SurClaro Flight Simulator Resources

Posted: Fri Feb 09, 2007 9:07 pm Post subject: I Mutated My CPU!

Or, in other words, I overclocked. First successful meeting with overclocking, and I've decided to comment about it.

First of all, for me it wasn't an easy task. There were no good Windows utilities that had my specific motherboard model to overclock within Windows. I would've wanted to do it through BIOS anyway. My original BIOS had no support for overclocking, so I was forced to do something I had never done before: flash my BIOS. Finally located the correct BIOS, and with only a page an a half of text to guide me through, I successfully flashed my BIOS to the newest version available for my motherboard. That's when the first of my problems arose. I was seeing Windows in 16 colors and a desktop resolution of something like 300x300!

Luckily, before you flash your BIOS the flash writer will ask if you want to backup your current BIOS, which I did. But, it couldn't save the whole thing because my floppy ran out of space. I was then forced to backup the old BIOS onto another empty floppy disk. I tried to use the disk with the backup BIOS to get the original BIOS back, but I forgot to make it a system disk, so I couldn't do that.

The next decision I made was a very, very, very stupid one. I decided to use the system disk that didn't have enough space for the backup to get the old BIOS back. It wasn't that the BIOS wasn't on the disk, it was just that it wasn't all there. But I did it anyway. What did it cost me? A corrupt BIOS that resulted in me not able to boot up my computer. Or do ANYTHING. When I pushed the power button, all I got was fans whirring and a blank monitor.

But, I had a secret weapon. I had the same exact motherboard in storage, with the same BIOS chip that had a working BIOS on it. There was nothing I could do without the new BIOS chip to save the old one. I had to perform a risky task to save the old BIOS chip: hot flash it. (No menopausal women here!) To hot flash is to use the new, working BIOS chip to get the BIOS running on the computer, and then replace the BIOS chip with the broken one WHILE the computer is running. I tried to flash the BIOS, only to have it freeze at about 90%. I didn't give up hope, and told myself it was because it was probably corrupt like the last one. I booted up Windows with the good BIOS chip, and got the next latest version of BIOS. I made a system disk with it, and attempted the hot flash again. After a couple file name changes, I got the broken fully flashed. I had just resurrected my broken chip from the dead.

My job wasn't done yet, though. The BIOS on the chip was still not the same as the original, but was also different from the one giving me the 16 colors. The computer booted up fine though (and with regular colors!), and so I went on to overclock it. I was too greedy and increased the front side bus from its default 66Mhz to about 100Mhz. Guess what? No boot. Nothing, including the blank monitor. But, this was not even half as bad as the BIOS problem. A simple jumper change was all that was needed to reset BIOS settings. After a couple rounds of tweaking, found out that 75Mhz for the front side bus with a 7.5x CPU multiplier worked pretty well. Almost there! Now for the stability test. Temps observed over 4 or 5 hours were fine with the CPU reaching a high of 54 degrees Celsius once on 100% load. My idle temps were fine too, around 26 degrees Celsius. Everything ran fine and the system was stable.

Really content now, since I can say, "I've overclocked!" without lying.

Unfortunately, the overclocked computer is not the one I play FS2004 on. I decided to overclock because this computer probably had no warranty on anything anymore because it was more than 4 years old. In addition, I had the same exact model ready to replace parts if I did fry something.

Remember, overclocking has its risks. You could fry something, void warranties, or kill your computer. But remember, it is possible, and I believe it will benefit you if you have experience, expertise, and just know what you're doing. Keep in mind though, OEM computers such as HP, Dell, Compaq's, etc. are virtually impossible to overclock, so I wouldn't even try.

Oh, almost forgot the specs. Since this computer was old, don't expect a dream brag and frag box. Intel Celeron with initial clock speed of 466Mhz with 64MB RAM. Overclocked to 533Mhz. Sure, it's one of the slower CPU's, but it's still overclocking!

Posted: Fri Feb 09, 2007 9:28 pm Post subject: GREAT JOB!

I am GLAD to see this happen, the recovery AND the mistakes.

I am so glad for you! Most kids would rather play a video game than take on "THE BIOS". The "mutha" of all misfortune!

You stuck with it, had a b/up mobo WITH A GREAT WORKING BIOS and you loaded it hot! Although you encountered many self made problems, YOU OVERCAME THEM ALL!

My hat tips off to you Heeshung!

Every one: this guy did all he could, fought off disaster after disaster, kept going when others fail and quit!

Allot to learn about PERSERVERENCE, sheer determination, knowledge in a emergency!

RIGHT ON !

Tomcatdriver

Posted: Fri Feb 09, 2007 10:05 pm Post subject:

"Remember, overclocking has its risks. You could fry something, void warranties, or kill your computer." Totally second that.
Nice to here everything turned out ok. I was freaking out when i overclocked my cpu, don't know what i would have done if i encountered that bois problem.