Overclocking E7200 2.53GHz with an unbranded 500W PSU?

[HardwareJunkie]

I know my system is really outdated but until I get a new system I want to get the most out of this one. So I've been reading around the web and understood that unbranded PSU's are a hit or miss most of the time and are unstable. What should I do? if so, can you direct me to an overclocking guide?

 

[GorbazTheDragon]

I assume these are not parts you are using in a rig that you need to have running and you are just toying around with old hardware. I doubt you will have trouble with the PSU as long as you don't use some high end GPU and push it to its limit.

What board are you using? Usually you want to look at overclocking guides per board.

Here's a quick rundown.

FSB clock is the main thing you are going to adjust, the CPU multiplier is locked at 9.5. Default FSB on the E7200 is 266MHz and FSB x CPU Multi = CPU Clock. I have an E7200 that went to around 3.3 GHz on stock volts, after that I needed to push up mainly the CPU core voltage. Some boards might need more FSB voltage too. Keep in mind that FSB also determines memory clock, so if you leave your memory divider at default you might see instability quite early on. If you are already using the lowest memory divider setting you will need to start turning up the voltage and increasing the memory timings to keep stability.

 

[HardwareJunkie]

Thanks for answering! This is just my current system, I don't have anything else at the moment, so I want to get it to do it's maximum, at least on stock volts.
My board is a Gigabyte G41M Combo and my GPU is 9500GT(VERY low-end, OC'd a bit). So am I good to go?

 

[Shambles1980]

i much prefered overclocking on the older system.
its basically increase the boards front side bus speed. change the memory ratios so they are at stock speeds.. try to keep the fsb speeds at around the mother boards maximum supported fsb. and then see if it boots.
(you obviously start with lower fsb incriments untill you get to instability. and then tweak voltages)

 

[GorbazTheDragon]

I have an Asus P5KPL that was in a prebuilt I got my E7200 from. That got to around 343MHz FSB stable, there were no voltage options and the memory controls were also very limited. I expect your board will be similar, just find the FSB speed in the BIOS and start turning it up in 10-20 MHz increments. Once it becomes unstable you will need to back it off to the last one and make a smaller increment.

The two Asus boards I have (other one is a Maximus II Formula) both have a handy little feature that automatically resets the Overclock if the board doesn't POST. I don't know what the Gigabyte boards have as far as this goes, it might be harder or more time consuming to reset the board after failing POST.

 

[P4-630]

There must be some thread here about overclocking an E7200, till sofar did not find it, maybe another user could dig it up?
I had one myself, it would run 3.6Ghz without voltage adjustment.

Edit: Found it: http://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/e7200-overclocking.60335/