To Overclock is Human...

So me and my processor hit it off quite nicely. That is until I got the Urge again. Ok, you have pushed the limits of the computer hardware wise, whats next? Overclock the sucker!! Which is why after a few false starts, I got started on a forum known as Overclock.net. The people there were really helpful, but I couldn't achieve a stable overclock of 3ghz for my Quad. I tried overvolting, undervolting, setting radical memory timings, underclocking my memory and nothing worked!! I was headed for a long journey of broken dreams...but wait!! Someone on the forums said "Try BIOS 0608." Well, this could be problem since I had upgraded my BIOS to 0803 in anticipation of using a 45nm Core 2 Duo. Most people had a lot of issues downgrading their BIOS's on this board. This guy, (name's Diddler), also was kind enough to write up of FAQ for downgrading the BIOS. Yay!! So after school a couple of days ago I got up the guts to try it. First time it didn't worked. It was because when I booted into the command prompt to downgrade the BIOS, I forgot to set the proper drive letter that the replacement BIOS was on. I tried again. This time it worked and it booted fully into Windows, no problem.

Next step, overclock!! I quickly restart my computer and boot into the downgraded BIOS and set my AI overclock to manual, my FSB to 1333 and my memory to 667 to keep a 1:1 divider on boot up. I saved the settings and what do you know? I booted fully into Windows riding on a 3ghz processer!! Oh yeah!!

But now I had to compensate for the extra heat generated by the overclock. So, I crank on an extra 92mm "booster" fan on the back of my computer and it pretty much sucked out all the heat produced. Unfortunately, that fan is REALLY LOUD!! Oh well, the price of overclocking. I can deal with it. But, before I had started this overclock I had purchased some upgrades...

Green with Envy

Like I said I was in the market for a new graphics card. Why? Well my old 7300GS was giving up the ghost or rather screaming like a banshee. The bearings in the GPU fan had gone out. Eeeeeeeeeeekkkkkkeeeeeeekkkk. Oh man that hurt my ears. Fortunately, I went on EBay a couple of days before this problem started and picked up a 8800GTS OC 320Mb. Pant, pant, pant. It was a choice between that and two 8600GT's in SLI. Again I wanted the best and hoped I could pick up another 8800 and run SLI later. So, I purchased it online. $300. That was more money than anybody in our house had ever spent on a "frivolous" piece of hardware. So, until it came, everyday in my living room that stupid fan kept screeching. It drove my family nuts. My dad finally got fed up enough to ask me to shut off my computer. I told him he just needed to wait till my new graphics card came. That made him happy.

When the card arrived, I was all agoggle over it. There was just a small snag. It wouldn't fit in my tool-less rear PCI slot. Uhoh. But, the trouble shooter in me came out and fixed the problem with ease. Whew. Ever since then I have had fun with this system and taken it as far as I could go with stock. Oh no!! The Urge!! The urge to..to..DO MORE!! Aargghhhh!!!!

Down the Multi-Core Road

A processor. A small piece of hardware that has such a huge impact on the rest of the system. I was so wanting a new processor ever since I heard that the Core 2 Duo's came out. Then as I was reading online I came across a review for a Core 2 Quad processor. Hmmm. I read the whole review like a thirsty man. And then I read another review and another. The price for this cool piece of hardware was $300. But it only utilized 1066mhz FSB and the core speed was only 2.4ghz. I wanted to utilize the full FSB of my board, 1333mhz. So, I looked at other processors, first the E6550 2.2ghz 1333mhz FSB at $179 Then the E6850 3Ghz 1333mhz FSB at $300, this was the absolute best processor you could get without moving into the Extremes.

And because I wanted the best, it finally came down to a contest between the Quad core and the E6850. Back and forth I went every minute. Then one day we were at Fry's and I was determined to get A processor that day, but I couldn't decide!! Arrghhh!! Then a light bulb struck. "Ask your dad." it said. And I did. He recommended the Quad core and gave me a couple of good reasons why. 1. This is where technology is going. 2. Its at the same price as the E6850. 3. Why not?

Now how could I argue with that. I went and purchased a brand new Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600.

Now she isn't the fastest horse on the track, but multiply the 4 cores by 2.4ghz and you get more processing power than the E6850 or even the brand new 45nm Core 2 Duo's. The 8MB L2 cache doesn't hurt either.

We then move on to the mean green eye, Nvidia and their awesome GPU's. Which of them will be my next graphics card?