Impressed with 2.4A!

[bobad]

I set up a system for a friend last Friday. He wanted "Cheap but fast", so I got him a Gigabyte 8S648FX-L board and the 2.4A.

I tweaked the VCore +5%, the VRAM to +.1V. Since he was in a hurry, I immediately went for 167 * 88= ~3Ghz. I hammered it for a short time with Prime and Passmarks 4.0. Was I impressed! Who knows how much more headroom this cheap little guy has? I hope to find out soon, but I'm betting ~1.3 Ghz overclock on stock Intel HSF.

Running XP with only 256 333Mhz RAM and a WD800JB, it fealt really snappy running apps. It fealt just as snappy as a 2.4C at 3Ghz. I forget temps, but I do remember they were only a few Deg higher than I am accustomed to seeing 2.4C's. Maybe 100F idle and 145F running Prime for a while, but don't hold me to it.

I accidentally posted the results in the 2.8A CPU database under
ID number 12683.

I somehow think the big cache and Prescott instructions largely negate the 533 FSB and lack of HT. I guess what I'm saying is, the 2.4 Prescott "feels" just as fast as the Northwood in real world usage.

Meanwhile, I'm waiting like a buzzard for the Prescott 2.8's with 800 bus!

 

[GST-97]

Why are you waiting?

2.8E's have been out for quite some time (2.8 prescott 800 FSB). However right now, they do run quite warm, and for the most part, the performance isn't on par with the northwoods.

I would bet that 2.4A could hit 3.2-3.4 pretty easily... after that, heat would become more of an issue since more voltage would probably be needed. With 166 Mhz RAM, you would need to use the dividers correctly though, 5:4 up to 200 FSB, and 3:2 beyond 200.

-Chris

 

[deathman20]

Hear some 2.4A's did 3.7+ on stock voltage also and ran decently cool.

 

[mtb856]

on stock voltage? Man, my 1.8 won't load Windows at 3.2 with 1.6V... although my vcore tends to undervolt, so I'll have to try it at a higher vcore

 

[Gasoline]

I running a 2.4a at 3.2+ GHz. It's a late September 2003 chip, made in China (SL6S9).

My mobo is an old ASUS P4T-E (rambus)

I have to set the memory multiplier to 3x and use the dipswitches instead of the bios menu or it won't overclock.

I also had to do the wire trick/pin mod on the cpu chip to bump voltage to 1.7v (monitor actually shows 1.664v) to get it to stay stable at 133+ FSB.

I'm using a Thermalright SP-94 heatsink and a Panaflo 92mm mid-speed fan to keep it cool. Temps with plain white silicone grease were pretty high with occasional peaks to 60.

Got me some AS-5 and spent the past four days experimenting with different cooling configs. After lapping the CPU top with 1500 grit MicroMesh emery paper and polishing compound, plus three different methods of applying the AS-5, I've finally got peak temps under full sustained cpu load to stay pretty steady at 48C with ambient room temperature of 80 degrees F ( ~27C). I was also able to bump my FSB up to 140 and still run stable and maintain 48C temps.... net cpu speed reported by wcpuid to be 3360MHz. Not too shabby, eh? Plays UT2003/2004 like liquid television.... I can now get killed faster and more often than ever.

 

[maroon]

533fsb motherboard w/ intel p4 2.4a

Hi! I'd like to ask if the Intel P4 2.4A 533fsb Prescott works with any 533fsb motherboard? Or does the 533fsb motherboard have to be Prescott too? I tried using it on an Asrock M266 533fsb mobo, and it wouldn't work. What should be the fsb and prescott status of the motherboard for the cpu to work?

 

[magnummafia]

have u tried to update the bios?i just put my chip in an asus p4p800s, right now im at about 3.4 with stock cooling, my temps idle at 43c and go up to 55c when i'm gamming. i haven't run prime yet but i let it burn in overnight and it didn't crach.i also played bf1942 for a couple hours without crashing.so far i really like this chip. even in the single channel board it's very fast, it definitely is very close to my [email protected] in my ai7.

 

[magnummafia]

heres a shot of my memory too

 

[EPirate]

what program is that just wondering i see it all the time

 

[Jimbob7]

what program is that just wondering i see it all the time

CPU-Z

http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

 

[Nemo]

Would there be a problem running/overclocking one of these 2.4 prescotts in, say, an Abit IS-7 (i865) motherboard?

 

[abitavenger]

There shoulndt be if they have an updated bios.

 

[randy49]

I put together a pc with the p4 2.4a and I am up to 3.29ghz with 183 fsb and stock voltages. Very stable and quite the nice overclock with air cooling. I will try to get it higher but I'm quite pleased so far.

 

[Gasoline]

I put together a pc with the p4 2.4a and I am up to 3.29ghz with 183 fsb and stock voltages. Very stable and quite the nice overclock with air cooling. I will try to get it higher but I'm quite pleased so far.

Very nice indeed! It's quite a bargain to get 3200 speeds on a 2400 budget, eh?

Mine's still the Northwood core, but a slight bump in voltage really helped out the overclockability in my case. I did have to do the wire trick to get the volts up on my old mobo, but it wasn't too difficult to accomplish.

 

[magnummafia]

hey randy, are you able to run prime? also what are your temps?
thanks

 

[maroon]

thanks magnummafia. the bios update worked.

 

[magnummafia]

cool have u tried to oc the chip yet? i found that my max the chip would do is 195fsb stable.(but wont run prime)i can play games day and night though without a hitch. i have backed it down to 190 though just to be safe and it's only running at 1.5v. giving it more volts didn't help anything. let me know what you can get out of yours. i'd reccomend leaving everything stock and try for around 180 and work up slowly from there. heres a pic of where i'm at now. btw. what are your temps?

 

[randy49]

magnummafia, I can't run prime at 183fsb but I can game forever with no problems. When I was running at 5:4 i couldn't get prime to run the first test. When I went to 1:1 I could get it to run the first 4 tests but it errored out on the 5th test. I need better cooling. Getting 42c at idle and around 54 under sustained load.
Not running prime well has me wondering, but since I can game super fast I'm not complaining

 

[magnummafia]

ya i'm having similar results, after burning in for a little and letting the arctic silver set, i can now run very stable at 195fsb=3.5ghz. with a vcore of only 1.5v. my temps idle around 38c - 40c and go up to just below 50c durring games. i cant run prime but i game forever and thats all i really built this rig for sincew it's not my main. i really do like this chip. sold my mobile 2400 and dfi infinity to buy this chip and mobo for only like $20 more and it's a much better performer IMHO.

 

[magnummafia]

btw randy, what stepping is your chip?