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pIII 500mhz????

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ghitch75

Registered
Joined
Oct 22, 2002
Location
B.F.E.
will i'm new to this so bear with me.my motherboard is a AM-BX2V3 and an 440bx chipset and a PIII 500mhz cpu. so where do i start to overclock this? thanks
 
First off, WELCOME TO THE FORUMS!

If you haven't already read this, the Overclockers.com Beginner's Guide Section has some good stuff to know about how to overclock, and other helpful hints about your computer in general. One article I think is definitely worth a look is this one, which was written by one of our Forum Senior Members, Batboy. It is a very thorough article that gives you the do’s and don’ts of overclocking. Likewise, you might find the CPU Database of some help in determining what others have been able to safely overclock your processor to.

Take baby steps... nothing more than maybe 110FSB on your first shot. Boot into Windows and run some sort of processor intensive application or burn-in utility for about an hour, and if it's stable, reboot, and try a higher FSB. Basically, this is trial and error. If you go too high and the system will not POST, you must find the "clear CMOS" jumper, and set it so it will clear the BIOS (your manual should have more info on this). This will restore everything to default, but it should let you boot.

You'll want to keep an eye on your temperatures. Make sure they never exceed 50C, and try to keep them below 45C.

If an overclock is somewhat stable, but still gives you some errors, you can boost the voltage, but then keep an even closer eye on the temps as that will raise heat.

Also, you might reach a point at which some of your PCI/AGP cards may not work. Most cards can handle up to a 40MHz PCI frequency well, but after that, start to flake out. Be especially careful if you're using a NIC, as these are known to be very persnickety about high PCI speeds.

Some good programs for burn-in and general system maintenance are Motherboard Manager 5 (MBM5), SiSoft Sandra, Toast, and Prime 95. You can check to see if some of these are available at downloads.com (I know Sandra is available there), and aoafiles.com also has some good CPU programs (and other nice, interesting stuff, as well).

G'luck, and report back with your max. speed and/or any problems you may have!
 
Just one addition to the GREAT advice you already have. KNOW YOUR BOARD. Read your MB manual. If you don't have it I am sure you can do a google search and find it. You'll be glad you did.
Good luck and welcome to the forums. Enjoy!:)
 
The other thing which you are going to need is which flavor of the PIII 500 you have -- a Katmai or a Coppermine. The best way to figure this is to watch at boot-up and see how much L2 cache you have. The Katmai 500's (probably what you've got) have 512k of L2 cache. The Coppermines have 256k of L2 cache. The Katmai P3s as a group do not overclock well (figure on getting to maybe 560-620); the coppermines overclock pretty well.

Dave
 
To bad you have a 500, my 550 coppermine is running at 133fsb with no additional cooling.
That would be 5.5*133 or 733mhz :)
 
thanks for all the help!! but i can only get 560mhz out of it any higher and it locks. need better goodys!!!
 
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