[Boli]

I don't Overclock as much as play around with the ratios. You DO notice a higher FSB in performance wise more than pure speed alone. a FSB of 133 which is what many systems run on is fine - but playing around with the ratios can give you a FSB of 220 - 230.

OK it does come with an inherrent stability problems which you have to tinker around with to fiond the right balance. But the upshot of it all is the longer you run on the overclocked speed the more stable it will become at that speed allowing you to push the bounderies further.

It is a dangerous game to overclock but it is STILL a game. Most people who don't care about benchmarking they just want to get the best performance out of their hardware they can get without sacrificing stability.

My first overclocked system was a 2000+ chip running at 1820mhz slightly raised speed from 1667mhz. Now that ran stable (and still will the system is just up on blocks till I can get a second PSU) at that speed.

Overclocking is just playing the numbers with the chips as the big manufacturers themselves do. They design a core and see how fast it will run stable on the same voltage - and they release the core under different speeds 1700+ - 2600+ lets say. You buy the lowest spec chip and tell the motherboard to run it at 2600+ speeds.

Now not all chips run the same but 9/10 you will run at the speed on AIR no problems. (My current 1800+ chip never made it to 2600+ stable but I could run it at 2600+ stable if I increased the voltage to it slightly - this shows me I have a low quaility chip not a downgraded 2600+ core and can never hope to pass 2600mhz stable).

All that crap aside overclocking is a balance between stability and speed. I could have run my 2000+ chip at 2gig or a lower 1820mhz but STABLE. I chose the latter. there is not much harm in overclocking the chp for your home computer sure it may only last 3 years instead of 6 but ask yourself will you still be using the system as a high end games machine in 3 years? - or rather a file server / print server pulled back to normal specs for the sake of making it last.

Watercooling DOESN'T add that much to the max STABLE overclock maybe another 200mhz but it DOES add silence which is why most people buy it in the first place.

Anyway what was I talking about?.. oh yeah ratios.

If you have a 2000+ chip (1667mhz) it is better to run it at 166x10 rather than 133x12.5 -same speed but a better ratio and providig your RAM can handle it - it is a stable alternative to get more "ummph" out of your system whilst not sacrifing the hardware.

~ Boli