Kingston TurboChips (and other "upgrades")

[Andy_L]

Those upgrade chips usually cost more than a new m/b and processor. If your motherboard supports 2.2 or 2.4 volts, you can get a K6-2 400, set the bus speed at 66Mhz, multiplier at 2x, the proc. will see it as 6x and you have 400 Mhz (6x66) and the same performance as the turbochip for a lot less money. Your bios may not regognize the processor speed correctly, but you can use any number of utilities to check the speed (DirectX 8 diag for one)in windows. Linux of course, will tell you right away. Oh, and if you cant find a 400, you can do the same with a 450, or 500, but you can only get 6X your max bus speed so maybe 450Mhz if you have a 75Mhz FSB.

[This message has been edited by Andy_L (edited 05-29-2001).]

[araaraara]

Check the jumpers for you motherboard here (http://www.asus.com/products/Motherboard/pentium/tx97-xe/tx97xe-jumper.html) . Check your board revision. Revision 3.01 or later looks the most promising for an upgrade. I'm not sure about the 75mhz and 83mhz bus speeds with the 430TX chipset. I'd suspect that it only has a /2 divider for the PCI bus, but you may be lucky. Download the latest bios here (ftp://www.asus.com/pub/asus/mb/sock7/430tx/tx97-xe/xe5x0111.zip) to add k6-2 support. A regular k6-2 is much cheaper than those upgrade packages. A k6-2 500mhz would be the highest that you may be able to put in it(83mhz*6). Pricewatch (http://www.pricewatch.com) lists a 500mhz k6-2 at $30US. Much cheaper and faster than those upgrades!

What do you do with you computer? What other parts are you using? If the rest of your system isn't too old and you don't need monsterous 3D performance, upgrading may be the best way to go. Adding more ram also helps improve speed. Are you using SDRAM or EDO ram right now?

[This message has been edited by araaraara (edited 05-29-2001).]

[Starlyth]

I'm thinking of buying the Kingston 400 TurboChip upgrade for a Cyrix 6x86 233 on an ASUS TX97-XE. How are these accelerators? Or should I just bite the (large, extremely way beyond by budget) bullet, and buy a new system?

Thanks for any input!

[doctj]

It should work. I dropped a k6III-350 oc'd to 366 in an asus sp97-v without any bios upgrades or problems. Just make sure you have the right jumper settings for voltage and multiplier. Also if you're using EDO ram you may not be able to go higher than 75 mhz fsb without losing stability. Be ready to tinker around with a few settings before you close your case again.

[This message has been edited by doctj (edited 06-03-2001).]

[This message has been edited by doctj (edited 06-03-2001).]

[edalha]

Hi Starlyth,
If you do as suggested and put in an AMD k-6 III you may find the bios on the motherboard will not support the CXT core of the chip correctly. You can find a utility that will support it at evergreen technologies site called CPU Control Panel. They provide it free.
Edalha

[edalha]

Hi Starlyth,
If you do as suggested and put in an AMD k-6 III you may find the bios on the motherboard will not support the CXT core of the chip correctly. You can find a utility that will support it at evergreen technologies site called CPU Control Panel. They provide it free.
Edalha

[edalha]

To Moderator,
Oops!!! posted twice .... will be more careful next time!!!

Edalha