Overclocking AMD X2 4200+

[Starsky303]

Hello all,

I'm trying to overclock this cpu (stock clock speed 2.2ghz). All I have accomplished at the moment is 2.42ghz (temp holding around 40-43°C) by incresing the fsb to 220. Any higher and the clock speed reads incorrectly or goes completely back on itself(2.02ghz etc.)

I've only increased the fsb without tampering with anything else (as to be honest, I'm not really sure what I'm doing!) but I've heard a stable clock speed of 2.6ghz is achievable.

My system specs are:
Asus A8N SLI Deluxe
Athlon 64 X2 4200+
4GB Corsair TWINX2048-3200C2PT (3GB effective on XP)
GeForce 8800GTX XT
300GB Maxtor 6B300S0
Audigy 2 ZS
Windows XP (32bit)

Can anyone instruct me or give me a few pointers on how to reach higher clock speeds with my bios/mobo? I'd rather overclock this way as I've heard bad or inconsistant results through software overclocking.

Thanks a lot for your time.

 

[Cinders]

HI, the reason your processor seems to be slipping back in speed is because your motherboard is throwing a memory divider into the mix to keep you from accidently overclocking your memory. You need to tell your motherboard the the memory speed is 200 or 400 whichever is higher and present in your BIOS and then slowly raise your HTT. If you'll give me a few minutes I have your motherboard manual downloading and I can tell you exactly what to do. With those huge 2GB dimms I doubt you'll get a very high overclock. Your old FX-55 could be easily overclocked simply by raising the CPU multiplier.

Set the Hyper Transport Frequency to 4
and disable Cool n Quiet.
Set the Overclock Profile to manual.
Set the Max Memclock to 400MHz anything else will set a memory divider.
Slowly move your CPU frequency beyond 200 to overclock both your memory and your CPU.

 

[Starsky303]

Hi again, Cinders! Nice one, thanks for lookin' stuff up for me! (I do love this forum!)
Will try that asap. I managed to get my FX-55 to 2.8ghz but at high temps. The X2 4200+ is giving me faster framerates in games now and I can only hope that more games support dual core. I'll also take your advice on getting an x64 operating system.

In the next month or so I intend to upgrade my mobo, cpu and ram but as this was my first time tampering with a new cpu and dual core, I thought for 50 quid, I'll give it a go! So far it seems to have paid off... about 50 quid's worth!

Thanks again for your help, I'll let you know how I get on with these bios changes.

Oh, forgot to mention, not sure if this will make any difference but my dimms are 1GB sticks. Cheers again.

 

[Starsky303]

I THINK I done as instructed! The max memclock thing threw me a bit. I had my memory set to 333mhz (due to windows, although I'm running the latest bios and have enabled the 4GB... thing in bios). I set the 'memclock index value' to 400mhz. Was that the 'max memclock' thing you were referring to?
I then set the fsb to 200 booted up, then reset to try a different timing, set the fsb back to 220 got to windows (2.42ghz) then shortly after hit a BSOD.

Please advise!

 

[Cinders]

Jumping the FSB from 200 to 220 was to much. You need to get back into your BIOS and reset it back to 200 and move the FSB up one point at a time and try again. This time try SysTool to help you overclock. With this tool you can quickly change your FSB and test the setting without shutting down going into the BIOS changing a value and then rebooting. Once you have a good idea what you want your values to be you then go into the BIOS make the changes and boot. If this is the first time you have overclocked you have a huge job ahead of you if you're really dedicated to overclocking. The more memory you have the harder it is to seriously overclock. You may just end up overclocking your processor but not your memory using a memory divider. Memory dividers are an overclocking compromise. They allow you to overclock a processor while normally clocking memory or over clocking memory while normally clocking your processor.

There are many very good overclocking guides out there. You should google for them. I'll help you if you have specific questions but I just don't have the energy or the knowledge to type out a complete guide.

I don't usually overclock memory. I like to purchase 2 large dimms that are faster memory than my motherboard is rated for (that's why I have 2 DDR500 dimms in my DDR400 rated board) and slowly push my processor until it will not go any further. This usually happens long before the memory is overclocked.

Best overclocking results are obtained when you simply move the FSB forward raising the processor speed and the memory speed at the same time in a one for one ratio.

Overclocked processors, north bridges and memory dimms usually need increased voltages and relaxed memory timings. More voltage causes electron collisions, electron collisions cause heat, and if enough voltage is applied the overclocked devices will burn and die. So you need good processor, north bridge and memory cooling to overclock. I like water cooling to tame the heat. Water cooling is expensive and can be destructive to electronic devices.

 

[Starsky303]

Well you've been more than helpful my good friend.
Thanks for the pointers and all the info. I've downloaded SysTool and will go over all you've said and try to get my head around it all.

Thanks again!

 

[Dantrag]

Welcome Starsky303 !

here are some articles/guides worth reading:

Motherboard
4200+ overclock review p1
4200+ overclock review p2
Athlon64 in depth general OC guide

It helps to read up on (OC)reviews of your hardware. Also apart from these guides there are some other nice sites with alot of info on them.

http://www.madshrimps.be/
http://www.xbitlabs.com/
http://www.tomshardware.com/
http://arstechnica.com/index.ars
http://www.anandtech.com/

and ofcourse; https://www.techspot.com/

hope that helped