend a Malaysian chip, FC-PGA on an slotket adapter board, retail boxed because those are guaranteed to not be pretested "rejects", and a good sized heatsink/fan with thermal compound. Also make sure you get a cB0 stepping processor, not the older cA2. If you get an older cA2 stepping chip, don't even open it, as you would have virtually NO shot at 933MHz. The PIII that will probably do 933MHz costs right at twice what the Celeron that will do 950 costs, but the PIII is running on a faster 133MHz FSB (after you overclock it) and it also has 256k of L2 cache instead of 128. If you are on a very tight budget, you can do the celemine, but the PIII rig will be considerably faster in certain applications if you can afford the extra $80.

Good luck,

Nack

Oh, almost forgot. The 133MHz FSB setting on my BH6 1.01 (I have the older board, which is a 1.01, NOT 1.1) DOES offer a 1/4 PCI/FSB divider even though it falsely says 1/3 (which would kill your PCI peripherals). I flashed it to the SS bios with a mendocino celery I had laying around before I even put in the PIII coppermine.

 

[Goi]

If you want to spend minimal cash, then a Celeron is hard to beat. I haven't really been paying much attention to the C2's overclocking abilities beyond the C566, but if the percentage of C633s reaching 950 is high, it should be a fairly good buy. Performance should be similar to a P3 750 to 800MHz in most applications.

If you have a hundred bucks more though, it might be worth it to get a P3 700+ and try overclocking it to 900+. Of course, since the BH6 lacks a 1/4 PCI divider or a 1/2 AGP divider, you gotta make sure your PCI peripherals and your AGP graphics card can work at the overclocked speed.

Edit: Just read Nack's post about the 1/4 PCI divider. I wasn't aware that the BH6 has that. Are you sure Nack? I have a BH6 v1.0x too, but I've only used FSBs of up to 112MHz before, haven't tried anything beyond that, so I can't verify that. If there is indeed a 1/4 PCI divider then that's good news, since most of the time its the PCI peripherals that don't work properly with high clock speeds. Most newer AGP graphics cards work just fine with an overclocked AGP.

 

[Nack]

Goi,

My BH6 v.1.01 flashed to SS bios reports a 1/3 PCI/FSB divider at 133MHZ FSB speed, but ACTUALLY IMPLEMENTS a 1/4 PCI/FSB divider when running at 133MHz FSB (I saw the 1/3 indication in the bios screen, but was in a particularly evil mood, and decided to try it anyway. Much to my pleasant suprise, not only did everything work just fine, I have been able to verify the actual 1/4 divider). Several hardware info programs report either that the motherboard is implementing a 1/4 PCI/FSB divider, or, depending on the program, that my PCI bus is running at ~33-34MHz right where it should be. More importantly, my hard drive, and PCI cards are working just fine. I even used to have a PCI video card running in this system perfectly with my 1/4 PCI/FSB at 133MHz divider, but I recently swapped it for a Radeon 32MB DDR AGP. The Radeon seems to like running at ~89MHz AGP bus (set to 2/3 of 133). I never would have guessed 2-3 years ago when I acquired most of these parts (except the processor and vid card) that I would still be able to make a very respectable gaming and photo editing system out of it 3 years in the future, but this old board just won't stop surprising me.

Good luck if you decide to try the 133MHz bus. Let me know if it works out for you. I would be interested in knowing if all BH6s have this characteristic.

Nack

 

[AceErik]

Hey Bomba. I recently upgraded from a C300 oc'd to 450. I got a (guaranteed) 566 at 910. I also got a MSI slotket. I have a BH6 also. It works fine at 850 with default voltage. I'd say go for a slotket and 566 because there is a really really good chance that it will overclock. Also you can find people post on Anandtech that sell guaranteed C566s. I also bought my own heatsink. I am pretty sure that Compuwiz still sells C566's. sorry i can't give a lot of input.
Erik

 

[Bomba]

Whoa, thanks for all the great advice guys!

Sorry I haven't been responding quickly - I got this biochem midterm on Thursday that's been taking all my free time. I think Im going to go for the celeron633 because I've seen it here in Toronto for about 150-60$ (Canadian). Other then this, I need to pick up a slotket adaptor and then Im golden. The 566 sounds good too, but from other posts I've come across it seems like the 633 has a better chance at OC'ing (but Ace Erik's suggestion of finding a guaranteed OC 566 on sale here might do it also)...

Enough of my rambling - thanks again for your advice, and wish me luck when I get started (hopefully next week)!

-Bomba

 

[AceErik]

You are correct Bomba. The 633 can OC better than the 566. Good luck on the midterm and the OCing.
Erik

 

[Drifter]

my system

P3 700(SL45Y 26week)@933 FC-PGA (IWill slocket 2)1.65V
BH-6 Rev1.01 (ss)
Asus Geforce 2 MX
Qestec PC133 256meg
Seagate 30 gig
Asus 36X
Yamaha 8X8X24
Yamaha speaker/sub

>For the record . This combo is rock solid

 

[Serville]

Want to ask all BH6 users here,
Does BH6 have 90 or 95Mhz FSB ?
How is the PCI Divider implemented for FSB <100MHz FSB ?
Is it 1/2 or 1/3 ?

Is the PCI always a fraction of the FSB in any board?
Can it be implemented as a fraction of AGP speed, in some board perhaps ?

 

[Nick Stone]

Serville

No the BH6 doesn't have 90 - 95 FSB options.
The PCI/FSB is like most older BX MB's, 1/2 for 66 mhz -- 1/3 for 100 mhz FSB as set in soft menu.
You can get 1/4 in some BX boards and some non-BX boards as Via chipset boards.
AGP options in BH6 are 1/1 and 2/3. All BX boards are like this.

 

[Goi]

Nack, cool...that's good to know, even though I probably won't have any use for it. My C566 won't go beyond 875.5MHz(103MHz FSB), and my next upgrade would include a new motherboard.

 

[Instigator]

I just got my Celeron II 633 from buy.com for $82. And it does 950mhz at 1.75 volts. Great cpu for $82. If you go to www.fatwallet.com and click on buy.com there is a $20 instant coupon you can use. Plus if you order by midnight tonight you get free shipping.
I would recommend the 633. Also, I'm using the Thermaltake Golden Orb with some Artic Silver thermal compound and the Abit Slotket III. I'm going to try for 1064mhz later this week. Here are the specs on the cpu:

Malay
Week 26
SL3W9
cB0

Good luck.