Still early days, but here's my HTPC so far...

Show off your quiet rig.

Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee

G7MJV
Posts: 37
Joined: Wed May 18, 2005 10:49 pm
Location: Southampton, UK

Post by G7MJV » Thu Jun 16, 2005 9:55 am

l certainly like the idea of underclocking, can you reccomend and 'safe' sources of info please.

paulrb
Posts: 49
Joined: Sat Jan 04, 2003 7:24 am
Location: England

Post by paulrb » Thu Jun 16, 2005 1:05 pm

g7mjv,

I haven't underclocked the cpu at all - its running at the standard speed for an xp2500 - which is 18.66MHz (I think that's right).

What I have done is underVOLT it, i.e. run it at a lower voltage than it is rated at. A standard Athlon XP runs at 1.575V. My "mobile" Athlon is rated to run at 1.45V. I'm running it at 1.35V.

"Mobile" athlons come off the same production line as regular ones. But then they are tested, and the ones that, because of natural variation, run OK at lower voltages are sold as "mobile" athlons, because they are more suited for use in laptops.

The advantage of lower voltage is that it uses less electrical power, but still gives you the same computing "power". All electrical power used turns to heat - its a basic law of physics. Less electrical power means less heat, which means easier/quieter to keep it cool.

I'm sure there are articles about underclocking and undervolting on the SPCR home page, also Sudian Forums/website.

G7MJV
Posts: 37
Joined: Wed May 18, 2005 10:49 pm
Location: Southampton, UK

Post by G7MJV » Fri Jun 17, 2005 1:28 pm

Thankyou very much for the information, l shall certainly look to see what information l can find about my P4.

Best wishes

paulrb
Posts: 49
Joined: Sat Jan 04, 2003 7:24 am
Location: England

Post by paulrb » Sun Jul 24, 2005 1:50 pm

Finally, after trying about 6 fans, I have found one I like.

Its an Acousti dust-proof 80mm fan. I'm running it at full speed (12V, about 1,700 rpm)

Its the only fan in the PC, blowing cool air inwards through the duct down onto the CPU heatsink. This creates a positive pressure inside the case, which helps the passive PSU to expel its heat.

Even on these warm summer evenings (by UK standards), the CPU only gets to about 44C.

Next thing to concentrate on is: is the DVD-RW working correctly? Or is the software I'm using with it incompatible with it? Either way, I haven't managed to create a single good DVD video disk with it.

Post Reply