TH7II o/c 133MHz (later)

[Undertaker2002]

I need to buy a system but I can't wait for i850E so I was wandering if I would get the TH7II now and use a 1.8AGHz P4 along with PC800 and later o/c the board to 133MHz and use a true 533MHz P4 along with PC1066.

Will it work and will I be shortening any componenet's life expactency ???(<---Important)

 

[mchammer187]

you dont have to worry about component expectancy doing this

but you have to get a TH 7 II that has the correct ICS clock generators because not all of them will do 533 Mhz FSB

 

[Undertaker2002]

What's an ICS clock generator, what's the correct one, and how can I make sure it is the correct one?
Won't the mainboard require extra cooling or something??

 

[Wolfsraider]

<< What's an ICS clock generator, what's the correct one >>



the ics clock generators are set at 133 and are the reason that people can get to 133 front side bus on the northwood processors (as the older clock generators are set to 100 mhz)



<< and how can I make sure it is the correct one >>



you have to find a site like atacom.com that lists it in there specs like the asus p4t-e listed here

ASUS P4TE FOR P4 478 PIN CPU W/O AUDIO(W/ ICS CLOCK GENERATOR-NEW REV) RDRAM TURBO MODE AVAILABLE -LIMITED QTY (BACK ORDER)

but as you can see there is quite a demand for guarenteed ics generators the newer abit th7ll boards also are supposed to have this feature but buying it unless you get written conformation your stuck with what you get and the longer its been since the store/website you buy it from may mean yhe older chips

if you can find ics chips (that is the new name) then you stand a better chance of overclocking

 

[PowerEngineer]

Here are some threads under "Motherboards", like this one that discuss the good and the bad DRCGs on the Abit TH7II and Asus PT4-E. Also a lot of good information in the Intel motherboard forums over at overclockers.com.

You'll see that older BIOS versions that don't (reliably) support P4 Northwoods have also been an issue for both boards. Andy Hui has a FAQ that addresses the P4T-E here

It seems now that most boards are showing up with the ICS-*-03 DRCGs. While these are rated at 400 MHz, many people are able to reach 500 MHz to support a 133 FSB. Older boards with the CYP DRCGs are generally poorer overclockers. Some lucky fellows report getting the ICS-*-13 DRCGs that are rated for 600 MHz for a 150 MHz FSB, however these paridoxiaclly seem to also have been on some older boards too.

The more recent TH7II purchased from Newegg are reported to come with the new version 38 BIOS, the AC2001 sound, and the ICP-*-03 DRCGs

As wolfraider points out, you can get a P4T-E with good DRCGs for a $25 premium. There are also some sites (the links to which escape me) that offer pretested CPU/motherboard bundles guaranteed (more or less) to overclock to the 133 FSB.

Me...I'm holding out until the I850E boards come out!

Good Luck