Overclocking a Celeron on an Asus P4S800

[mickmcc03]

Hey,

I build my first PC (Yay thanks all at PCMech!) and I'm using an Asus P4S800 with a Celeron 2.7GHz. I will use this mainly for gaming and surfing the internet. I want to push this to the max and overclock it. I'm new to overclocking so I don't know much about it. I want to play games like Halo and Vice City. Now, how exactly do I overclock and is it safe? I have 4 fans in my case, 2 intake at the front and 2 exhaust at the back. What do u think the max this would overclock to and be stable at? I will probably overclock my graphics card as well. I have tried my best to clean up all cables in my computer to increase airflow, I covered them in insulating tape and I personally think it looks great . So any ideas for overclocking?

Thanks,

mickmcc

[mr_spider3]

if you really want to max it out you should use cooling, you could use fans but your going to need a **** load of them.

[Joeberg]

After reading your sig, I've noticed you have a Geforce 4 MX440 - Not exactly a gaming card. Since your going to be doing quite a bit of gaming, some quality, budget minded cards are the Geforce Ti 4200, and the ATi 9600 Pro and XT...
And an article about Overclocking:
http://web.zdnet.com.au/reviews/comp...207843,00.htm?

[enhanced08]

well its an intel which doesn't get as hot as say an AMD so temp isn't as much of a problem (as much, its still a big problem tho!) and its a celeron so it wont OC very much to begin with, you might get it up to 3GHz. To OC go into the BIOS settings and chage the FSB. OC'ing is safe to a point, it can fry your system, can cause an unstable system, etc. if this is your first try at overclocking do some reading about it first.

read Overclocking - An Overview

[imbest123]

I hope you know that the pc3200 ram will act as pc2100 ram since it is on a 100Mhz bus speed. pc 3200 is good for overclocking though and im sure you can reach at least 3Ghz on that Celly. There was a test made on Anandtech and an Athlon 1900+ outperformed a 3Ghz Celeron on almost every test, the celly isnt exactly a gaming cpu. Dont worry aboot frying your cpu, just make sure that you dont raise the voltage core. As for the Geforce 4 MX440, I am using that card and I can run Vice City on a 1280x1024 resolution with very little or no lag. I just got Halo so im not sure how good I can make the resolution and detail yet. Unless you want full everything on every game then just stick with that card, although I did gt this card when it was new and its getting outdated now. If you want crazy detail in Half Life 2 then get a Radeon 9600 Pro.

[mickmcc03]

Hey guys,

I will only use the Celeron as a stepping stone to a Pentium 4 (When I save up the money to get a good one, I am only 13). Hopefully the games will run O.K but I will upgrade eventually, and probably get a ATI 9800 PRO after a while. Hopefully 4 fans will be enough.

Thanks again for all your help,

mickmcc

P.S When new processors come out over 3.2GHz and I wanted to get one of them can I flash my mobo so it will accept processors over 3.2GHz? It's an Asus P4S800, the limit is 3.2GHz. Thanks.

[Joeberg]

If a BIOS revision comes along in the future that has support for Processors >3.2Ghz you shoud be able to use a Proc. up to the supported speeds the board will handle. Intel's generally run cooler than AMD's, so your cooling seems adequate. Wait until after the new line of Video cards come out (In the Spring) to buy the Radeon 9800 Pro, hopefully prices will drop...

[mickmcc03]

Hey,

Thanks for the advice Joeberg, will wait for the new line of vid. cards to come out and then buy 9800 Pro.

Thanks again,

mickmcc