Question How To overclock my cpu (amd athlon II x4 640) without knowing what motherboard I got

May 5, 2019
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Is it a good idea to put the CPU/HT Reference clock (MHz) to 241 and the frequency multiplier to [14.5 2900 MHz]?
 

clutchc

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If you don't even know what motherboard you have, or what PSU you have, no... it is not a good idea to dabble in OC'ing.
That said, if you don't care what happens to your system, dabble away. But be sure you have the system connected to a sound electrical system with ground fault and short circuit protection. Wouldn't want to start any house fires.

Oh, and in case the worst happens, maybe have a good Class C fire extinguisher handy as well. If something catches fire, you'll want to be able to put out an electrical fire w/o spreading it.
 
That's not very power demanding CPU, it should OC on any MB but take care with FSB, it also raises PCIe and Memory frequency and that may present a problem. Start with multiplier only and maybe just tune it with FSB by few Hz or not even that. If you do, make sure you lower RAM frequency and set PCIe to 100 manually.
 
May 25, 2019
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That ref clock is a bit high, you may run into ram and PCIE issues. I'd start by leaving ref clock at 200 and see how high you can get the multi stable. then try bumping the ref clock up 1mhz at a time to maximize your overclock.
Your chip is basically a neutered Phenom II x4 core, so it should scale pretty well if you have good enough cooling.
 
Since Athlon IIs are all multiplier locked, HT reference clock is the only way to go. It's pretty much a long forgotten art on this forum since the novice overclockers here have been spoiled for years with unlocked multipliers. I would certainly open your case and see exactly what hardware you have to work with, and damn sure know how to Clear CMOS before you begin.

I've oc'd a few of these myself, C2 and C3 rev chips, as well as ones that could unlock extra cores and L3 cache.
 
May 25, 2019
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ah that makes sense being a locked multi. The OP mentioned setting the multi so I just figured they had an adjustable one.

In that case you need to look for bios options to hopefully limit your ram and PCIE clocks to achieve the highest possible overclock.
 
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ah that makes sense being a locked multi. The OP mentioned setting the multi so I just figured they had an adjustable one.

In that case you need to look for bios options to hopefully limit your ram and PCIE clocks to achieve the highest possible overclock.

Exactly. You lock pcie to 100, and drop your other multipliers to stay within stability while raising ht ref to increase cpu frequency. The problems usually occur from ram timings being too tight in auto once it is downclocked and driven back up from ref clock, so learn how to set ram timings manually.
 
May 25, 2019
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Then again, there were the pads on the tops of those chips that, when bridged with conductive ink, would unlock the processor for overclocking.....don't ask me which ones, since my OCing days are long dead, and I have forgotten that tidbit of information.
That would be the socket 462 Athlon series
 
May 25, 2019
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yeah those were the ones.

I know what you mean. never had the chance to play with a 4004 but I remember ''tweaking'' an AMD 386DX, pushing a 486 to 133 and who could forget the''fun'' of Vesa local bus graphics cards, or trying to get SIMMs seated properly.