• Please review our updated Terms and Rules here

Help me! PIII Overheating!

Erik's host's bandwidth completely dropped there for like 10 minutes...Wierd...

Anywho, I've browsed many forums & I can't seem to get a good solid number on how hot my CPU should be...
 
atari2600a said:
Seriously, why would I worry about shortening the lifespan of my PIII!? This is the slowest modern CPU I have! It's over 5 years old! If it dies, I'll just put in another of my various MotherBoards & CPU's! (Heck, I have a Dual-PIII Proxy server in my room gathering dust!) & I have no worries for my data! All that's on my HD is Win2000, some emulators, OS Updates, & Mozilla FF! I don't need anymore warnings about how I'm not gonna gain anything or how it might damage my system! I just want to get some extra speed, even if it's 50MHz, out of my existing hardware!

(Damn, it's like speaking to a scratched up record!)
Click to expand...


If you want to trash stuff, there are better groups of people to ask for advice. The people here generally like to keep things running for a good long time so that it makes it to vintage.

By the way, you're still not going to notice a 50Mhz jump. Most of your time is spent waiting for memory or disk. Your time would be better spent elsewhere, like say, reading a book that teaches you the basics about these things.
 
I've stated before, I've already noticed the drop from 405MHz to 375MHz. My HD is no more than 3 years old, & my RAM's maximum Bus speed is 133MHz. If I set the Bus speed to 133MHz & the Multiplier to 3.5, I'd be getting 95MHz more than I'm getting now. With some good cooling, I could set the multiplier to 4 & get 532MHz, still 2 MHz short of officially overclocking. This would be enough for my emulators to work well w/o framerate issues.


...& all I ask in this thread is the simple awnser of what would be a good CPU Tempurature Alarm setting, & yet I've gotten no awnser...
 
375 MHz sounds like 5 x 75 MHz? What is the CPU rated, and are your RAM chips PC-133 or better?

I googled for "pentium 3 temperature" and found these links. The latter document goes down to 450 MHz SECC2. As you can see, no Pentium III processor is recommended to have a core temperature above 90C (195F), so if your board reads 250F, the CPU is cooking.

http://www.yak.net/fqa/290.html
http://www.casecooler.com/temandvolgui.html
 
I never said it went that high, I just said that the alarm's capable of going that high. This is good, seing that I have my alarm set to 194F. I looked up my CPU, & it's limit is 90C. I forgot the equation to convert C to F, so what's 90C in F?

Also, again, the manufacturors speed is 533MHz. (4x133MHz maybe?)
 
Last edited:
A 500Mhz CPU operates at 500 million operations per second. That's a new operation every 2 nanoseconds.

Memory latency is generally in the 10s of nanoseconds.

Hard disks, even the newest, are orders of magnitude slower than memory.

The net result - your computer, even when overclocked, spends most of it's time waiting for memory or disk. Even with a big cache on the chip. There just isn't much point in overclocking.

You just don't bump the clock speed and expect a big difference. That's not the way things work. There are plenty of web sites and books that explain how CPUs and memory work together.
 
The only way to get something like that to work is if your Hard Drive used Fiber Channel or something near the HPC end of things. As for RAM, you would need RDRAM, DDR2, or XDR for that to work. So in the end, a Pentium III really isn't worth the trouble of over clocking. Only really High end stuff can overclock and show that drastic of an improvement.......
 
...& I'm not expecting a big difference. You have to realize that my CPU is (& has been) running about 150MHz lower than what Intel intended it to be. I'm not trying to overclock it 500MHz or create some mutant supercomputer or something, I'm just trying to get it to it's original speed & maybe exceed it. The current speed of the CPU isn't capable of even playing StarFox on an SNES emulator correctly!!
 
well you didn't say that to begin with........
icon_rolleyes.gif


what is the STANDARD speed for your CPU?
 
For the 2305564855705745505709573457345079th time, it's 533MHz!!!!!

& I just learned EVERYTHING I need to know about overclocking within the past 18 hours. Until less than 5 hours ago, I didn't even know what the standard speed of my CPU was!
 
Let's recap this thread:

atari2600a said:
Well 1: I don't know what the actual/official speed of the CPU is, & 2: It's not a sticky sticker, It's completely dry! The CPU left an imprint on it though...

Also, I plan to do some serious overclocking, so I'm planning to get some high-grade coolant paste.
Click to expand...

Ok, so we've established that you are going to do some overclocking.

atari2600a said:
Trust me, I use my PC to the limit. Even w/ my CPU speed minimized to 375MHz, I manage hang my computer (Everything; not just an app) Even when I boot up, you can already see the 30MHz difference. At 405MHz, the logon window would show for about .2 seconds, and at 375MHz, it stays for about 1.
Click to expand...

A 30Mhz difference made that one step in your boot process 5 times faster? Do you think that is believable or realistic using any sort of math?

atari2600a said:
Also, again, the manufacturors speed is 533MHz. (4x133MHz maybe?)
Click to expand...

Funny use of the word 'again'. This is the first time you ever mention the speed of the CPU, which you didn't know at the start of this thread.

atari2600a said:
For the 2305564855705745505709573457345079th time, it's 533MHz!!!!!

& I just learned EVERYTHING I need to know about overclocking within the past 18 hours. Until less than 5 hours ago, I didn't even know what the standard speed of my CPU was!
Click to expand...

I counted 2 times. Now you are just being plain rude.

I'm going to speak for a few level headed people when I make the following points:

  • Don't ask for help then turn rude when people give it to you.
  • Don't be suprised if people here are against the artificial shortening of a computer's lifespan.
 
I apoligize. There was a dog barking at me all night, which was giving me a bad headache. I had a little trouble thinking straight. Plus, I didn't know much about my CPU when I started the thread; All I knew was that it was a PIII & that the BIOS was running it at 405MHz. I believe I mentioned 533MHz more than twice, at least 3 times. Today I MIGHT go to RadioShack, so that might give me some time to buy Thermal Coolant & a Chassis fan(I probobly have one somewhere at my otherhouse).
 
I think the thing for you to do is to get it running at it's proper rated speed, and if it can't, find out the definitive reason why.

And that, we can help you with. :)

Go get some sleep first!
 
atari2600a said:
Yeah, I'm cool like that...
Click to expand...

Perhaps you could share with the rest of us some of the links you've been studying, so that we too can learn everything there is to know about overclocking. (Hell, with my highly-evolved intellectual capacity, I might even be able to shave it down to a mere 36-or-so hours).

--T
 
Well, I said everything I NEEDED to know, not everything. I think the reason Terry Yager reacted was because I went from zero to semi-hero in -18 hours.

Google is your friend, & my friend too! I just searched things like "how to overclock" (w/ the quote marks) If there's anything I know that you don't, I'd be suprised! An example of the deph of my knowledge of overclocking is something like don't srew around with the voltage if you're dealing with an AMD processor. I'd be really suprised if I knew something you didn't!
 
Actually, I'm kinda vintage computer-centric, so I have very little knowledge of modern systems, let alone overclocking them. My most up-to-date computer is a 300MHz P-II.

--T
 
...and, no...my reaction is not out of envy for your superior learning ability, but more of a knee-jerk at percieved rudeness towards people who are genuinely trying to help you. If rudeness was not your intention, then I beg your forgiveness...

--T
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top