Elbatrop1
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I thought I would make a post about my recent upgrades in case someone was considering upgrading their computer, and wanted to see some results.
At first, I bought 1G of RAM to add to my existing 512MB. With 1.5GB of RAM, my 3Dmark03 score went from 998 to 1110. I noticed that because the new RAM had a lower latency than the old stuff, all of the RAM ended up underclocking itself. I took out the old 512MB, and my 3dmark stayed about the same.
Then came overclocking. I overclocked my 2.6GHz P4 up to about 3.05 GHz (which bumped my FSB above 800MHz). My idle temps during the overclock (in Windows) were around 37C. This screwed up my ratio of my FSB to my RAM frequency, and my RAM underclocked again. I benchmarked again, with little or no difference. Because of the lack of differnce, I set the CPU back to normal speed.
After that I got my ATi Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB. This is what made the biggest difference. From a 3Dmark score of 1110, I went to 5740. Battlefield: Vietnam never looked so good, I changed all of the video settings in the game to the max, and still get high fps. I can play Doom 3 and FarCry with high settings and everything runs perfectly.
Hopefully my upgrading/overclocking story helps someone out that is thinking about doing either
Before Specs:
P4 2.6 GHz (800MHz FSB)
Stock heatsink/fan
Asus P4C800-D
512 MB RAM CL:3.0
Sapphire Radeon 9200
120GB Maxtor HDD 8MB cache
3DMark03: 998
After Specs:
Now in sig!
If you guys have any questions about what I did, feel free!
At first, I bought 1G of RAM to add to my existing 512MB. With 1.5GB of RAM, my 3Dmark03 score went from 998 to 1110. I noticed that because the new RAM had a lower latency than the old stuff, all of the RAM ended up underclocking itself. I took out the old 512MB, and my 3dmark stayed about the same.
Then came overclocking. I overclocked my 2.6GHz P4 up to about 3.05 GHz (which bumped my FSB above 800MHz). My idle temps during the overclock (in Windows) were around 37C. This screwed up my ratio of my FSB to my RAM frequency, and my RAM underclocked again. I benchmarked again, with little or no difference. Because of the lack of differnce, I set the CPU back to normal speed.
After that I got my ATi Radeon 9800 Pro 128MB. This is what made the biggest difference. From a 3Dmark score of 1110, I went to 5740. Battlefield: Vietnam never looked so good, I changed all of the video settings in the game to the max, and still get high fps. I can play Doom 3 and FarCry with high settings and everything runs perfectly.
Hopefully my upgrading/overclocking story helps someone out that is thinking about doing either
Before Specs:
P4 2.6 GHz (800MHz FSB)
Stock heatsink/fan
Asus P4C800-D
512 MB RAM CL:3.0
Sapphire Radeon 9200
120GB Maxtor HDD 8MB cache
3DMark03: 998
After Specs:
Now in sig!
If you guys have any questions about what I did, feel free!
