Wrong processor?

JasX

bevan840 wrote: »

I haven't noticed it doing that macman

Whats overclocking?

Fairly advanced PC use where you force a chip designed to run at say 2GHz to run faster at say 2.8 GHz.

Up side:
-you get more power/performance out of a cheaper chip.

Down sides include:
1-Shortening the life of the chip if pushed too far
2-Requires a delicate balance of nudging it up slowly, increasing the voltages by the minimum amount necessary(if mother board supports this) to find the point where the chip is running faster and is stable, but not pushed too far it becomes unstable or worse (see below)
3-Overclocking a chip causes it to produce significantly more heat than it would under normal operating conditions, this must be dealt with by upgrading the chips cooling or else the chip will fry and become useless (hence this can be an expensive passtime when overclocking top of the range expensive processors)

Having said that your chip reporting running slowly is very confusing and something I don't understand yet, could be a false reading? or could be the motherboard/BIOS has settings for overclocking but is mis-set low and causing your processor to do the opposite of the above (lets work at the things we know how to fix -viruses etc, b4 playing with the clock speeed)



And if I re-install XP won't I lose everything?

yes, and that is a good thing as your computer never performs better then when it has a fresh install of your operating system and has been setup sensibly, over time they get clogged up with junk software, data gets scattered/fragmented over the disk and it generally gets slower. the way to get the best of both worlds is to BACKUP all the stuff you want to keep somewhere else (external hard disk, USB stick, CD etc) whilst reinstalling everything to get all the above without losing anything important)

Is the BIOS setting when it comes up after being switched off at the mains? Asking me to set something at a speed?

Kinda, BIOS stands for Built In Operating System and it controlls your PC hardware at a very low level, when you turn it on the black screens and rolls of white system checks you see is your BIOS starting up and working out where the hard disk, CD drive, memory etc is and checking it works.

after the BIOS has done its stuff your machine will load up whatever 'main' operating system is (windows XP, vista, linux etc)

your BIOS code is set/held in chips on yoour motherboard, a small battery is used to allow it to store your hardware setup when you turn the computer off.

JasX

OMG, I bookmarked this on monday at ebuyer, had heaps in stock (the 3450 I was talking about earlier for £19 in post #25)

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/159711

They pulled it tuesday and doubled the price the b@#"!#s (before it was later linked to in post #55 by piggeh ) :mad:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/169448

other places still have it for about £20 so look elsewhere


EDIT: also worth mentioning some of the games the review tested on the 3450 and seemed to run ok quoted higher minimum specs than sims3 (such as COD4 needed a radeon 9800PRO).... once you've cleared & reinstalled everything might be worth giving it a go anyway on reduced graphics settings/resolution.

Does Sims3 have any kind of free demo version you could test with? EDIT2 -no they don't, mainly viruses claiming to be demo programs....

bevan840

I remember looking at that one when it was £20 too, bu88er, never mind, I have an account with ebuyer atleast as that is where I bought my memory from and is also where all the parts of my PC came from as thats where the neighbour purchased them all

Do you think, if I purchased the parts, then took it to a PC shop they would fit them?

atrixblue.-MFR-.

things in this thread have become a little hazed............

your AMD processor is under the recomended setting and graphics are not good enough to run sims 3 the recomended settings is a baseline to weather the game will run on BASIC graphics settings and performance of a system, anything over the recomended settings is a in game graphics and performance bonus.

your amd athlon is old and so maybe your motherboard, your graphics is out of date too.

those advising to re-install windows xp i would not, if your system is shuting down freezing etc your hardrive is probably on the way out.

if you did buy the game and it installed with a newer type of graphics card (your memory is sufficiant buy the way you have 2gb) the loading times of the game would be affected because the processor will bottlekneck with the graphics card and more than likely the game willl crash endlessly.

most new systems comes with 3gb on board memory because xp-vista 32bit operating systems only reads up to 3gb of memory for example you have bought 4gb of memory to put in your system the bios reads 4gb but when you go to your system details it will only say 3gb of memory installed so people telling you 320gb hard drive with only 3gb looks unballenced this is not the case theres a 32bit operating system installed with maximum memory and looks perfect to me. 64bit processors operateing a 64bit operating sytem will read up to 16gb of memory.

