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Abit KD7 MoBo/Via KT400 chispset -CPU/FSB?


bvc
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I just went from a Celeron 600 (Anaheim2 Mobo)/Intel i810 chipset to what's in the tittle + a AMD Athlon XP 1900+ cpu/266fsb. My old sys limited me when it came to overclocking so I'm new at it and I'm lost. I honestly haven't done extensive research because quite frankly I think this Abit AMD crap is a joke, and if this can't be resolved quickly and easily I'll return them for something Intel. Lets see if I can confuse us...

 

Problem: The defaults in the bios are

cpu 1600/133fsb

fsb 133

agp 4x

 

Fry's advertises a fsb of 400, and agp 8x. The box doesn't say but the manual says cpu up to AMD Athlon 3200+/fsb 266 and fsb 100 to 250. Heh? Are we saying there's a cpu fsb speed and a actual fsb speed? ...and the book says agp 8x as well.

 

Now, I can easily tell the bios to "Load Optimized Defaults" and get

cpu 1900/266fsb

fsb 133

agp 4x

but after reboot cpucool in Win98 and cat /proc/cpuinfo show (I'm on win95 at work so this is from memory)

AMD Athlon XP 1900+

speed: 1600

 

I can chose a "User Defined" option and change the fsb from 100 to 250, or the ratio from 4.2.1 to 5.x.x and/or a number of other options like core voltage etc...., but if I so much as change the fsb from 133 to 134 either the sys won't boot even to the bios without pressing <Insert> or reseting the CMOS, or I get a bios message that the cpu parameters have been changed, try another setting.

 

I read 4 articles that bragged on the bios options, ability to overclock and how easy it is, and I don't even want to overclock! I just want

 

cpu 1900

fsb 266

agp8x

 

Now granted, [don't shoot!] I have a NVIDIA GeForce2 MX200 PCI but when I upgrade I want the 8x capability, so wouldn't you think it would show a setting for 8x?

 

Am I missing something obvious here?

 

Any thoughts are greatly appreciated!

 

OH!, and I have 256 DDR400 though it is the cheap OEM crap, but it's all I could afford. Could this cause this? Oh look.....my 2000th post :wink:

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Several things to observe:

Abit is an excellent board. What you are encountering, however, is the diffeencr between performance ratings and cpu clock speed. I have an amd xp1800. The speed is actually 1546, or something like that. In performance testing, my cpu performs like an intel at 2G!! :wink:

So, 1600 is no doubt the correct real default value for you processor.

 

 

The fsb for amd is double the real value on the board. So, 133=266.

By changing the fsb to as high as 250, you get an amd value as high as 500!! :shock:

 

Finally, in your manual it tells you that 8x agp is only available with a vid card present in the slot that can handle it. It is some kind of safety factor, so that users don't burn up their cards.

 

Get better ram. :lol:

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Thanks for clearing up the cpu and fsb issues! :) Is it an Athlon thing? Cuz my Celeron 600 was always shown to be 598MHz. Or, is this done in increments or something?

in your manual it tells you that 8x agp is only available with a vid card present in the slot that can handle it.
Where? I considered that but I haven't found it.

 

Got any good links about this stuff and/performance testing?

 

BTW, the RAM past memtest86 test for what little that's worth :wink: and I haven't tried to use cpucool or cpufsb yet to overclock.....looks like it's not necessary. Besides, these suckers run hot enough as it is and 5 degrees hotter than my Celeron under normal use but 10-12 degrees hotter while playing games. I'm very pleased with the upgrade (of course) as far as speed goes....I just wanted to make sure I was getting what I paid for :wink:

 

Thanks!

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This is what my CPU looks like, it has 1.5G PC 2100 DDR RAM. It's an MSI KT4 Ultra (VIA Apollo KT400).

