Athlon 2100xp: So CONFUSED! Just want FSB->200 ...

[Xaphod]

Hey all,

I've just spent another 60 minutes reading through this vast collection of intelligent and semi-intelligent posts alike... and i'm not really any better off than when I started :(

Here's what I have:

ASUS A7N8X-Deluxe (nF2 chipset)
256 x 2 kingsmax DDR400 RAM
Athlon XP2100+ palomino, see this link for pic -
http://tdot-dundas.dyndns.org/tdot/cpu_ath2100.jpg
You can see that I have a non-green but lasered version, stepping is clearly visible.

Now I don't have the $$$ for an expensive heatsink/fan combo at the moment (i'm a university student), i'm just running the retail AMD stock one.

What I want is to unlock my cpu's multiplier so that I can run my FSB at 200mhz, because that's what my RAM can handle in SYNC mode.

Please could someone tell me the mods required to the CPU itself in order to allow my mobo to change the multiplier? I want the BELOW 13x range, not above...

I've read the posts about this, but most are trying to o/c and are quite confusing to me... I've read candjac's pages which I find too difficult to understand... I know it sounds like i'm asking for hand-holding, but considering all I want is a specific solution for one CPU I guess it's not too bad.

Maybe later i'll buy a good fan/sink .. is my stepping capable of o/cing well?

thanks in advance,

tim

[TodB]

For a multies below 13x you'll need to switch the L10 Bridges.....

If it's like :I now you'll have to make it like I: for multies of 5x to 12.5x...... yep, you'll need to HARDmod your CPU....

[Xaphod]

Originally posted by TodB
For a multies below 13x you'll need to switch the L10 Bridges.....

If it's like :I now you'll have to make it like I: for multies of 5x to 12.5x...... yep, you'll need to HARDmod your CPU....

Ok, that's it? No other mod required? That sounds nice and easy, I can handle that no sweat... Can someone else confirm this? Not to be rude, just making sure before I actually hardmod something :)

I just had a look at the pic of my CPU, and I noticed that some L bridge connections are lasered open, but none seem to be actually closed. Are they closed inside? How do I open them if that is the case?

Tod, if you could look at the pic @ the link I posted originally, you can zoom in on the L10 bridges and see that one is lasered, and the other is "as is" ... I guess that corresponds to ":I" ?

thanks,

tim

[DriveEuro]

No that is not it. You also have to cut the L10 bridge that is closed. If you don't want to do that then you have to do the wire trick. That's were you wrap an uninsulated wire around two pins on bottom of the CPU. You can find links for it somewhere on this site.

[Bravo]

Your Kingmax memory sucks arse. Get some decent OCZ/Corsair PC-3200 and you'll be in business.

[Xaphod]

Originally posted by DriveEuro
No that is not it. You also have to cut the L10 bridge that is closed. If you don't want to do that then you have to do the wire trick. That's were you wrap an uninsulated wire around two pins on bottom of the CPU. You can find links for it somewhere on this site.

Ok, but I meant OTHER than the L10 bridges.... The first guy said I had to change my L10 bridges from OPEN-CLOSED to CLOSED-OPEN... What about my L1 bridges which are all open etc?

Thanks again for all your help....

tim

[DriveEuro]

Close all the L1 bridges and do the wire pin trick.

[SPQQKY]

Close the L1 bridges by filling the pits with nail polish or whatever works best and make sure the contacts are not covered and then use a conductive material like rear window defogger. Then take a small guage wire and cut it about twice as long as one of the pins under the cpu and bend it in a U shape (one from an old IDE ribbon works great) and drop it in the holes in the ZIF socket as indicated in the picture below. It is not unlocked with multi's 5.5-12.5

[OPPAINTER]

Do what SPQQKY said :D

OPP

[Xaphod]

welp i've attempted no less than 3 times to connect my L1 bridges... damn it's hard, and it takes FOREVER !

I have had some partial success. Right now, 4 times out of 5 the multiplier is locked at 5x (presumeably because the L3/L4 bridges are cut-set to 13x, and since i've done the wire-trick to make the 8bit LO, 5x is what you get since it's 5x/13x), and the other 1 time out of 5 the multiplier is "unlocked". I presume my L1-connecting job didn't go 100% well. Sooo small they are...

Anyways... troubles as far as RAM goes. I get RAM-related crashes if I try to run my DDR400 Kingsmax ram sync'd to 200mhz FSB... which prolly means that guy was right, my ram is arse. Grrr.

Two questions:

1. Does anyone know if the A7N8X-Deluxe (bios version 1001.G) actually has problems with memory timings when not at SYNC ? eg 83%, 66%, by spd when that means NOT sync'd... If I leave my CPU NON-oc'd at 133mhz FSB, but tell my RAM to go 200mhz DDR, I get ram crashes all over the place (Win XP won't even boot). I don't know if this is §§§§ty ram, or the a7n8x sucking. I have tried both sticks of ram, same deal both times.... kinda unlikely that BOTH ddr400 sticks are not capable of running at ddr 400?

2. Does a CPU see any difference between 200fsb x 5 (1000mhz) and 100fsb x 10 (1000mhz) ?? I've always thought "no", but someone has just told me otherwise. What's the deal here?

thanks

tim