Upgrade P4 1.6 to 2.53Mhz

digitech · Post by **digitech** » Fri Jul 15, 2005 1:16 pm

What I have now:

MSI 845 Pro4 MB
P4 Willamette 1.6 running at 1.7 Mhz
Mad Dog HSF 33 cfm
512 MB PC133 mem
FSB at 106Mhz (X 4)
Nvidia GForce 2 MX 200 OCed to 203 and 332Mhz
3 older Maxtor drive (7 gig, 8gig, 30gig)
Win 98 1st
300 watt PS

I'm currently getting 61.4 FPS in Quake2 timedemo.

I plan on a new computer in a couple years and would like to up the performance of this system in the mean time.

I want to play some of the newer games but realize the OS is a major issue. When I build the new system I plan on using Linux and Longhorn (maybe).

What I'd like to do is up the processor to a 2.53Mhz P4 Northwood (since the 2.6 is scarce and expensive). The MB will work with up to a 2.6 P4 with the recent BIOS upgrade.

My concern is the memory and FSB speed. The 2.53 P4 uses a 533 Mhz FSB and don't know if this will work with the PC133 memory the board supports. As all who have MSI boards know, they are not very responsive to questions.

Also, the 1.6 I have runs at 1.75v and the 2.53 uses 1.525v and I don't know if the board will provide the correct voltage. I would think so since the new bios supports this speed processor.

A new MoBo, memory, hard drives, and PS are not in the cards at this time.
Any help is much appreciated.

Chris · Post by **Chris** » Fri Jul 15, 2005 1:48 pm

If were me, I'd go at the video card, and leave the rest alone.
That would provide you some much needed kick in most current games.
The OS is limiting for you also.
SSome of the Nvidea folks will chime in with vid card suggestions for bank for the buck options, I'm a ATI guy
A 9600 XT or a 9800 Pro would keep you running for a bit
I have a 1.9 on 512 of PC133 mem in my multimedia machine with a ATI 9800 AIW.
Works pretty darn good.

digitech · Post by **digitech** » Fri Jul 15, 2005 2:50 pm

Thanks, Chris, for the response. I was think of a new card in addition or instead of the CPU change. The 9800 Pro has been suggested to me before along with the GForce 4 Ti (an older card) and the 6600 GT. Looks like Newegg has the 9800 Pro and the 6600 GT for about the same price (GT slightly more). I'll look into some benchmarks.

I am concerned about the 300W PS, though. I wonder if it is enough for these cards, it has 10A at 12v.

loop2kil · Post by **loop2kil** » Fri Jul 15, 2005 3:26 pm

save your money and wait till you can get a whole new system. spending $135-175 on a new card will be a waste as it most likely will not be able to go with a nice new system here in a few months. Also, your board will not support 533 fsb processors. looks like the 2.6 400 fsb is the highest you can go.

http://www.msi.com.tw/program/support/b ... =33&kind=1

digitech · Post by **digitech** » Fri Jul 15, 2005 6:44 pm

loop2kil, you hit my dilemma squarely on the head. Since my job was outsourced to China, I can't build a new system at this time but would like to increase performance and play some of the newer games. I have the latest bios (v 1.5) installed. You answered one of my questions, though, about if the 533 FSB CPU would work would on my 400 FSB. Thanks.

Post by **YeOldeStonecat** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 7:12 am

loop2kil wrote:save your money and wait till you can get a whole new system. spending $135-175 on a new card will be a waste as it most likely will not be able to go with a nice new system here in a few months. Also, your board will not support 533 fsb processors. looks like the 2.6 400 fsb is the highest you can go.

I agree...I'd not sink much money, if at all, into this early Willamette based system. CPU support, RAM support, etc.

Windows 98 also is holding you back from benefiting from additional RAM. While yes you can edit some .INI files in Win9X so it will "recognize" RAM past the 512 meg mark...it's useless to add additional RAM, since Win98 really only "utilizes" RAM up to the 320 - 384 meg mark, that's where it flatlines...any additional RAM your system has will simply go unused.

Futurama_fan · Post by **Futurama_fan** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 8:27 am

I think you'd better buy a new one Hard Drive Maxtor. For example 80Gb. It will make your PC running faster.
Once I had to add to my PC another HDD, and the result wasn't good. PC started running slowly approximately twice time.

digitech · Post by **digitech** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 12:18 am

I figured that was probably the case. I guess I'll live with this system as is for a while. Thanks

Post by **YeOldeStonecat** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 6:33 am

That's kinda where I'm at now, being as my system is around 2 years old, newer mobo's are PCIe, I'd be upgrading my graphics card too..substantially increasing the cost of the upgrade.

Once you're generally 3 or more generations behind, it becomes a battle of having to upgrade most of those other components also because as new systems come out, new technology comes out with them. So it's not just a matter of upgrading your mobo and CPU, you'll also have to consider memory, graphics card, newer SATA hard drive connectors, possibly your power supply. If you don't do those, if you only upgrade say one component, you won't often realize the full benefit of a full upgrade because trying to maintain other older technologies (like trying to stick with PC133 RAM or an old graphics card) your new system will be held back.