Will Overclocking my P4 shorten its lifespan.

[framerateuk]

And by how much?

Ive got my 2.53 running at 2.85 right now, hoping to up the voltage a bit and get it running at 3Ghz tonight.

At this speed how long will it last?

Its a c1 stepping by the way.

 

[CraigRT]

Just keep it cool.... and it'll run good for quite some time... heat kills!!

 

[Smilin]

Yes it will shorten the life. Since you are a 'power user' and probably upgrade more often than most it will probably not die before you upgrade to your next cpu...provided of course you don't do something to let the smoke out.

 

[framerateuk]

But how long?

Months? Years?

I dont exactally plan on upgrading every few months, and usually i keep a CPU for about 18 months before upgrading to something new.

 

[Telsari]

Should be fine... I remember several years back I got a 300 Mhz Celeron... and overclocked it to 450 Mhz. I got it back in '97, and it still runs fine. The life of the core depends on several factors, including operating temperature (heat kills), quality of manufacture, voltage, power supply, etc, etc. If you upgrade every 18 months... you probably won't ever see a problem.

 

[framerateuk]

Originally posted by: Telsari
Should be fine... I remember several years back I got a 300 Mhz Celeron... and overclocked it to 450 Mhz. I got it back in '97, and it still runs fine. The life of the core depends on several factors, including operating temperature (heat kills), quality of manufacture, voltage, power supply, etc, etc. If you upgrade every 18 months... you probably won't ever see a problem.

Thats good to hear.

Ive heared the P4 Northwoods are particularly vunerable to high voltages. How high is a safe voltage?

 

[Vic]

Originally posted by: framerateuk

Originally posted by: Telsari
Should be fine... I remember several years back I got a 300 Mhz Celeron... and overclocked it to 450 Mhz. I got it back in '97, and it still runs fine. The life of the core depends on several factors, including operating temperature (heat kills), quality of manufacture, voltage, power supply, etc, etc. If you upgrade every 18 months... you probably won't ever see a problem.

Thats good to hear.

Ive heared the P4 Northwoods are particularly vunerable to high voltages. How high is a safe voltage?

I suggest you read up on "Sudden Northwood Death Syndrome"
From what I have seen, sustained voltages above 1.75v can cause the cpu to suddenly die in as little as a month's time.
Otherwise, a properly cooled and conservatively overclocked Northwood should last a long time. Sure, OC'ing will shorten the life of any cpu, but cpu's are already designed to last for 10 years, shortening to 2-3 years is really no big deal.

 

[framerateuk]

Originally posted by: Vic

Originally posted by: framerateuk

Originally posted by: Telsari
Should be fine... I remember several years back I got a 300 Mhz Celeron... and overclocked it to 450 Mhz. I got it back in '97, and it still runs fine. The life of the core depends on several factors, including operating temperature (heat kills), quality of manufacture, voltage, power supply, etc, etc. If you upgrade every 18 months... you probably won't ever see a problem.

Thats good to hear.

Ive heared the P4 Northwoods are particularly vunerable to high voltages. How high is a safe voltage?

I suggest you read up on "Sudden Northwood Death Syndrome"
From what I have seen, sustained voltages above 1.75v can cause the cpu to suddenly die in as little as a month's time.
Otherwise, a properly cooled and conservatively overclocked Northwood should last a long time. Sure, OC'ing will shorten the life of any cpu, but cpu's are already designed to last for 10 years, shortening to 2-3 years is really no big deal.

Just did some reading on that... Seems a bit worrying, could it happen if i keep my vcore below 1.65v in the BIOS?
Is it really worth risking it? I really cant just buy another chip.

 

[OverVolt]

It WILL shorten it but it's ard to say how much. CPU's are meant to last 10yrs but i think oc'ing will bring it down to 5

 

[Ketchup]

I think it all depends on how much you overclock and what you do to get it at that speed. Someone correct me if I am wrong, but say you overclocked a P4 from 1.8 to 2.4 GHz without touching the voltage (assuming it's stable of course), the chip would last just as long as it would if it ran stock speed its entire life. (you would, in effect, be turning your 1.8A to 2.4B as far as CPU power dissipation is cocerned.)

