Hi All,I just built my own PC, but I'm really not much more than a Novice. I'm really proud of my build it runs fs9 like a charm and looks great. Nick, I followed all your tweaks and suggestions in getting it setup.Using WinXP sp2,Intel E2160 1.8ghz dual core processor,G. Skill 4gb(2x2gb)ddr2 800 memory,650W Power Supply Corsair, Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L MotherBoard,EVGA 8800GT 512MB Video CardArctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro 92mm CPU Cooler, 250gb Hard Drive, and a Lite-on DVD Burner.I did a lot of reading before I came up with this. Sorry for all the rambling.....anyway, I would like to overclock to about 2.8 to 3.0 ghz. The reading on this just seemed to get confusing. Advice and/or Tutorial would be greatly appreciated.Nick, I know this would be a piece of cake for u...regards and Thanks in Advance,Dick ReaMCA372

Hi Dick,Before you even think about overclocking you should be aware it invalidates your warranty. If you still want to go ahead then this is a good place to start... http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=17612922Cheers,

If your proud of your system and it meets your needs, maybe just enjoy it as is.If you really want a faster CPU , a much simpler / safer approach would be to exchange or replace your CPU for e8400 , those default to 3GHz and are priced well, check if your MB supports it as its 45nm and uses less voltage.Always some risk to overclocking so do read on the web and understand what settings to change.I started simple, just increasing the FSB and locking the PCIe bus at 100, setting the ram to its default volts, and the cpu to its default. I cloned my OS install before starting too just in case.The 2160 CPU is FSB 200 x 9 multiple = 1.8 GHz.So trying a FSB of 233 would get 2.1 and then 266 would get 2.4 GHz.Every MB, CPU and Ram combo is different.Read a guide about your board and CPU and only go ahead if you can accept the loss if the worst happens.Know your CPU voltage limits, and know your ram voltage and how to set them in the bios. I start with default volts, a small FSB increase, test and work up the FSB. At some point I'll get errors running Prime95 so I can either back off on the FSB or increase CPU voltage one small step.All the while watching CPU temps.Intel CPU info:http://processorfinder.intel.com/List.aspx...SearchKey=e2160MB O/C Infohttp://www.overclock.net/intel-motherboard...s3l-thread.html

Congrats on your new build! Overclocking is free and is one of the only things that you can do hardware wise that translates directly into more FPS within Flight Sim. With the manufacturing of C2D's today, you may not even have to increase voltages to obtain the speed you are looking for. As an example, I can run my e8400 @ 3.6ghz on stock voltages. If properly cooled, you are not going to fry your chip or shorten it's life so that you would notice it by increasing the voltage the small amount needed to reach a reasonable clock speed. Just watch the temps and read the many overclocking forums for ideas on values to plug into your bios and enjoy the increased FPS in FS! :)

Here are your targets: http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/displ...0_14.html#sect0http://www.hardwarezone.com/articles/view....2332&cid=2&pg=2This little guy will get you an ~ / > 80% overclock, but you gotta have good air cooling. The hardware zone article describes the CPU will cause its voltage to be "auto-increased" as you ramp-up its clock speed. Give it a try. Leave Everything else in Auto, then increase the Front Side Buss to 300Mhz. If it boots, run Prime 95 for 10 minutes, If no errors occur, shutdowm and try a 350 FSB. Run Prime again. Both xBit and Hardware zone got to a FSB of ~ 370. Your CPU multiplier is 9X, so 9x370= 3.30Ghz. That's your CPU overclock target. Not bad for $70 bucks.

Thanks for all the valuable info.....after a bit more reading and research, I'll give it a try.Dick ReaMCA372

>Hi All,>I just built my own PC, but I'm really not much more than a>Novice. I'm really proud of my build it runs fs9 like a charm>and looks great. Nick, I followed all your tweaks and>suggestions in getting it setup.>Using WinXP sp2,Intel E2160 1.8ghz dual core processor,G.>Skill 4gb(2x2gb)ddr2 800 memory,650W Power Supply Corsair,>Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L MotherBoard,EVGA 8800GT 512MB Video>CardArctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro 92mm CPU Cooler, 250gb Hard>Drive, and a Lite-on DVD Burner.>>I did a lot of reading before I came up with this. Sorry for>all the rambling.....anyway, I would like to overclock to>about 2.8 to 3.0 ghz. The reading on this just seemed to get>confusing. Advice and/or Tutorial would be greatly>appreciated.>Nick, I know this would be a piece of cake for u...>>regards and Thanks in Advance,>>Dick Rea>MCA372>Lots of places to check out http://www.big-boards.com/kw/overclocking/

Overclocking isn't dangerous, really. As long as you don't let the CPU overheat and don't increase the VCore to some ridiculous setting, nothing bad can really happen. Sure, your CPU might only last 10 years instead of 20 if you over-volt it and it's running a little hotter than normal, but how much do you think a 1.8GHz CPU is going to cost in 10 years and do you think you'll still be using yours?There's however a small chance of data corruption when increasing the FSB, so make a backup of any important data.-About stress-testing- This is *very* important. Just because your system boots up and runs FSX or Prime95 for 10 minutes doesn't mean it's stable. Prime95, to my knowledge, only stresses one core. You need to run as many instances as you have cores, and assign each instance to an individual core. Or use Stress Prime Orthos or similar which does this automatically and provides a specialized GUI that only focuses on the stress-test features. Use small FFT's first, but you need to try it with Blend and Large too, to make sure your memory and subsystems are doing fine. Once you've reached an overclock that you *think* is stable, you should run the stress test for at least 6 hours (preferably overnight or longer) to make sure it really is stable. Alot of tweakers are happy if their system passes one run of 3DMark, but if you're using your system for simming, it would be very annoying to have the sim lock up in the middle of a 5-hour flight.