General OC Questions

[BrianCapps]

The overclocking gods have now got a frim grip on what I used to call a social life. As if this were such a bad thing :D

I have started down the long and perilous path of overclocking my P!!! 1 GHZ. So far, were running smoothly at 1050 MHZ, but I thirst for more!

When I up my FSB any higher than 140, I get a windows protection fault. I have an inkling that this may be a RAM issue. How to I overclock the bus, and then 'underclock' my ram so that it still works?

I have 2 sticks of PC133 128meg RAM.

Also, I want to know: when should I up my Vcore?

Thanks a million, I know you've probably answered these questions a thousand times before, but added to 100, whats once more?

Brian

[batboy]

Not all motherboards allow you to underclock the memory bus. My Abit SA6R does allow you to do that in the BIOS, usually a 3/4 RAM divider is all you need. I know many of the Asus boards do too. Need to research your motherboard. Voltage should be bumped when you lose stability. Trouble is, your instability could be either CPU or RAM or cooling problems.

[BrianCapps]

What would you recommend as a means of RAM cooling? I have a Coolermaster P3 HSF, but will upgrade that soon and move it to my GF2mx400. I have an ABIT Se6 mobo

[batboy]

Did you really mean RAM cooling? As long as you have good air flow through your case, RAM should be ok. Or did you mean CPU cooling? I still have an Abit SE6 that I'm not using right now. Probably need to sell it. Anyway, yes you can set the memory bus divider with that motherboard. It's done in the Soft Menu II part of the BIOS.

[batboy]

I just remembered, everyone has trouble running RAM above 140 MHz on those SE6 boards. It's a known problem. Mine would not even run PC150 RAM at 140 FSB. You have to use the memory system divider. For example, if you enter "user define" settings and want to set the FSB to 140 MHz. You noticethat there are two 140 settings, one has (4:3:1) and the other has (4:4:1). Use the 140 (4:3:1) setting to utilize the 3/4 memory divider. The (4:4:1) runs the RAM at full FSB speed or 1:1.

[BrianCapps]

Ok, I've tried both settings (4:3:1, 4:4:1) at 147. No dice. Windoze is still giving me a protection error. Ideas?

Edit: Update! I lowered the ratio to 4:3:1, upped the Vcore to 1.8, and Viola! I am now crusing along at 1087. Also it brought my 3DMark score to 2387. Sweet!

Time to test this out a little. Quake 3, here I come.