Phenom II: Unlocking Cores, Cache, And A Free Lunch

[cangelini]

Some Phenom II X3 700-series processors can be unlocked, enabling the triple-core CPU's fourth core. The same goes for Phenom II X4 800s, enabling 2MB of L3 cache that'd otherwise bring the chip's total to 4MB. Should you even bother with these mods?

Phenom II: Unlocking Cores, Cache, And A Free Lunch : Read more

 

[dirtmountain]

Good article. Now if you can just get your ad clowns from sticking us with those annoying ads.....!

 

[Guest]

test them with games... some people care about that 😛

 

[cangelini]

Well, but the point isn't the benchmarks. We already know that most games are going to be limited more by graphics horsepower versus whether a CPU has three or four cores/4MB shared L3 or 6MB shared L3.

In fact, when it comes to gaming, you're going to be better off looking for the fastest overclock possible with your three good cores or 4MB of known-good cache, really.

 

[Guest]

omg you replied to me... i'm so honoured 😛

but yes, i agree... but if you had crossfire gpus, this would make a difference. but then again, i think you'd have the money to buy the real thing (phenom II 920)

 

[tacoslave]

i like this article toms should do more stuff like this.

 

[apache_lives]

Page 3 "it ran for an hour sans error before we shut it down" - mistake?

Me wonders if extra v's would help both to the memory, HTT and cores etc, or underclock that extra core if possible....

On the other hand as all overclockers/modders should be aware THERE'S NO GUARANTEE on what you can get out of your hardware etc.

Out of interest, is the third core ("Core 2"... LOL) still always the culprit of every X3 (unlockable or not)?

Now if only there was some super secret on modding my Q6600 into a i7 940.....

 

[cangelini]

Hey Apache! No error, sans = without.

 

[apache_lives]

still reads wrong to me?

 

[Summer Leigh Castle]

Good article but can someone explain how ACC % works? Also, where do we start in terms of ACC % if we're tweaking for stability?

 

[ravenware]

[citation][nom]cangelini[/nom]Hey Apache! No error, sans = without.[/citation]

The only reason I know that is because of Wayne's World2.

 

[cangelini]

I do wish I could give you more detail on ACC, but AMD has played that card close to its chest. In terms of where to start, I'd say "Auto" is your best bet, and then move up and down in 2% increments in each direction.

 

[raden_muaz]

can you compare it with PII 910? PII 810 have higher clock speed.

 

[Slobogob]

Great article. Reminds me of how Tomshardware used to be.

 

[empstar]

this reminds me of the 1st Athlon with gold finger and the athlon with the "tape" on top to link connection for Socket A. 1998 I start reading this web..... 🙂 where is Dr. Toms P go ? I wonder..

 

[apache_lives]

tom sold it 😉

 

[empstar]

sold it to Bestofmedia? omg since when?

 

[Pei-chen]

AMD is not overclocker friendly by locking the multiplier, cores and cache. What happened to the AMD in Athlon and Athlon XP era?

 

[apache_lives]

[citation][nom]Pei-chen[/nom]AMD is not overclocker friendly by locking the multiplier, cores and cache. What happened to the AMD in Athlon and Athlon XP era?[/citation]

its called sales - if your $100 processor was the same as your $500 processor why would you buy the $500 processor?

 

[neiroatopelcc]

I supposed it wouldn't be impossible to custom tailor a bios for a non asrock board. I haven't dared try (nor needed to), but I expect it to be quite likely you could just extract the microcode from an older, working, asrock bios, and replace the code in your gigabyte, asus or whatever bios with it. All I think that is required, apart from knowledge on bios tinkering I don't have, is a 750 chip on the board.

 

[apache_lives]

i believe it depends partly on the IO chip too (usually one of those ITE 87xx chips), then flash part type, rom size, bios brand (award, AMI etc) - beyond most of us and more for the motherboard engineers etc.

 

[glawk]

Does this article mention anywhere that the 4th core may very well be disabled because it is defective or not up to spec? I didn't see it. Isn't this how the X3 came about in the first place? Because the manufacturing process for the X4 wasn't all that great to begin with.

While it's true that AMD may have have improved their process and these might be 'ok', don't you think that's atleast worth mentioning to people who are considering modding their cpu to do this?

 

[neiroatopelcc]

[citation][nom]glawk[/nom]Does this article mention anywhere that the 4th core may very well be disabled because it is defective or not up to spec? I didn't see it. Isn't this how the X3 came about in the first place? Because the manufacturing process for the X4 wasn't all that great to begin with.While it's true that AMD may have have improved their process and these might be 'ok', don't you think that's atleast worth mentioning to people who are considering modding their cpu to do this?[/citation]
If we assume those 720's that didn't want to work are defective, that is your answer.

 

[glawk]

[citation][nom]neiroatopelcc[/nom]If we assume those 720's that didn't want to work are defective, that is your answer.[/citation]

What about those that work, but are randomly unstable? I wouldn't want to sacrifice system stability for enabling another core that 99% of consumer-level applications don't utilize anyway.

 

[neiroatopelcc]

[citation][nom]glawk[/nom]What about those that work, but are randomly unstable? I wouldn't want to sacrifice system stability for enabling another core that 99% of consumer-level applications don't utilize anyway.[/citation]
If the article doesn't state they are unstable, let's assume they are stable ?
In the end it seems random if you get one that works or one that doesn't. At least with regards to the 720s. So no matter what, if you enable acc you might want to run prime95 or equivalent to ensure stability. There's no such thing as a guarantee in this.