Time to Upgrade...

[mleeber]

I have been running my Asus A7V266-E with a slightly overclocked XP1600 for almost 3 years and it is time for an upgrade (never could really overclock this too far with the hardware I am running even though I successfully unlocked the CPU). Cooling is done with a Themaltake Volcano 7+ and the variable speed fan.

I am on a tight budget and have initially settled on a Gigabyte GA-7NNXP motherboard (yeah this contradicts the whole budget idea but I need the 4 IDE controllers and the SATA Raid - besides, I hear it is great for overclocking). I have read the posts about the XP mobile processor's ability to be overclocked and need some help choosing one, I don't want to pay $200 for a XP3200+ if I can use a mobile 2600.

I have 2 sticks of Crucial 256MB PC2100 and 2 sticks of PNY 512MB PC2700. I am not sure how "overclockable" this RAM is so I may have to invest in more.

I am also running an Adaptec 2940UW but only driving external SCSI devices, my hard disks will be maxtor 80GB or 120GB SATA set up on the raid array as mirrors (I have had nothing but problems with Western Digital drives set up as striped raid, one drive seems to die every 6 months or so which means a total rebuild of the array and reinstallation of the software, what a PITA).

I am using an Intel 10/100 network card but that will go away since all the motherboards in this class have 100BT and GigaLAN on the board.

I want to replace my video card, currently an ATI All-in-Wonder 128 Pro AGP, most likely with a Radeon but I would like to keep the TV tuner ability. This upgrade may be delayed for a little while due to cost though.

Also thinking about adding a sony DRU-700 DVD burner to replace the DRU500A (man did those drop in price right after I shelled out $500 to be the first on the block to burn DVDs).

So my question of you overclocking experts is: "which processor should I use?" Ultimately I would like to keep the FSB at least at 333 and if I can get to 400 on the cheap I will do that but I think that is going to mean investing in new RAM too. I appreciate any help and suggestions about any of the components I have listed.

Thanks!
Mark

 

[arisythila]

I like the 2500+ easy to set the FSB to 400 mhz, and have a 3200+ and they are cheap too. But then again, I was running a Asus A7N8X-Deluxe mainboard, PC3200 DC memory.

 

[alinosa]

i'm running 2700 ddr and have my FSB at 200 first with a tbred 1700 and now (since yesterday) a mobile 2500... as long as you don't try to squeeze your memory timings, you can probably push your memory higher than 333... i like the mobile bartons because they're unlocked, and they use low voltage to start. So, yeah i'd recommend one of these. i don't know about the gigabyte board, (i have a dfi and love it.) good luck with your new setup tho.

 

[mleeber]

Thanks for the replies guys!

I was originally going to use the Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe but there are only 2 IDE channels and 3 DIMM slots. My understanding is that the Gigabyte interleaves their 4 DIMM slots to effectively double memory access speed. It also has 4 EIDE channels and supports SATA Raid 0 or Raid 1, and ATA133 Raid 0, 1, or 0+1.

So the Mobile XP Barton core sounds like a winner. What is the best place to get one and do I have to worry about specifying anything particular?

Thanks!!!

 

[alinosa]

i got my mobile barton at newegg for 88 bucks and it's IQYHA 0407 vpmw, it's running stable at 2500MHz until it cooks my ceramique, then i'll try for 2800 MHz...hopefully!