Preliminary report on Barton 2500+

[MadJack]

First post after making some reading in these forums...

Did some tweaking on my rig (in sig).

First, I made some tests with stock settings with SiSoft Sandra and came up with those:

CPU: 6765 & 2752

Multimedia: 10050 & 10671

Mem. Band.: 2369 & 2224

Slowly, by steps of 3, I increased the FSB until I started to get a Winblows XP booting problem with giveio.sys... I understand this file is for temp/fan monitoring but I'm not 100% sure of that. Maybe I'll uninstall that file and see if Winblows boots. Ideas or opinions on that welcome.

The last settings used with XP booting is: FSB at 178x11.0 @ 1969 MHz but at that point I thought about running 3DMark2003 and the rig rebooted... As for Sandra's results here they are:

CPU:7282 & 2925

Multimedia: 10767 & 11495

Mem. Band.: 2533 & 2384

From day 1 I've had rebooting problems when using games, almost any games, Dungeon Siege, Unreal Tournament 2003 and Unreal2 mainly where the rig would just reboot. AFAIK, no overheating was involved because max was about 48C after playing and lucky enough not to reboot. So rebooting might not indicate an OC'ing problem but a some other thing.

Since those tests, I've change the casing and PSU. Went from 300W to an Enermax 350W double fan. Now that the rig is working and stable with those upgrades, I'm back at testing.

Questions or Comments welcome.

 

[Chrisdafu]

48c seems a little high. What kind of heatsink and fan are you using?

 

[MadJack]

Stock HSF that came with the CPU...

Being in a small community, we have to order parts so It'll take some time before getting the Zalman CNPS6000-AlCu w/ Arctic Silver 3 paste. From what I can read, the die temp is about the same as socket temp at idle but under strain I never really thought about checking.

I'll order Monday morning but before I do if anyone has a better FAN to suggest...

 

[Chrisdafu]

If you havent already order you might want to think about getting a diffrent heatsink. Here you can compare the preformance from diffrent heatsinks. I would recomend a thermalright slk-800 or an sk7. They are both very good.

As for the fan I like the high cfm panaflo and sunon's. If you dont care about noise you can get a vantec torando.

The cheapest place with those 2 heatsinks would be SVC . I have ordered from them many times and havent had any problems, but Im not sure if they ship to Canada or not.

Good Luck!

 

[MadJack]

I wanted the SLK-800 but the manufacturer says it not for the A7N8X because of the placement of the CPU and I have to agree with that because even with the stock HSF it's a bit of a hassle to take it off... The SLK-700 seems pretty good too...

I'll check the review.

Thanks.

 

[gogadgetman]

well i have got the SLK-800 on my CPU and that is with a A7N8X Deluxe

 

[MadJack]

well i have got the SLK-800 on my CPU and that is with a A7N8X Deluxe

Just to be sure I checked Thermalright's site and it says it's OK with the A7N8X Dlx...

I did a lot of shopping lately and I guess I saw the mention at some shopping site... Or it might even be a different model/make...



My bad

 

[Ange]

MadJack,

where u able to push the 2500 any higher? Below 2Gz s kinda sorry, I would have thought it gets at least to 2100 TbredB OC levels.

A.

 

[MadJack]

Update...

Because of the rebooting under stress I always though I had the "lemon" motherboard of the batch but lacking any proof I, instead, flamed Asus on a bad product but still had the Tom Hardware and other review site's "Very good product" ringing in my ears... No need to say I was quite dissapointed.

Eventually Asus answered me with a: Call us to my email but thought... "What the hell am I gonna say? I've got only my gut feeling and 15 years of experience"... So I just put it aside hoping some kind of proof would appear, not really believing in that.

I've always had bad luck so this time wouldn't be the exception.

Ho and behold!

Yesterday, I decided to re-start the OC'ing just to increase my test where I left before changing the case and PSU. Can't go any higher than 172 FSB... Doh! Right before starting I decided to get Prime95 to test stability when OC'ed. Yesterday, before going to bed, I left the computer running throughout the night so I might find the 5th Messene number... This morning... OUCH! Bad hardware was written all over the place in Prime95...

So guess what? I'm calling Asus tomorrow I'll have something to say!

@Ange: I know, it's pityful but as I explain above it's probably because of bad hardware. We'll see where it'll get after I talk with Asus.

Stay tune!

 

[Chrisdafu]

And the stock heatsink. Once you get a better one you should be able to get a lot more than what you are now.

