Is it worth overclocking?

Ronald Epstein · 05-12-2005, 12:47 PM

Just ordered my new computer.

I ditched Alienware. If I had to read one
more Alienware complaint I was going to to
have a stroke. It was a risky investment
based on the fact so many people are
dissatisfied with that company.

I decided to spend a little more money
and go with the very highly-rated Velocity
Micro computers.

You can see the computer I ordered HERE

The new dual-core Pentiums peak out at 3.2.

The company will overclock it for a few
hundred dollars more. I had them send me
a unit overclocked to 3.8.

Was this a good idea? Will I see a boost
of performance from such overclocking?

These come liquid-cooled which the company
claims will handle the excessive heat caused
by overclocking.

Thanks for your replies in advance.

Christ Reynolds · 05-12-2005, 01:16 PM

Quote:

Will I see a boost of performance from such overclocking?

it depends, you may see a boost and you may not, it depends on what applications you use. as long as the heat is taken care of properly (which it sounds like it is), you have a true 3.8 GHZ machine, instead of a 3.2. it's (basically) like upgrading your cpu, even though they only come in 3.2 GHz max.

CJ

Tekara · 05-12-2005, 02:00 PM

Something else to think about is that most processors are geared towards running at a higher cleck speed than they are advertised at, like AMD traditionally gears their batches to operate at 200mhz higher than what the highest clockspeed that they intend to sell at.

This is primarily to account for the statistical variation, with the mean 200mhz higher than needed, a good majority of the processors that are made will be able to operate at the desired speed.

Lew Crippen · 05-12-2005, 05:39 PM

Quote:

Will I see a boost of performance from such overclocking?

Quote:

it depends, you may see a boost and you may not, it depends on what applications you use.

I agree with Christ. For most routine aps, you will see no difference. But if you use heavily CPU intensive applications, or ones that may be CPU intensive, depending on how you use them.

For example you would see no difference in almost any use of Word or the Internet. And so long as you don't have massive spreadsheets with a lot of complex calculations, you also will not see a difference.

But for many graphics apps, especially if you are into editing HD movies and various motion capture effects, you should see a difference. Here, in fact two processors are better than one.

BTW, for most applications of this type, additional memory is even more important than a higher processor speed.

Mike_J_Potter · 05-12-2005, 09:43 PM

Quote:

Was this a good idea? Will I see a boost
of performance from such overclocking?

According to my benchmarks ran before and after overclocking I averaged about 10% performace increase. This was on a Athlon 64 3500+ with 1 gig of ram that was overclocked from 2.2ghz to 2.4 ghz. The main benefit of having the company do the overclocking is that you don't lose the warranty which is nice. Since usually any overclocking of the CPU voids it. Heat shouldn't be a problem since it is watercooled. I always see overclocking as free performance, after all you pay good money for a fast system, why not make it faster for free.

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Thomas J. Coyle III · 05-12-2005, 09:52 PM

Ron,

You should have waited for the AMD Athlon 64 X2 dual-core processors. The Intel dual-core Pentiums dissipate as much power idling as the AMD dual-core X2s at full power (Check out Tom's Hardware website). Hope that the water cooling works as well as they say it does.
Regards,
TCIII

Ronald Epstein · 05-13-2005, 05:27 AM

Thaks for the great responses thus far.

Next question....

Does overclocking affect the life of a CPU?

This may be a mute question because I have
never had a CPU fail on me due to age, and
I buy a new computer every 2-3 years anyway.

Mike_J_Potter · 05-13-2005, 07:11 AM

Quote:

Does overclocking affect the life of a CPU?

It shouldn't effect it all providing your watercooling system is working properly and doesn't fail. Looking at the specs you have a 3 year warranty, if your planning to buy a pc in 2-3 years you should be fine.

SethH · 05-13-2005, 08:21 AM

The speed will not affect life. Heat, however, will. As mentioned, your water-cooling system should keep things running smoothly. But you might want to keep an eye on the CPU temperature to make sure it stays in a normal range.

Chris Bardon · 05-13-2005, 09:38 AM

A few hundred dollars to overclock? Wow...

Maybe it's just me, but all I did to overclock my p4 1.6 to 2.13 is to increase the FSB in the BIOS to 133 Mhz instead of 100, which took all of a minute, plus maybe ten minutes of research on what speeds/settings worked for my CPU. Is there something else these guys could be doing that would make it a more involved process?

As for whether this affects the CPU life, I haven't seen any adverse effects yet, and I've had this CPU for about 3 years now. The only problem is increased risk of overheating, but I'm pretty sure that the P4 CPUs will automatically slow themselves down to prevent burnout (so you're saved if your cooling system fails). Honestly, I'd be more worried about the water cooling system leaking.

You should notice a bump in anything that's calculation intensive though. Some aspects of gaming will improve, as will things like video encoding.