Hello...

[JohnnyTheRed]

First post here, tho I've been perusing the forums for quite some time. I'm very impressed by the amount of knowledge possessed by most of you. I've always known enough to get me by, but I learn something new everyday. Very informative, very helpful.

If you don't mind, I'd like to ask some questions....not so much questions as recaps of some things...or a combonation thereof...

Please correct me if I'm wrong.

AMD's are usually better if you wish to upgrade sometime down the road...they don't change the size of their cpu's etc...
Intel however seems to change the size of their chips/interface with every new chip made, thus requiring a new/diff mobo?

Intel = pure speed, but that is usually what is required to get the job done. Stable enough to get ya by as well. Seems most benchmarks I've seen comparing AMD and Intel put Intel out on top.

FSB is the main way to o/c your chip?
ALong the lines of the last statement....The way to o/c your FSB is thru:
A) Your mobo?
B) An app?
C) Either of the two?

Are these apps usually manufacturer specific? or do they cover alot of the bases?

I'm not even really looking for answers atm, just like to clear my head of things from time to time.

Input is always welcome. And thanks agains for all your time and info.

[hydrata]

i'm not the most knowledgeable here (did i just misspell knowledgabljskfweoruw???) anyway....starting from the bottom, raising the front side bus is most commonly done through your motherboard's bios. The bios will usually have a place to do this in 1mhz increments. One thing to remember though when raising your front side bus is that you're raising the speed on everyting, your expansion cards, etc. So you have to be careful there, most motherboards sport either AGP/PCI locks or dividers to try and keep these speeds for other components in check, because they can't handle the higher speeds. Front side bus is the only way to overclock your chip for intel because they lock the chip multiplier. On athlon xp's you can do either, but to change the multiplier you have to unlock the chip, a somewhat tricky process. AMD has stuck with the same socket for a long time, but someone correct me if i'm wrong, i believe they're about to change to a new socket in the next few months for their upcoming hammer line of processors. However, the XP's are still going to be around as a value chip, so the socket should remain. Intel has changed their socket a lot recently, but i think the current socket 478 has some more lifetime as Intel plans to stick with the pentium 4 for a while.
Now, Intel's architecture and AMD's architecture differ. So don't compare megahertz to megahertz between the two. Intel's architecture allows for higher clock speeds, but AMD's focuses on lower clock speeds but more productivity at those clock speeds. That's why AMD has come up with their naming system, where an Athlon XP 2200+ actually runs at 1.8 ghz, but it can perform equally with an intel chip running at 2.2ghz. Hope that helps some and didn't bore you to death!!!

[dansonang]

mobo is the way and with the right bios and excellent cooling

[sundaythedog]

I can't believe no one's said:
WELCOME TO THE FORUMS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


W00T 3 Stars!