Comp: everything's brand new: D845gbv board, 2 pc2100 266 1GB kingston mem's, i845g chipset, p17 updated bios (latest one i could find) , and I cant figure out why it only clocks at 1.4 on all performance tests i could find (motherboard system disk scan, cpu-z, system info)... Cpu-z says fsb 100 x 14 cpu multi, but there is no way in bios to adjust fsb or anything, further more the board boasts a 533 fsb which i dont understand either.... i am FULLY a noob but understand the basics.... ANY help would be appreciated!

That computer parts is from year 2004. It is considered as obsolete part. You need to return all those new parts back to store and exchange for newer and faster one.

Beside those D845GBV board supports only on 400MHZ front side bus, that will seriously affect your processor's ability to run at maximum performance.

Consider to exchange the board for the 800MHZ fsb, such as 848P, 865G / 865PE or 875P chipset.

i understand that its an old setup, but the board does support the 2.8 (it is the largest supported by this board) and many other computers run the same board and processor as this one and they all clock at 2.8, mine only at 1.4 regardless.

your board may support your process, but it forces your CPU to downgrade it's speed so it is part of your problem.

understood....

I fully understand what your saying.... these parts are brand new, and they were free from a family member across the US. My goal was to see if I could push this board to it's limits and get a 2.8 out of it. Like a project. The advice I ask for on this is just to bring it up to maximum potential for what it is. Hell, after I'm done, hopefully I will understand everything enough to really build my own in a while, but I need to understand first. So with that being said, can you offer support?

chances are the board only supports 533 FSB which is 133 x 4, the chip you are using is meant to run at 800 FSB which is 200 x 4, so the board is just running a speed it can handle, probably because it would just crash when running at 800 FSB, just because others got it to work may mean they have different revision of the same board ie newer release, different chips and so on. I've gone through three Asus P5P800's each one physically looking different from the next, thankfully you didn't pay for such useless hardware but when you buy new stuff it will almost 100% work if set up right. So just use it as is and when you can upgrade to newer better parts, if you were able to get older hardware working newer stuff is always getting easier so don't sweat it.