O/C Virgin with AMD 3000+ and Gigabyte EasyTune OC Software needs help

I'm currently running a system with a Gigabyte GA-K8-NXP-SLI Mobo and I'm soon (this weekend properly) to upgrade to a brand new SATA Seagate HD w/ fast seek/access stats (A Barracuda 7900.9 160Gb).

I have 1Gb of Muskin Basic Green PC3200 RAM -oh and I have one BFG nVidia 7800GTX which is factory overclocked which gave me the idea of doing the same thing to the aging AMD 3000+.

I also use an X-Connect 550W power supply with the cool customizeable cabling system.

I'm using an AMD 939pin 3000+ Proc and I'm thinking of overclocking so I got myself a "Big Typhoon" (ditching a standard little tiny proc cooling unit), and I replaced the two 80x80x25mm fans in the front and back of the case with two 90x90x25 multi-speed, user adjustable, Enermax UC-9FAB's.

I have software to do overclocking that came with my motherboard called "EasyTune 5" which to be honest I'm kinda freaked out to boot up coz I'm an OC virgin.

OC'ing has always gone against my "computer stability and durability is king - OC is RISKY!!! Oooh Scary" kind of thinking.

Anyway. Am I right in thinking my cooling with a "Big Typhoon" (a huge six copper cool pipe CPU cooling unit with a 120x120mm fan on top) and two 90x90x25mm fans, one in front pulling air in, one in the back pushing air out, just right for OCing?

However lately I've been wanting a little more bang for my gaming habit and my wife is whining that her on-line shopping experience with our recently acquired cable modem seems to be lagging on our end - especially when she has more than 50 tabbed browsing windows open at Ebay.

How can I find out how much juice I can safely pump through my proc?
Also how can I find the min/optimal/and max temps of my processor in some language I can understand (i.e. English - Volts and Celsius, Farenheit or Kelvin - whichever).


That said am I insane to consider OC'ing?
Did Micha Barton's nipple really slip out in that episode back last year?
Should I threaten to divorce my beloved Wife for her insane Ebay browsing habits?
Do you need wooden stakes or silver bullets to kill Ann Coulter?
Has anyone else seen Melissa and Contessa on MSNBC morning news for megababes by megababes? Phew!

Where can I find temps and max volts and stuff for my processor and the other stuff something like NXSensor detects. (NXSensor is something available here at MajorGeeks.com).

I Downloaded the pdf from AMD for my processor - I even cut and printed out the specs from the PDF - my processor is designated an ADA3000DAA4BP.

However, the specs I downloaded and printed out seem to be either Nazi encoded German, Ancient Samarian, Talaxian, Goa'uld, Scarran, or the language of the Sand People of Tattooine or of Species 8472 from liquid dimension in the Delta Quadrant.

Without access to a Leviathan space vessel and an injection from a DRD of translator microbes, a UFP universal translator unit in one ear, a babel fish in the other, and the help of Daniel Jackson, Ford Prefect, C3P0, Jean Luc Picard, Teal'c, Obi Wan Kenobi, Seven-of-Nine, and an enigma coding machine stolen from a German U-Boat circa 1942 where can I get the info I need?

Please, I've already gone insane with this stuff.

Before I stop taking my meds please help me!

Thanks,

Deoxy.

 

O.K. I just tried whacking up my processor to 2000Mhz with easy mode on easy tune - a 15% increase.

I then loaded PC Wizard and tried to do some benchmarking.
I did a benchmark of the CPU and it came out slightly better than a 3200+ 2000Mhz AMD Proc - I'm only using a 3000+ that runs at 1810Mhz.

However, I also have one BFG nVidia GeForce 7800GTX OC'd (Factory OverClocked) so I did a test of the DirectX chucking power and I got a nasty BSD with a STOP error (didn't write down the hex stuff coz I couldnt be bothered - told ya'll I was insane and stoopid) and it took about 3 mins to dump phys mem to disk as it said.

Anyway. that freaked me out although I've had a couple of STOP BSD's in the past couple of months. My local expert store said it was my aging HD having been run for too long without being defragged - I've known about and been defragging HD's since HD's and defragging was invented but for some reason I just never found the time to defrag this one til about 2 years into it's use.

It was heavily fragged and took an overnight job to defrag - it was only 50Gb full 80Gb Western Digital. I shoulda known that noise was thrashing.

Still - Should I be freaked out or should I try OC'ing my old 3000+ or should I try and get some money together to replace the old 3000+ with something more up to date?

Help an idiot.

Please,

Deoxy.

 

Depending on your Mobo you should have no problems at all getting it up to 2200 on stock cooling, and aftermarket cooling should make it up to around 2400 without needing to bump the vcore voltage up.

I'm not a big fan of using OC software, IMO it's much better to do slow incremental bumps of HTT via bios.

Keep in mind that the mem is tied to the HTT (fsb) on AMD boards so you should drop your mem down (set it to ddr 333 or lower speeds) first so that you can test the limit of your cpu, then drop your HTT and bring your mem back up to normal speeds to see how high you can push the mem (you can lower your cpu multiplier to keep the cpu out of the equation, but not all boards/cpu combinations work well with lower multiplers).

Last thing to keep in mind is your HT (hypertransport?) multiplier (stock should be 4 on your cpu).

As you increase your HTT, you want to lower that multiplier.

I'm not sure what it is on a S939 board, but on the S754 boards the HT on my sempron 3100 is normally 4 X htt200 = 800. The target is 800 - 1000 so any HTT above 250 requires that the HT multiplier be dropped.

Oh.... if you haven't already figured it out.... I say.... go for it!!!!!

The lower end AMDs are just begging to be OC'd and do quite well at it!!!!!

 

Whoa Whoa WHoa WHoa Cowboy.

Firstly - I have two friends called Oxycontin and Valium - they keep life at a slow hum - You see some very unfunny things happened to me two years ago involving an MP5, two .22's of indeterminate origin, and a .45 ACP Sig Sauer. Add to that fourteen hours of surgery, and some people who live in small concrete rooms right now - thankfully - and I had to slow my life down.

Second - i'm an O/C Virgin - I think I mentioned that. You're going to have to explain this like you're talking to an idiot.

Sounds like you know what you're talking about though. If you have the patience I'd appreciate that at stoopid-person-speed.

Thanks,

Deoxy.

 

Sorry it took so long to get back to you, I was working nights this week.

First step would be for you to have a look at the OC "sticky" at the top of this thread.

It covers the basics, and should at least familiarize you with the terms / concepts you need to start on your new OC career.

Much of it might go over your head, but that's ok... come back with any question you may have. (Just remember..... slow steps).

Have a great weekend!