Noob Question regarding my Bios

i have an ecs mobo with a p4 1.7, it has an ami bios, version 6/10/02. in the bios there is a page called 'CPU PnP setup page' it has the following listings:

CPU type: Intel P4
CPU/DRAM speed: 100/100mhz
CPU core voltage: 1.712v
CPU ratio: H/W trap
CPU frequency:100mhz
Dram frequency: 100mhz


the only two i am able to toggle are CPU/DRAM speed, and CPU ratio. I can change CPU/DRAM speed tp 100/100. 100/133, 133/133, and 133/166. i can toggle CPU ratio between 'H/W trap' (whatever that means), and numbers ranging from x8 to x24. ( i thought you werent supposed to be able to change the ratio on intel cpus).

can anyone give me any help with how to O/C this thing? Is there any other utilities that allow me to change voltage/ fsb speed besides my BIOS? Help! Thanks.

Hi,

It looks like your board has limited overclocking potential, but it can probably be done. If you have a 1.7 Ghz P4 then its a Willamette core operating on a quad-pumped 100 mhz bus. By setting the CPU/DRAM ratio to 133/133 you are essentially overclocking the 100 mhz front side bus by 33 mhz and overclocking the memory an additional 33 mhz. Do you know if your mobo uses single data rate ram or double data rate (DDR) memory? If you're using DDR then 100/133 would be the minimum speed I would run at. If you're using PC133 SDRAM then you can also safely use 100/133.

Some things to consider when overclocking:
CPUs and RAM may need more voltage to maintain stability at higher frequencies, if your motherboard doesn't allow you to adjust voltages it may limit you somewhat
If you don't have PCI/AGP ratios or locks on your motherboard overclocking to 133/133 or 133/166 may push your PCI frequency out of spec, this can lead to data corruption and other anomalies.

Many motherboards have the option of adjusting the CPU multiplier, but it will not have an effect unless you have an unlocked "engineering sample" P4, which is highly unlikely. Just leave CPU ratio at H/W trap.

Hope this helps!

that does help...

as long as i can remember, it has been running 100/100, but i DO have DDR ram, so i will switch to 100/133. I also found a version of SetFSB that works with my sis645 chipset. recently, i have been able to get the fsb up to 114 stabily. i think more power is needed to go higher, so right now im looking into chip mods and whatnot. thanks for your response.