The problem arises when you add voltage, you are stressing the trasistors beyond what they are designed to handle. Then, the lifespan of your CPU depends mostly on how much voltage you are applying to the chip and how cool you keep it.

 

[Outlaw]

I wouldnt worry unless you apply the voltage modification to the pins as seen here:

P4 Mod

My P4 1.8A @ 2750 lasted 6 months before it starting acting up and eventually died.

 

[LiQiCE]

I have a PII/333 o/c'ed to 400 (was before Intel applied a multiplier lock, at that time it was only a multiplier limit, so you could easily just bump the FSB to 100Mhz and lower the multiplier) ... And a Celeron 300A o/c'ed to 450 in my parent's / brother's machine. Both chips are about 4-5 years old now, and are starting to show signs that they're dying. Of course, getting 5 years out of the CPU means that replacing it with a chip for $50, and a motherboard for $80 would at least double the performance if not triple it (without overclocking).

Not a really big deal ... I ended up getting a P4 2.4B for my parent's and am gonna give my XP1900+ to my brother. Unless you're bumping up the voltage like crazy (both the PII and Celeron were running stock voltage), you should be able to get at least 3 years out of the chip, at which time replacing it with something equivalent or faster should be dirt cheap.

 

[Duvie]

Originally posted by: Outlaw
I wouldnt worry unless you apply the voltage modification to the pins as seen here:

P4 Mod

My P4 1.8A @ 2750 lasted 6 months before it starting acting up and eventually died.

I have done the pin mod on my p4...still running 6+ months....HOwever I only have 2 pins wrapped to make its default vcore 1.7v...The vid shows 4 pins wrapped and I don't remember that at all in the directions. So I will assume you were going much higher then 1.7v. I also have only done it because my epox mobo came with 1.65v in +.15v adjustment and undervolts by .07v. Meaning the best I could get was 1.57-1.58v idle. So I set it to 1.7v and bumped it to +.075v to give me an actual 1.7v in windows as reported by epox, sandra, and mbm....

Many have done pin mod and chips work fine, so don't think this proves anything. However in your case that f'd up mod you showed is clearly different then what I read whenI did mine. You screwed it up!!!

Stay under 1.7v idle and you should be fine.....

IMO, if you run default vcore...ie my 1.6a@2.53ghz requires only default vcore....and temps are well below the throttling limit theoretically it should last the same as 2.53ghz stock. However Intel stresses them to levels we may not be able to duplicate and may have seen weaknesses we don't. That being said I basically go with the theory Intel gets consistent and tremendous yields and many chips were downsized to meet market demand for the range speed chip....


Anything over default vcore should diminish the longevity, but at what percentage is anyones guess. You likely may not see it if you are like me and change them out at least twice in 1 year....

 

[LouPoir]

Overclocking will shorten the P4 life. From 10 years to 5. Who cares cause you will never keep it that long.

Lou

 

[Regalk]

On Wednesday I will be testing a 1.6A that ran at 2.176 for 8 months at 1.525 voltage and then started to misbehave (crashed at 133FSB) - even at default voltage it can still give problems.

 

[batotman]

I'm not so sure it will really shorten its life unless you add too much voltage or let it get too hot. A good example is my OLD OLD OLD pentium 166@200Mhz. That sucker has been probably been overclocked for over 5 years. Still runs (still slow...lol) with a passive heatsink!

 

[Regalk]

Originally posted by: batotman
I'm not so sure it will really shorten its life unless you add too much voltage or let it get too hot. A good example is my OLD OLD OLD pentium 166@200Mhz. That sucker has been probably been overclocked for over 5 years. Still runs (still slow...lol) with a passive heatsink!

Different time different technology - apples and oranges

 

[framerateuk]

Well its been running on default voltage, at 2.85ghz for a few days now, and is solid as a rock, any higher and it crashes (needs more voltage).

I think ill leave it at what its on, im pretty happy with the speed.

Thanks for all the replies!

 

[Regalk]

Update
My friend's computer with a 1.6A is definitely dying. It used to run at 2133 now can only run at spec. This is inspite of removing stock HS and using ASilver and cleaning up the whole board (after 8 months). Even tried an Antec True Power PS (replacing his generic). I know it can't be the board (Asus P4S333) since even though it overvolts I compensated for that.