Overclocking Intel E2160 to 3.33GHz Safe?

[ripken204]

im just going to talk about the game part of that nmX, the ppl with those problems i think are the ones who don't test for stability

also when you talk about the -10C = 2x life, i wonder how that will convert for someone at -200C on a 4 stage phase change at well over 4GHz

[iceangel89]

thanks. i guess i don't OC 1st, until i need to or the warranty ends. but whats the performance of the E2160? anyone knows or maybe i save more to get a better CPU instead. i dont want to get something whose performance is bad...

i do have a P4 530 but that comp is spoilt can't boot now i posted http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=103415

[ripken204]

the performance is good for most things that you want to do and its really cheap.

[Zxian]

@iceangel89 - You say "how good is the performance"... compared to what? Compared to the P4-530 you've got, the performance is much better, but compared to any other C2D chips, the E2160 isn't much to write home about at stock speeds. It's fast enough for plenty of things, but it's no match for an E6400 or anything of the sort.

Like ripken said - you can't really beat the price though. I can get one here for about $100 CAD, and for a basic system, that's pretty freakin wicked.

[nmX.Memnoch]

im just going to talk about the game part of that nmX, the ppl with those problems i think are the ones who don't test for stability

Again...just blanket recommending "yeah, it's safe" to someone who doesn't now anything at all about overclocking isn't something you can do. He asked if it was safe to overclock a 1.8GHz CPU to 3.33GHz, a clock speed that's over 50% faster than it's rated for, and the answer he got was "yeah, sure...go head".

Now, do you think he would go about it by incrementally adjusting the FSB and other settings? No...he's going to go straight to 3.33GHz, thereby taking a chance on data corruption or even worse, burning something up. And who's going to be to blame?

also when you talk about the -10C = 2x life, i wonder how that will convert for someone at -200C on a 4 stage phase change at well over 4GHz

And exactly how many people out of the millions that use a computer every day are running phase change? Check that...how many out of those that are overclocking are running phase change? I think you'll find the percentage is still rather small. But yeah, their CPUs will last for a while.

Lemme ask you this as well...would you spend a bunch of money on a phase change system to only put a $100 CPU under it?

Edited August 24, 2007 by nmX.Memnoch

[ripken204]

okay first of all i'm not trying to argue with you at all, you have to stop doing that. i never told him to go straight to any number, all i told him was that OC isnt all that safe unless you watch what you're doing.

and the phase change thing was a joke. why did you think i was telling someone to get phase change?

[nmX.Memnoch]

okay first of all i'm not trying to argue with you at all, you have to stop doing that.

I'm not arguing with you at all. I'm just trying to make you realize why it's important to explain things to people. If you tell them something should work a certain way, but don't explain all of the details about how to make it work that certain way then who are they going to blame when it doesn't? One, they're either going to blame you, or two they're going to think they have a hardware problem when they may not.

i never told him to go straight to any number, all i told him was that OC isnt all that safe unless you watch what you're doing.

Those comments weren't aimed directly at you. Again, I'm just trying to explain the difference between "yeah, it's safe" and "well, you can probably get a good overclock, maybe not that high and you should be aware of 'this', 'this' and 'this'". If you're going to provide people with support then do the research and do it right.

and the phase change thing was a joke. why did you think i was telling someone to get phase change?

Did I say you were telling him or anyone else to get phase change? Again, it was another observation/point.

[iceangel89]

ya definitely its cheap... then i can OC when i need so good deal i guess. and i guess i wont use the computer for 10 years! thats alot and by then it will be antique! cant do s*** i guess i guess abt 6 yrs will be wonderfull already, my 5 yr old PC still going strong but slow like mad.

[iceangel89]

When bringing up the FSB all components will be OCed.

That's not entirely correct either. Several years ago raising the FSB would also raise the PCI and AGP buses, as well as overclocking the IDE controller (in some cases). But newer boards have features that keep the PCI, AGP and PCIe buses within specifications. Most of them even have memory dividers so you can choose not to overclock anything but the CPU.

ooo... so i know that memory will be OCed (autually if i get a DDR2 800 1 it wont) but GPU also?

ya overclocking isn't all that safe but it is pretty hard to mess something up unless you arn't paying attention. just watch the temps and voltages and you will be fine. this is where after market coolers come in handy.

actually the article said something about the voltage will automatically be increased, so its not so safe then...

and what coolers do u recconmend? Cooler Master ones looks good? and which 1

observed when the Core 2 Duo processors first hit our labs and we were impressed that the CPU is clever enough to request more voltage when the clocks are beyond default operations.