CPU     

processor	0  

vendor_id	AuthenticAMD  

cpufamily   6  

model     8  

modelname	AMD Athlon(tm) XP 2600+  

stepping     1  

cpuMHz    2131.528  

cachesize	256 KB  

fdiv_bug  no  

hlt_bug 	 no  

f00f_bug  no  

coma_bug  no  

fpu       yes  

fpu_exception	yes  

cpuidlevel  1  

wp        yes  

flags     fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 mmx fxsr sse syscall mmxext 3dnowext 3dnow  

bogomips  4246.73  



Memory    

    total      used      free       shared	buffers	cached

Mem:	1587941376	178872320	1409069056	0      7393280	78733312

Swap:  2006958080	0         2006958080

 

It took me a while to get my BIOS settings right too, but this is what I use:

 

 

[*] Spread Spectrum >> Disabled

 

[*] CPU FSB Clock >> 170MHz

 

[*] CPU Ratio >> x12.5/x13.0

 

[*] Everything else is auto

 

so, 170 x 13.0 = something in the range of 2.2GHz

170 x 12.5 = something in the range of 2.1GHz

 

From dmesg:

Initializing CPU#0

Detected 2131.528 MHz processor.

Console: colour VGA+ 80x25

Calibrating delay loop... 4246.73 BogoMIPS

Memory: 1032280k/1048512k available (2091k kernel code, 15844k reserved, 550k data, 328k init, 131008k highmem)



..... CPU clock speed is 2131.5849 MHz.

..... host bus clock speed is 341.0534 MHz.

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Sorry! :oops:

 

Actually, my manual says that about the 8x agp. But I have an epox, and I guess I assumed that the 8x feature is similar in other boards!

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I think it's probably the same. I have an 8x AGP, but a really cheap video card (Radeon VE) since I don't really play any games and BIOS will only let it go up to 4x.

 

 

bvc: Well, to clarify, that CPU clock speed and host bus clock speed was actually further down in the dmesg output, my post makes it look like it is right next to the "Initializing CPU#0 section" when it's not, so perhaps you have it too (although probably not, I'm sure you've gone over the whole dmesg output)

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From your Mobo manual:

AGP Data Transfer Rate:

 

Two options are available: 4X -> 2X.  The default setting is 4X (When you installed AGP 4X adapter, if you installed the AGP adapter that supports AGP 3.0 specifications, this item will disappear).

 

It also gives a website link http://www.agpforum.org which appears to be part of intel's website. There are downloads available there for windows and linux; but the wording on the site makes me think it's only for intel chipsets, which your Mobo isn't. Interesting.

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The AMD/Intell speed thing started quite a while ago.

 

Every time AMD came out with a new prossessor speed to match or beat Intel. Intell would one up them. In the begining this was acceptable to AMD since they were just starting in the besktop cpu area. But after a while it got quite obvious to them that Intell was cooking the speed books.

Everytime the speed nembers were reached intell brought out the same chipset and said they just upped its speed. Then AMD realized the test was made up by Intell and Intell started to change the test to favor themselves. (even blind people could see this one coming)

So AMD tried making their own tests but no one bought the idea of a new test so they just gave up and started stating that their prossessors did the same amount of calculations (or flops) as Intell did never mind what the FSB or CPU "speed" was. So your Xp 1900+ does the same work as an Intell 1900 even though the actual numbers are less.

Since then Intell has switched back to their older form of testing and calculating speed.

 

I've used both and can't tell the difference unless I'm REALLY taxing the system. Games run the same. The only time I ever really noticed a difference was in intencive CAD 3d solid modeling. You might notice it if you ever compile your kernel/distro from source. But just how often are you going to tie up your computer for a weekend?

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The biggest difference that I noticed is not quality or work, but price! Amd gives me a certain amount of power for significantly less money than intel. Even with the recent price drops by intel, amd is still a better deal! :wink:

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Makes no diff to me. A Celeron 2.1 for the same price as the AMA 1900 will go to 400fsb (supposedly) which is supposedly what the board can do. There's a Albatron MoBo for the same $80.00 with the intel845p or whatever and I almost got that for the 400fsb but I thought I'd try something other than Intel :roll:

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