Recommend an nForce2 Mobo

[GNEP]

Right - had another little fiddle around.

Decided to try cranking the FSB straight up to 200, and run the memory at 83% to run at it's stock PC2700 speed.

Seems perfectly stable (although need more time to tell) - and the temperatures have not moved more than the usual margin of error... (ie not at all). So this Barton is more than capable of sitting happily at 2.2GHz (3200+) speeds it would seem.

Now the question is (which with a couple more days running CPDN I'll be able to answer myself): how much performance is lost by running the memory asynchronously like this? Do I lose more than I gain by ramping the CPU up 20%?

[Marshmallowman]

I think you probably would be losing a bit by running aynchonously but, the easiest way to find out is to do some benchmark comparisons.

There is a good chance some things will faster with the highe clock's and some with faster with lower latencies from synchronous clocks...try it

[Wombat]

You're probably not losing too much running the memory asynchronously. Especially since upping the CPU's speed ups your CPU's cache, which is where 99% of the hits are anyway.

[rugger]

Incorrect

Nforce chipsets HATE running memory asyncronously from the FSB. VIA and SIS chipsets are much more tollerant of this situation.

Performance ussually drops a fair bit if you don't keep them running at the same frequency. So it is probably a good idea to increase memory timings until you can get your PC2700 ram running at 200mhz.

Also, if you do use the nforce drivers from nvidia's website, and you want to use the MCP ethernet adapter (not the 3com one) roll back the MCP ethernet adaptor driver to an older version, otherwise you will probably see a 10% reduction in system performance. If you don't use the MCP ethernet adaptor, disable it completely in the device manager.

I just got an Asus A7N8X-X (its cheap, and I am cheap, so its a good combination), and its a good 10-20% faster then my old ECS K7S5A (sis 735) board with my athlon xp2000 cpu. I managed to overclock the fsb to 148mhz with by upping the CPU voltage a bit.

[GNEP]

Great - good info rugger and the others I'm running off the MCP ethernet adapter now btw, but the drivers are just those from the cd-rom and then windows-updated... as I'm only using the one port at the moment, I'll give it a go from the 3com one with the MCP port disabled and see what difference it makes...

Well it seems at first look that climateprediction (my stability test/benchmark combined ) is about 8% faster running with mem at 166, FSB at 200 (mult =11 locked) than running at fsb 169/mem 169... so that is where I'll stay for now. I can't get the memory running any faster than 169 unfortunately (it's a sinlge 512 stick of crucial pc2700) so taking them up further synchronously will have to wait until I get better memory next year some time.

I could see how much higher the fsb will go with the memory kept at 166... but that can wait until I have some time...

[rugger]

you should borrow some PC3200 ram and see how that goes at 200mem then. That will probably increase performance by another 10%. (since climateprediction is probably very cpu/memory bound, especially since you increased your CPU speed by 20%)

[GNEP]

from fiddling around it seems mem speed is indeed a key determinant of climateprediction speed... I don't actually know anyone with any PC3200 ram so will get some (or faster if it's in the same price-range when I get it) in a few months.

[Fat Tone]

Well e-buyer or the courier well and truly messed up: the case/keyb/mouse/spkr kit has gone astray. e-buyer say they have re-created my order and the weight matches what was shipped so they are 'investigating' with city-link.

I'm gonna have to buy the stuff elsewhere (at a loss I daresay) so I can get this system built on time

[rugger]

I ussually find its best to buy most things locally. It is ussually cheaper, safer, and you get instant gratification. Online shops here have an extremely tough time competing with our local suppliers.

Its ussually only the difficult to get items that require buying online.

[Kastuvas]

Wehey I made the same purchase as GNEP only I got 400Mhz DDR to overclock to 3200+. All the components are arriving tomorrow I still havn't got the case i will go to the local computer shop to have a look some time later, any advice what to look for would be ace

[Fat Tone]

There is now an even better version of the board - the Asus A7N8X-E deluxe, which has wifi (option)and gigabit lan on board. I just built one for a mate...very nice, with a good bundle too. Costs £90 without the wifi adapter, which costs around £20 extra.

T.

[Kastuvas]

Why is it cheaper then the old one :/

[Kastuvas]

I can still change Item because it is not dispached yet, think it's worth it?

[Fat Tone]

I dunno...perhaps because the old one has a good rep, or they had lots of stock?

I put this mobo together with 1GB PC3200, an XP2500+ and an ASUS 9600XT and it gets ~3700 3marks and is smooth as silk everywhere.

T.

[Kastuvas]

I changed it for the "E" version. Thank you Tone