the littlewoods system you were going to buy would of been a mistake as it is a lway too dear for what it is. DELL ARE GOOD SYSTEMS but if you get a problem dont expect them to help you over the phone the operators are too inexperienced to help you and work off a cheat sheet if that fails the operator tells you its your doing and they have to pick it up for repair at your cost!! hapened to me and my bro in law and some friends.

in my experience AMD are not verry good processors dual core tri cor or quad core they do not operate as good as intel processors and not very good when it comes to multi tasking demands.

do-not overclock if you dont have the know how you will most certainly do more harm than good either to your processor memory or harddrive or motherboard.

vista is a good operating system and once youve learned it.

search out your local pc shops tell them what you want the system to do and they will then advice you and price up the system you desire but allways try knocking them down in price they want your custom and dont want to lose a potential sale to pc world or the net.

www.overclockersuk.co.uk is a good place to look for a system or www.novatech.co.uk is also a good place... if you just want a system not monitor mouse etc and your re-useing you monitor and mouse etc look for a barbones system.

hope i been informative to you.

adouglasmhor

bevan840 wrote: »

I remember looking at that one when it was £20 too, bu88er, never mind, I have an account with ebuyer atleast as that is where I bought my memory from and is also where all the parts of my PC came from as thats where the neighbour purchased them all

Do you think, if I purchased the parts, then took it to a PC shop they would fit them?

I think if you can turn a screwdriver and push somethng into a socket you could probably do it yourself, possibly with the help of a library book or a guide like any of these http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_ss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=build+your+own+pc&x=16&y=19. I am a total klutz but have buit every pc I have owned.

JasX

atrixblue.-MFR-. wrote: »

things in this thread have become a little hazed............

your AMD processor is under the recomended setting and graphics are not good enough to run sims 3 the recomended settings is a baseline to weather the game will run on BASIC graphics settings and performance of a system, anything over the recomended settings is a in game graphics and performance bonus.

hope i been informative to you.

even more hazed when posts like this come along, for the record OPs cpu EXCEEDS the min published spec (by being an Athlon 2500+ vs published minimum of Athlon 2000+), the graphics card does not, keep up pls

davetrousers

atrixblue.-MFR-. wrote: »

those advising to re-install windows xp i would not, if your system is shutting down freezing etc your hardrive is probably on the way out.

Even if the hard drive is on its way out there is no harm in trying to re install windows (providing all important photos, mp3s etc. are backed up elsewhere). If the hard drive did prove to be dodgy, a new replacement would be pretty cheap (£30 would probably cover it).

atrixblue.-MFR-.

bevan840 wrote: »

I remember looking at that one when it was £20 too, bu88er, never mind, I have an account with ebuyer atleast as that is where I bought my memory from and is also where all the parts of my PC came from as thats where the neighbour purchased them all

Do you think, if I purchased the parts, then took it to a PC shop they would fit them?

they would but would charge you around 50-150 for the privaldge!!

most things in a pc are self explanatory (fits one thing and oneway)and many parts comes with fitting instructions have a go yourself save you money and waiting times a system should be built from scratch in under an hour in the novice of time scales, i built my system in 20 mins from scratch but i have vast knowladge but remember doing it first time and took 45 mins.

my specs are

intel e7400 dual core processor 2.8ghz overcolcked to 3.5ghz
kingston hyperX 4gb memory 2gb giel black dragon gameing memory =6gb
asus p5q motherboard
nvidia 9800gtx overclocked as standard.
500gb hardrive
pioneer dvdrw rom
jeantech unicorn gameing case
windows ultimate 64bit service pack 2.
ocz equalizer 3200 dpi mouse.
and this system cost me £350 to build

it imperative to update your hardware graphics cards etc to fully optemize your system too.

atrixblue.-MFR-.

davetrousers wrote: »

Even if the hard drive is on its way out there is no harm in trying to re install windows (providing all important photos, mp3s etc. are backed up elsewhere). If the hard drive did prove to be dodgy, a new replacement would be pretty cheap (£30 would probably cover it).

but if it failed it would be a waste of time and effort wouldnt it. not to mention petrol money if he/she had to travel to cornwall to collect it.

why re-install the operating system as it stands service pack is installed and would be updated as it should be.

the matter in hand is the system not operating system is too old for the game and todays demanding tasks.

bevan840

I am definitely leaning more towards getting one of those books and building my own at the moment, that way I can put what I really need in first (tower wise) then once have enough money get new bits and bobs for outside (mouse, keyboard etc) who did you use to buy your specs atrix?