Dying Northwood?

[exi]

P4 2.60c, purchased in December '03. Has spent most of its time overclocked to no more than 3.1 - usually, 3.0, or 2.8-2.9 for quite a few months. Constant voltages never exceeded 1.6 or so.

Now, some time ago, the computer stopped booting (would either freeze on boot or spontaneously restart). Boosting vcore from 1.525, which is default, to ~1.55 did the trick. Awhile after that, it took 1.575. After that, it wouldn't boot at all, right up to 1.65+.

I finally tried disabling Hyper-Threading in the BIOS, and here I am (1.55vc), scared to restart this computer in fear of never making it to the desktop long enough to hit up Newegg.

Basically, I guess I'm just looking for a second opinion on making sure that this P4 is essentially doomed and/or wondering out loud just how long it'll last like this.

Well, always did want to go AMD, so ... yup. Too bad that means I'd need a new s939 mobo for my A64 to be, and then I'd want to move to PCI-Express, leaving me with a useless 9800pro ... unless I could get a new AGP board, but then I dunno how smart THAT is. And then there's dual-core right around the corner... sigh

 

[Counter-Strike]

That is the scary part of raising voltages, you probably lowered its life by a damn lot. I would try restarting it, and setting the CPU back to stock settings and see how it does. A stock processor is better than a dead one...

 

[exi]

Oh, trust me, I did that. It won't boot at stock settings.

It's at stock clocks, 1.55vc, HT-disabled right now. And I'm Newegg shopping just in case.

(A long, long time ago, several months after original build, I was unable to get much past POST - that time, it turned out that if I disabled thermal mgmt in the BIOS, I was fine. I guess I should've taken the hint then, eh?)

 

[exi]

Any other thoughts?