@iceangel89 - You say "how good is the performance"... compared to what? Compared to the P4-530 you've got, the performance is much better, but compared to any other C2D chips, the E2160 isn't much to write home about at stock speeds. It's fast enough for plenty of things, but it's no match for an E6400 or anything of the sort.

Like ripken said - you can't really beat the price though. I can get one here for about $100 CAD, and for a basic system, that's pretty freakin wicked.

maybe for school work, i do programming - Visual Studio, Dreamweaver, SQL Server, design, photoshop, illustrator, maya(abit) is it good enuf?

and if i dont OC? or would it be better if i just get the Motherboard 1st, then try using the P4 530 from the old computer

Edited August 24, 2007 by iceangel89

[Zxian]

For all the programs you listed - the E2160 will be fine at stock speeds. Maya is more graphics dependent though, so make sure you have a decent graphics card.

[eyeball]

good info on overclocking there, personally i never bother, Zxians explanation sums up my opinion of it.

With the price/speed of stuff these days do we really need to overclock anymore? is it just a habit ppl have?

[iceangel89]

Maya is more graphics dependent though, so make sure you have a decent graphics card.

i don't think so, or is it? i read from somewhere that the software renderer of Maya uses CPU, the Hardware renderer uses GPU - OpenGL all that. so it means that if i do a software render, like Mental Ray i dont need a good GPU but a good CPU. and for physics, get a PhysX card, but not for me for now.

good info on overclocking there, personally i never bother, Zxians explanation sums up my opinion of it.

With the price/speed of stuff these days do we really need to overclock anymore? is it just a habit ppl have?

good also, so don't OC safer also. erm then good RAM also then

[amit_talkin]

Just a personal note - I never consider overclocking safe at any time. The CPU you have is designed to run with an 800MHz FSB (actually 200MHz), and at a clock speed of 1.8GHz. Anything higher, and you're running outside the tested limits.

If you're willing to overclock your components, you're willing to break them IMO. Overclocking stresses the components more than they were designed for. If they break while under normal operation, you can get a new one. If you've been overclocking, then getting a new one is harder (and you've got an ethical dilemma to face).

oh yeah? mine is running at 3 Ghz for last 7 months without any problems. if u dont know how to play with overclocking then u can leave it and shout as u did above.

@iceangel89.

yes 3.33 is safe . but u need to maintain temp. of CPU at this speed. if it goes overlimit then lower down vcore and keep checking it. adjust ur speed until u maintain safe temp. for ur CPU.

P.S. overclocking FSB will increase RAM FSB too. but it wont affect GPU clocks anyway. GPU is totally independent from FSB overclocking.

if u have nvidia card then u can use RivaTuner to overclock it.

if ATI, then use ATITrayTools ( which i prefer ) ,ATItool or Rivatuner.

Good luck!

AMIT

Edited August 24, 2007 by amit_talkin

[ripken204]

ya overclocking isn't all that safe but it is pretty hard to mess something up unless you arn't paying attention. just watch the temps and voltages and you will be fine. this is where after market coolers come in handy.

actually the article said something about the voltage will automatically be increased, so its not so safe then...

well maybe if you have an auto overclock feature on.. otherwise it will stay at what you set it. and if you dont have enough voltage then the comp will be unstable and it may crash/freeze up.

[nmX.Memnoch]

@iceangel89.

yes 3.33 is safe . but u need to maintain temp. of CPU at this speed. if it goes overlimit then lower down vcore and keep checking it. adjust ur speed until u maintain safe temp. for ur CPU.

*sigh*

Did you even read the entire thread or did you just skip over the "long boring" posts?

P.S. overclocking FSB will increase RAM FSB too.

This is completely dependent on the motherboard and how it's BIOS is setup. For instance, my P5B-E allows me to change the CPU FSB but keep the RAM FSB locked (within a certain tolerance). It automatically adjusts (again, within certain tolerance) so I don't have to worry about it.

but it wont affect GPU clocks anyway. GPU is totally independent from FSB overclocking.

The GPU yes. But the bus is a different story. Older motherboards (and even some newer cheap ones) will also overclock the PCI and AGP/PCIe buses as well. This can cause the GPU to fail as if it were overclocked too much itself. It's particularly bad with NICs and sound cards.