[razor_edge]

I'm thinking about overclocking my pc, it's an xps 600 pentium D 3.0 ghz. I'd like to overclock it to about 4.0 ghz and my question is, if i do this, would it be recommended to replace my original heatsink with a better one?

[Mosquito555]

Overclocking is not something to take lightly, especially if you don't have any previous experience...1.0 Ghz increase with a Pentium D is really too much. In any case you have to install a better cooling solution. But before trying anything please google for your CPU, mobo and RAM o/c capabilities. It's better to reffer to an overclocking guide to the internet.

Take the below in great consideration:

o/c can be performed by increasing FSB speed if CPU's multiplier is locked. This increases the operating speeds of almost any other part you have in your machine including PCI bus (so evert PCI cards too), RAM and graphics card. You need to know the complete capabilities of your system before o/c. You may need to add better cooling to other subsystems like RAM and case fans.

Only increase FSB speeds by one Mhz at a time until your machine becomes unstable. Never go beyond this threshold without better cooling. It can be also just impossible to o/c further.

Extreme o/c requires CPU voltage increase sometimes. If you are not familiar with stuff like that do not try them yet.

Before any attempt it is good to upgrade your BIOS with the newest one available.

[accat13]

Not that I have done much o/cing but from what I have read , Dell pc's just don't offer the options in the bios to accomplish the task....

[Mosquito555]

You are right, Dell offers mostly machines targeting average/home users...But the best way to know is to check exactly what mobo he owns...Anyway I don't think o/c this machine too much is a good idea. Even if it wasn't a Dell, the CPU is not a great overclocker as far as I know.

[crjdriver]

You cannot oc a dell; all of the adjustments in the bios are locked.

Next overclocking a pentium D requires very good cooling since it already runs warm.

Note there are bios editors available to edit your bios and unlock the overclocking options [Provided you have an asus board and not an intel board]
I have done this on a few systems however unless you really understand what you are doing, you can render the system unbootable.

Note I DO NOT recommend editing your bios.

[accat13]

Originally Posted by Mosquito555

You are right, Dell offers mostly machines targeting average/home users...But the best way to know is to check exactly what mobo he owns...Anyway I don't think o/c this machine too much is a good idea. Even if it wasn't a Dell, the CPU is not a great overclocker as far as I know.

Now on the other hand reading your specs Mosquito555 you have a system that can o/c

[Mosquito555]

You mean his system I think...Yes he could o/c but not at 4.0 Ghz. At least without good cooling.

Also keep in mind what Crjdriver posted.

It will need to take care for a lot of stuff in order to o/c and judging from Kurtis' post he doesn't have a lot of experience in o/c (no offence meant but we need to be sure of what we are going to do, especially if it is going to affect our machine in several ways).

[razor_edge]

Hey guys, thanks for the all advice. It's true i'm not experienced in overclocking but because my pentium D 3.0 is lacking in performance versus other processors like core 2 duo and AMD i want to somewhat bridge that gap. If i could i would simply replace my pentium D with a conroe, like the core 2 duo, but apparently that's not possible due to limitations in the bios. As far as Dell pc's not being able to be overclocked that is untrue. I've heard the pentium D 920 and 930 are processors that can be overlclocked a great deal. The pentium D processors do feature a locked clock frequency multiplier so that means i'm going to have to overclock by raising the FSB bus frequency. My mobo is a Dell Inc. 0XH241 (according to belarc advisor). Could anybody tell me if this mobo would be reliable enough for o/cing? And also what type of heatsink would be a good choice to replace my original, even if i could o/c to 3.6 rather than 4.0? The least thing i want to do is destroy my system, even if it is a pentium D it's still my baby lol. But i will still take Mosquito555's advice and google for my cpu, mobo and ram o/cing capabilities. Hopefully i'll read something promising. One more thing, the program i downloaded to perform the overclocking is ClockGen 1.0.5.3. Anybody know if this is a good application to use, or if there are any better ones? Once again, thanks all for the advice and any future advice.

[crjdriver]

You are not getting it. Dells cannot be overclocked. ALL fsb adjustments in the bios are locked.

As I posted, you might be able to edit a bios and flash it to unlock the fsb and other bios adjustments. Again this is NOT for someone who does not fully understand what they are doing. Flashing with a bios file that was not correctly edited will render the system unbootable.

[razor_edge]

crjdriver... please follow this link and tell me if the information provided there by X-bit laboratories is incorrect. http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu...d-920-930.html

[crjdriver]

You are still not understanding. You can overclock a pentium D however a dell computer does not have ANY adjustments to raise the fsb. In short you CANNOT overclock a dell. If the cpu was in a normal system, then you could however NOT WITH A DELL. The only way you could even attempt to do this is by what I posted.

Again the only way you could do this is by flashing with an edited bios file and that is ONLY if you have an asus board. It will not work with an intel board. Dell uses both intel and asus [along with a few others]

[crjdriver]

BTW I have a pentium D 940 and yes they do overclock well. I have had this one up to 3.8 stable running prime2004.

[razor_edge]

Ok, i understand. Don't forget here i'm new to overclocking, and i really did want to o/c my system. It's like taking a dagger to the heart, not being able to. Could you tell me then if i could replace my entire mobo with another dual core mobo?

[Mosquito555]

I think that you can change the mobo with another one, it's a normal PC after all. But if you do it alone or by 3rd party technicians your warranty could be broken.I don't know for sure, please reffer to Dell for details.

Why do you say that your mobo doesn't support a Core 2 Duo? Is it due to Dell specific limitations? Or the current BIOS does not support them? In this last case a BIOS update could help if applying it is possible.

Also I think I saw somewhere that his mobo has a Nforce4 chipset if that helps!

Check this http://forum.worldstart.com/showpost...5&postcount=12

[crjdriver]

You guys are not understanding; it is not a standard pc. It is a dell. Dells are proprietary. You cannot get a standard atx motherboard and install it in a dell case. The slots / mounts will not line up. In addition many [however not all] dells use a proprietary power supply. The atx power plug is standard however some of the wiring is not. If you have one of these power supplies and you connect a standard motherboard.... Ops.

The only option to overclock is the one I posted above. Other than that, you are looking at a new case, power supply, motherboard, and buying another copy of xp since the one that came with the dell will not work on another system.

Really unless you are playing games or hardcore video editing, a 3gig cpu will run just about any general app.