PC speed-up on the cheap

[Byronape]

IT professional here, but I have no experience with Overclocking and would like to do some baseline improvements to my pc on the cheap. I have not done much gaming, and that really isn't my focus since I never have the time for it anymore. Mostly running Office apps, web, cd burning, photo editing... nothing hard core enough to justify spending any real money on new hardware.

Components:
MB - ECS A785GM-AD3
CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 635 2.9Ghz AM3 CPU with stock fan
GPU - Zotac GeForce 9500 GT 1GB PCIe
RAM - OCZ OCZ3G1333LV4GK Gold 4GB PC10666 1333Mhz
RAM - Kingston 2x2GB generic 1333Mhz RAM that I salvaged from a broken system that works fine (and yes, I know mixing RAM can cause funny stuff, but been stable so far)
Case - Gigabyte X2 ATX Mid Tower Case with 1 120MM case fan ( http://www.tigerdirect.com/applica [...] No=4975064 )
PSU - Rosewill 430W 80 Plus Certified (it may be a 530w, I can't remember since it was migrated out of an older pc. Works fine.)
OS - Win 7 Pro, 64-Bit
Monitor - 1920 x 1080 max resolution

(Yeah, I know, the hardware is pretty dated and wasn't that great to begin with. It was all ordered in Sept. 2010 while I was in school and I spent less than $350 on it.

I recently moved the OS to a Samsung 128GB SSD and that gave me a noticeable speed jump, but it's still not quite enough yet. Also have a 500 GB WD HDD for bulk storage.

I've played with OCing a little, but so far have not been able to get it to stay stable without running the CPU way too hot. I know adding an additional case fan will help, but the only place left to mount one would be on the side that comes off or the front of the case. In the front, the only intake area is about 2 inches off the floor on the bottom of the case front. This isn't a huge deal as the computer is on a hardwood floor, but I have a short haired dog that sheds and I'd rather not blow in a bunch of fur (and I don't think I can convince the wife that I need to get the computer off the floor an on to the short filing cabinet next to the computer desk due to the huge freaking printer she wanted for printing photos). I've also run into cases where the computer would be working fine and then just reboot for no apparent reason. I'm assuming that the reboot is either a stability issue or due to CPU burn-out protections on the MB.

On the side of the case (see link) there is a plastic air funnel that comes pretty close to encompassing the entire CPU fan, with only about 20% not aligned with the cone. I doubt that this is doing anything to limit the amount of warmer air the fan pulls in, but it's there in theory to funnel in outside air.

Other than not enough fans, the case gets decent airflow. The wiring is a bit sloppy since the case is kinda cramped. I know binding some of the cables together will help airflow, but I don't know how much.

At stock levels, the computer runs rock solid and I have zero complaints generally. It has done everything I've asked it to do with reasonable ability and doesn't even do to bad on those extremely rare occasions I game (I think the last new game I played was NWN II and the wife will play Sims 3 from time to time). I'd just like to play with it and see if I can squeeze a little more out of the system without buying any new hardware.

Any suggestions you have would be greatly appreciated!

 

[trents]

ECS boards are the absolute bottom of the barrel for overclocking purposes and if you know you are having overheating problems already with the overclocking attempts you have made to date that does not bode well. Now I am assuming you are using the stock CPU HSF that came boxed with the processor for cooling that component and that you are not willing to spend to upgrade the cooler. Correct? When overclocking is an afterthought it usually doesn't work out well. Successful overclocking starts with good planning in the initial purchase decisions phase.

 

[Byronape]

ECS boards are the absolute bottom of the barrel for overclocking purposes and if you know you are having overheating problems already with the overclocking attempts you have made to date that does not bode well. Now I am assuming you are using the stock CPU HSF that came boxed with the processor for cooling that component and that you are not willing to spend to upgrade the cooler. Correct? When overclocking is an afterthought it usually doesn't work out well. Successful overclocking starts with good planning in the initial purchase decisions phase.

I never really even considered overclocking when I ordered the hardware, and I guess it shows. I don't even see ECS boards anymore when I price out additional hardware, so I'm guessing that either I'm looking at stuff that's a little to high end (if I'm going to do any upgrading, I might as well make it worth while) or most places don't carry them anymore.

Yeah, I'm using the stock HSF that came boxed with the CPU. Works well enough at stock speeds, but is quickly overwhelmed when any kind of OC is done.

Oh well, I don't really use the computer that much anyway at this time since I spend all my day with my work laptop chained to me.

Thanks for the info.

 

[dtrunk]

i would suggest a good cleaning, once the dog was mentioned i thought HALT; clean internally to make sure no dog hair is interrupting with the CPU HSF, check all other fans in the case too. those funnels work decently, you need other fans to help though. your case has an additional exhaust fan so we can assume inside temps are ok. have you ran an application like hwmonitor to see the temps you're facing? (<-- this would be a good start.)

that ecs motherboard is crap, but it's ecs's newer crap so it might offer a small OC. the cpu on the other hand, might OC a bit, but I'm not sure you'll see a performance difference. the phenom chips OC way better and are more of a powerhouse than the althon cpus. you might not really see much of the boost you're looking for. but you can at least get a nice 10-15% OC just for giggles. the stock HSF might be the issue; a nice tower style HSF cost about $30 now days and provided me with a ~20c temp drop on my cpu load temps on my old phenom 925 chip.

PS: what is the model # on that kingston ram; you might find a speed issue with the ram. you might even run faster with the 2x2gb chips alone, and might be able to OC those a little. do you have CPUz?