locked? unlocked?

[RangerJoe34]

how can i tell if my cpu is locked or unlocked???
i bought a retail off of newegg and i dunno what it is, but it seems to not be stable at speeds over 1.45 ghz even those the temps are at 35-37c soo i dunno whats up

[thefly]

locked and unlocked has taken on a new meaning now that the xp chips are out.

There is two definitions.
one for thunderbird and one for xp.


Thunderbird locked.

Look at the L1 bridges with a jewels loop. If they are cut with a lazer and thus non connected, the chip is locked. But lucky for you, all you have to do is connect the L1s with conductive ink and you've got an unlocked chip.

Thunderbird unlocked.

The chip arrives in your hands and you check the L1 bridges to find the chips bridges are connected! yippie! You don't have to do anything to this chip. It's ready to be overclocked.

XP chip locked.

When examining the L1 bridges on the chip you notice that there is a nasty lazer trench dug in between the L1 bridges. This visible gap in the cpu surface makes it much more difficult to unlock the chip by connecting the L1s but it is not impossible.

XP chip unlocked.

Peering at the L1s you see that the bridges are cut. However the chip does not suffer from the nasty lazer trench. So, this is what is being considered an unlocked xp chip. You still must connect the L1s with conductive paint or defogger repair kit. but it's easy as pie.

confused yet?

[RangerJoe34]

will a locked chip let you overclock just a little, but then not work past a certain point?

[flounder43]

No, if you want to change the multipier, you need to unlock it. If you don't have the bridges unlocked, the bios will set it back to default. My experience is with a 1.0 Ghz Athlon.

Fsb overclocking will be OK, but that is not the best way to get top O/C results with an Athlon.

Get out a sharp pencil, it is easy!

[RangerJoe34]

well right now the multiplier is set to 10.5
and the fsb is 135 or 136 cant remember
and it wont seem to go any higher, yet it is PLENTY cold
i ran this cpu tempature program
and when it got done, it said "COLD" but the cold has icicles over it so it cant be too hot, i have no idea why it wont go any higher, and i think my motherboard has the problem with the usb ports being shut off if you put the fsb any higher than 145 or something like that because my optical mouse wasnt working when i put it that high

[thefly]

locked chips won't allow you to change the multiplier.

so say you're running 10x100=1000 and you bump the mult up
to 11x100=1100. if the chip is locked you're system won't boot and you'll probably have to reset the cmos.

if it's factory unlocked, like some 1.3s are, you'll boot up at 1100.

with frontside bus overclocking it doesn't matter if the cpu is locked because your boosting the bus of the board not the cpu core.