 

[Jarek]

2500+ is a sweet cpu mine does 2350 with agresive cooling, but I like it quiet so its @ 2260. This thing is asking for water cooling.
Get SLK800 92mm fan and let it rip.

 

[MadJack]

More update...

Just to be on the safe side I decided to do a small memory burn-in with memtest86... I thought maybe the memory could be the problem. After over 6 hours, no errors whatsoever. So it's either the barton or the motherboard.

Since I made a small adjustment to one of the fans on my case's side, so it blows air IN instead of OUT, I dropped the temperature to ~36C idle and ~42C load

@ Jarek & Chrisdafu -> Yeah, definitively a GOOD HSF will be part of that rig soon. My choice is the Thermalright SLK800 w/ 92 mm fan. I don't really care about noise that much anyway.

 

[Sir Barton]

my barton runs stable at 2287MHz (183x12.5). i think it can go a little higher, but my memory is my bottleneck, and im also limited by a 1/5 divider. hopefully nF2 will help me out there.

 

[SiGmA_X]

As for heatsink, it's all about the ThermalRight SLK900U. I had one for review and loved it. Would still be using it, but this K7D just can't handle it - with out a lot of cutting.. So back to dual AX-7's

 

[MadJack]

I'm Back!

Kind of...

After MUCH reading into lots of forums, I decided to lap the stock HSF and put a new battery for the BIOS. I'm testing the system right now with stock settings just to make sure it's running fine.

I'll do some test with Sisoft and 3DMark2003 and if all goes well I'll be checking if I can get it to post and load winblows at around 178, ie last "working" setting.

Planning some V[most-of-them] mods too but not for now. I just want it to be kind for once lol

Wish me luck!

 

[MadJack]

Currently running at 175 FSB @ x11 but to achieve this I had to jolt the memory at 2.8V... Seems like mem is having some kind of diarrhea... I don't think I should have to do that. Not at this point.

Any ideas?

A pity... Can't even break the 2 GHz... Now at 1929.37 MHz. I'd post a WCPUID screenie but nowhere to place it that allows external linking...

 

[MadJack]

Oh... Forgot to add that Sisoft did great. Results were even better than last ones at that same speed. But 3DMark2003 went from 1514 (highest stock BIOS options) to 1143 ...

What gives!? Can it be that locking APG at 66 MHz did that!? I would think so... Maybe I should OC that Ti4200

 

[MadJack]

Ti4200 OC'ed @ 275 MHz/490 MHz brings it at 1219...

A shame and I'm ashamed. *hides under the rug*

This is a RMA case.

 

[mage_x]

Currently running at 175 FSB @ x11 but to achieve this I had to jolt the memory at 2.8V... Seems like mem is having some kind of diarrhea... I don't think I should have to do that. Not at this point.

Any ideas?

A pity... Can't even break the 2 GHz... Now at 1929.37 MHz. I'd post a WCPUID screenie but nowhere to place it that allows external linking...

your ram is fine, youre using pc2700 which is rated for 166fsb, its doing more than its suppose to so you can't really complain. some do higher than others. i havent heard of specktek ram before though.

Ti4200 OC'ed @ 275 MHz/490 MHz brings it at 1219...

A shame and I'm ashamed. *hides under the rug*

This is a RMA case.

wait wait, what are you rmaing? 3dmark2003 is a dx9 test, which gf4's dont support. dont expect a high score in 03 with that card, try using 2001

also the a7n8x has some problems with the northbridge stock heatsink and its thermal pad, it usually needs to be replaced with a new heatsink and as3 (or w/e you choose) to get a high fsb. i cant go over 180 with the stock northbridge heatsink. usually once you get a better heatsink and as3 on there it can hit 200+ easy. id say this is the main reason why youre stuck in the 170's.

 

[Lonely Raven]

also the a7n8x has some problems with the northbridge stock heatsink and its thermal pad, it usually needs to be replaced with a new heatsink and as3 (or w/e you choose) to get a high fsb. i cant go over 180 with the stock northbridge heatsink. usually once you get a better heatsink and as3 on there it can hit 200+ easy. id say this is the main reason why youre stuck in the 170's.

Well that and the cheap memory, and stock cooling.

His hands are tied before he even hits the BIOS!!

Dude, to overclock, you need QUALITY HARDWARE!

stop messing with the cheap canuck stuff and get a good HSF,
AS3, and some Corsair XMS 3200LL or Hyper-X 3200.

Complaining and wanting to RMA everything in site for pushing
it past rated specs (successfully!!!) is pretty llama.

Get a grip, get some solid hardware, and then ROCK!