The Dangers of Overclocking

[Onlooker]

I was just wondering what some of the dangers of overclocking are, and what can cause them. Can overclocking ruin other parts of your computer? I'm kind of clueless in the subject but I was thinking about giving it a whirl since I'm getting a new CPU soon. Thanks.

[jmebonner]

Nah, the newer boards shut off if it gets too hot. Also, you'll notice system instability before that, so as long as you heed the warning signs, you're fine. Some people say the heat shortens the effective life of the processor, but I won't ever keep one around long enough to tell Make sure you get some good thermal grease and a good fan and heat shouldn't even be an issue.

[nukes]

So long as you keep an eye on your temps and don't put the voltage up too high, you won't loose anything.
Heat does shorten the life of a CPU, try and keep your temps below 47 at the most. That's the highest I'd be happy running a comp, but lots of people here run their systems day in day out with no problems at like 55-60.

[gentry_joey]

Originally posted by nukes
So long as you keep an eye on your temps and don't put the voltage up too high, you won't loose anything.
Heat does shorten the life of a CPU, try and keep your temps below 47 at the most. That's the highest I'd be happy running a comp, but lots of people here run their systems day in day out with no problems at like 55-60.

That would be me. 55-60 is about what my xp 2000+ runs at. Its prob due to the fact i need some more thermal greese to put on it. Its not on vary well.

Anyone got any to spare

[LordKwiKSilva00]

what cpu you lookin to get??? if ya gimme specs, i can recommend ya some stuff to keep it from overheatin, as well as max OC on it...but right now, my best suggestion is to use artci silver 3 thermal grease...until i get specs, thats the best i can do

[daveleau]

Yes you can damage other items by overclocking.

The PCI and AGP buses are set to run at 33MHz and 66MHz respectively. Most PCI devices are not too finicky and there are dividers in the chipset that allow for changes (1/2, 3/4, 2/3). for instance, on a system with 100MHz fsb, the AGP runs with a 2/3 divider to make its devices run at 66MHz.

This is all well and good but how does it affect my hardware? With video, it can make significant performance differences. If your card is running at 61 MHz or 58MHz, then it will run slower. If it is running at 70MHz or 75MHz, it can make it perform better and it can overheat the card and make it less stable. The real problem arises in IDE channels. IDE runs at the same speed as PCI: 33MHz. Drives NOT running at 33MHz have a tendency to lose data, corrupt and possibly even die. The latter is only conjecture and possible coincidence, but data loss and OS corruption is a very real possibility. For instance, Maxtors are the worst when they run outside of 33MHz. If they get outside of 36 to 37 MHz or 31 to 32MHz, they tend to be less and less reliable.

This is not meant to scare you out of OCing, because I have OC'ed my systems for years. These are just items you must be aware of. They do not happen with any regularity, but they do occur and are a side-effect of OCing.

Of course, the main side effect of OCing is that the processor's life is degraded. So, instead of being around for 10 years, the life may be reduced to 5 or 6 years. For most of us that upgrade, that is no big deal.

[nukes]

You won't kill stuff from running the PCI out of spec though, maybe some of your cards/onboard stuff will stop working, but most enthusiast-class boards have options for the dividers, and NForce2 has a thing so the clocks are always the same for PCI/AGP. The thing about the hard disks is a valid point though, most boards have options for the dividers though, as I say.

Anyone got any to spare

If you're in the UK, PM me your address, I have a few little sachets of it I could send you.

[Onlooker]

What are some of the first steps I need to take in order to OC my system. I dont think heat will be a problem, considering I have a 7400 rpm copper heat sink sitting on top of a dinky AMD Duron 1.2. I also have some sample thermal gel that I haven't applied. I was a little comfused on the thermal gel. Do you have to continually replace it, or does the gel last for a long time?

[nukes]

Compound or Tape? The tape is meant to last for like 3 years or something, the compound will last for as long as you have that chip.
To overclock you have 2 options. Increase the FSB or multiplier. To increase the multiplier, you need to unlock the chip. To do this, find the L1 bridges and pencil them in so they look like this:
|||||.
not joining between them horizontally, but joint them all up vertically.
Then go into your BIOS and up the FSB a bit, you shouldn't put the voltageabove 1.85v. and you need a motherboard that supports FSB/Mult/Voltage adjustment.

[Telexen]

The pencil trick does'nt work with AthlonXPs ...did with Thunderbirds though.