IS7-E and P4 2.0A Northwood, help please

[justinCO]

I just upgraded my mainboard to an IS7-E from a P4S533. I'm a little confused on the the new (to me) bios settings and need some help getting things configured right. My setup:

Abit IS7-E
P4 2.0A Northwood (400mhz bus)
2x 512meg Crucial pc2700
ATI Radeon 9800
Antec PS
Zalman 7000cu HSF

Basically, what are the optimal bios settings that I can run with this cpu and mobo combo? I would like to get to 133fsb (2.6ghz). I tried this by just changing the fsb to 133 but the computer would not POST. I have it running at 2.3ghz now (115fsb, that's all I could get out of it with the P4S533 too) but not certain I have the bios setup correctly.

What should I set the "N/B Strap CPU As" to? I noticed if I changed that I got different memory ratio's to choose from. If I choose my CPU option (PSB400) I only get the option of a 3:4 memory ratio. Which at 100fsb only gets me ddr266

What should "Fixed AGP/PCI Freq" be set to? I just left that default 'cause I figure having the agp and pci locked to 66/33 is better then it going up with the fsb increases.

And the voltages? I'm guessing I'll need some more CPU voltage if I'm going to overclock to 2.6ghz? DDR SDRAM Voltage should I leave at 2.6v? I think AGP voltage can stay stock, not sure on that one either.

I think that's it. I'm planning on going to a 2.4c or faster sometime in the future. But in the mean time I want to get the most out of my 2.0A. I've seen tons of reports that a 2.0A will do 133fsb and 2.6ghz, but I've yet to get it to work on either of my Intel mobo's

Thanks for any help, sorry for the giant essay.

Justin

 

[batboy]

The main problem is that you need to "fix" the PCI/AGP. Don't leave it on default, cycle through the choices until you find "fix" and lock it to 33/66.

The "N/B Strap CPU As" is not all that important. Just use 400 or 533. The setting below that is the ratio. At 133 FSB if you use the 4:5 ratio, that will give you DDR333 which is exactly what PC2700 RAM is rated at.

Don't give it any voltage unless it's unstable. The AGP can stay at default. Might not hurt to try vdumm of 2.7v and bump up the vcore to 1.55v or so.

 

[lyle]

Also, is your Northwood a B0 or C1 stepping? You can tell this by the S-spec code etched onto the IHS of the CPU. B0 steppings were not great overclockers whereas the C1's are stellar.

 

[Xymurgy]

From all the rants & raves about the C1 steppings, I'd say yours is a B0 stepping. I have a 2.0a B0, and am stable up to 130fsb with 1.65 vcore. Running 3:4 ratio with DDR400.

Hope this helps as a reference.

 

[batboy]

B0 stepping has a default vcore of 1.5v while C1 has 1.525v.

 

[justinCO]

Thanks for the replies, this definitely helps. My default cpu vcore is 1.5000v, so I assume I have a B0 stepping cpu. I'm going to try out some of the settings and let you know how it goes.

Justin

 

[justinCO]

Well so far I've gotten to this, a little progress atleast. I put the settings to:
133fsb
nbstrap psb533
4:5 mem ratio
1.55vcore
fixed agp/pci to 66/33

It POSTS ok now, shows 2.66ghz and 133fsb, but fails on windows startup. Says a system file is corrupted and needs to be repaired. I only went to 1.55vcore until I realized I haven't updated the bios, hehe. So I got bios 17 and updated it, but had to put it back down to 2ghz for a bit before I can do some more testing.

Should I start increasing vcore .25 at a time at this point?

Justin

 

[batboy]

Almost sounds like you need more voltage. Maybe set the memory to 1:1 ratio just for a bit to make sure it's not the RAM. I doubt it, but you never know. Looks like you have good cooling, so try more vcore. Going up to 1.6v should be no problem. Most Abit mobos undervolt a tad anyway. You could always back down to 130 FSB maybe, that will still give you 2.6 gig.

 

[justinCO]

Well just gave it another go and so far so good. Settings are:

133fsb
nbstrap psb533
4:5 mem ratio
** 1.60vcore **
fixed agp/pci to 66/33

Got into Windows now and just need to do some stress testing and install mobo monitor again for temps. Hopefully all will be well. I'll update with Sandra and 3dmark results later if it's stable, hehe

Justin

 

[lyle]

Not too bad for a B0 stepping, I had two and could never get them to 133, had to settle for 130.

My two C1's, though, 165fsb each and that's without raising vcore at all.

 

[justinCO]

Well, I still have to do some more testing. 3dmark2001 crapped out the first time I ran it. I tried uninstalling 3dmark and reinstalling but ran into some weird problems, it locked up once on reinstall. The only thing I've really done so far is get Sandra cpu arith and mem bandwidth tests done. My mem bandwidth scored 3414 though which is a huge jump from the 2574 I had on the old mainboard. We'll see how 3dmark goes tonight once I get home from work...

Justin

 

[justinCO]

Well, did some testing in game and had one crash at 133fsb. I am pretty certain it's because of heat. The cpu is getting super hot and under load while playing games it's at 135F (55C or so), room temperature of about 78F. I dropped the fsb to 130 and upped the cpu vcore to 1.65 and it ran fine and my game didn't crash.

I'm wondering why it's getting so damn hot though. On the P4S533 board with same HSF I would only get to 115-120F during load and that was in the summer time. Any ideas why it's getting so hot?

Justin

 

[lyle]

Abit boards read high, Asus boards read low. At this point, if I'm running stable, I tend to disregard CPU temp readings.

Now that you're at 1.65, try 133fsb again. It looks like 2.6ish is the top end of your CPU for now.

 

[batboy]

Yeah, temps run a little warm on an Abit. Also, the more you overclock and especially the higher you run the voltage, the hotter it will get. I usuall recommend lower 50's, but 55 is probably ok. How's your case ventilation?

 

[justinCO]

Hrmm, ok then I guess I won't get too worried about it reaching 55C under full load. The case has the side panel off so there shouldn't be any heat getting packed in the case. I've got two 80mm fans also, one in back and one in front.

I'll bump the fsb back to 133 tonight and she how it runs. Thanks again for the help. Next computer on the OC list is my wife's AMD computer

Justin