Hi, I've just bought a new CPU to replace my Athlon XP 2600+. The model number of the new CPU is: AXMJ2800FHQ4C Being a Athlon XP-M 2800+ 2.13Ghz Mobile CPU. Now i've just replaced it in my system and it booted to the BIOS (Asus 1014 BIOS) where I had 4 speed choices: 600/800/1000/1200Mhz or Manual. It refuses to boot with any other setting other than 600Mhz. There are a load of other settings on this screen which i'm afraid to alter, as whenever I select a speed it automatically adjusts the settings below. When I select Manual here are the options I have: CPU Multiplier: 5.0x - 22.5x (Range) CPU External Frequency (Mhz): 100/33 - 227/45 (Range) Memory Frequency: 333/Auto (Set to Auto) Can someone please let me know what settings I should pick, I did search and people have refered to Set the CPU External Frequency to 166Mhz? I can't see this number unless theres a /33 etc after it. Please help! Many many thanks !

Just an update: I had a fiddle with the settings and set the CPU Multiple Frequency to 13.0x and the External Frequency to 166/33 and i'm now getting a speed of 2.17Ghz which I think is about right for this CPU. I've heard of overclocking, what is the Maximum frequency/speed I could get out of this CPU? I have a post reporter and a nice lady informs me if i've over clocked too much.. and it fails to boot, but I would like to know what are the safe limits. thanks.

Overclocking is not an exact science, it very often requires experience, trial & errors and some luck. Not surprisingly, results typically vary from one system to the other depending on other components in the PC. Luckily for you, you seem to have a board with features that allow overclocking. However, it is impossible for anyone to tell you the exact maximum that the 2800+ will go simply for the reasons that I have outlined in the first paragraph. With regards to the need for a board that allows you to tune the CPU clock, HT bus/multiplier, voltage, ram timings and also lock the PCI/AGP/PCI-E bus. I figured your board does all that to a good degree. My suggestion would be to first ensure the PCI & AGP buses are locked at 33MHz & 66MHz respectively, then disable settings like System BIOS Cacheable, Video BIOS Shadow & Speed Spectrum. Once that is done, simply lower the multiplier all the way to say 10x & start raising the CPU's clock frequency incrementally (1MHz-3MHz) at a time between BIOS saves & see how far you can go before the system hits instability or fails to boot. Once you hit that threshold & determined how high your clock can scale with the low multiplier - you can go ahead start raising the multiplier until the system hits instabiity again - this is where you start to ramp up voltage to the CPU - adjusting this a notch (0.0125V) at a time. Follow the cycle above & very soon you'll discover the best your system will do, but I suspect you may not be able to go beyond 2.4GHz-2.6GHz on air cooling. Good luck! Oh, & BTW. Unless your 2600+ had been destroyed or you have gotten possession of the 2800+ for free - I really would not have gone from the 2600+ to the 2800+.

Also best to check which XP2800M you have as the standard voltage are different: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...

Hi, thanks Sabertooth for that informative response. I think I will have a go with the settings another time, it appears to be running smoothly now i've adjusted what I thought was correct. I'm lucky to have a board that tells me if i've set the multiplier too high etc. The Voltage part etc is something I would rather leave alone incase I do fry something. My board can only handle a max 2.4Ghz speed anyway, so I thought I would buy the 2800 which I read could do that. It was only 10GBP on ebay so not all that much. I will keep the spare 2600+ which could only manage 2.08Ghz for something to fall back on if anything ever goes wrong. I know 2.08Ghz to 2.17Ghz isnt much but i've noticed some time difference when encoding video etc. Thank you all again.

I'm running an XP-M 2400+ Barton (AXMH2400FQQ4C) at 2.2GHz (11 x 200MHz) on an nF2 board. I had to bump up the vcore from 1.45v to 1.65v.