Introduction
This processor has me amped. The AMD XP 1700+ series is certainly not new, and it certainly
isn’t competing with the likes of Intel’s 3GHz HT processors, but it is proving
for some to be an overclocker’s dream. Not just any 1700+ will do though; a few
important changes have come about which will let us achieve a worthy overclock.
The most important change has been the move to the Thoroughbred core, instead of the
Palomino based cores of older XP series chips. The Thoroughbred core is on
a much smaller process than Palomino: 0.13 and 0.18 respectively. Furthering
the potential of this chip is the voltage rating – the DLT3C is rated at a stock core
voltage of 1.5v, as opposed to the more common 1.6v. These are all details we’ll tackle in a minute,
though.
When I originally ordered this processor, it was a toss up for me as to whether I should order
the XPMW or the WPMW. While I saw a number of very high overclocks on the XPMW chips,
the ‘general consensus’ was convinced that the WPMW is a more effective overclocker. I couldn’t
find anything to support this aside from rumor, so we are here today to find out!
I went ahead and ordered the JIUHB:0310XPMW from ExcaliberPC.com;
they sell OEM tray chips with guaranteed stepping, and much to my enjoyment the
proper CPU was shipped in great condition.
Let’s move on and see what this chip is really made of…
A package in my package
First of all, we will check out the detailed specs of this unit, and see how it looks up close.
| Product: | AMD Athlon XP 1700+ DLT3C JIUHB:0310XPMW |
| Application: | Socket A |
| CPU Speed: | 1.47GHz |
| Default VCore: | 1.5V |
| Bus Speed: | 266MHz |
| L1 Cache: | 128KB (64×64) |
| L2 Cache: | 256KB |
| Micron: | 0.13 |
This chip was an OEM tray processor, as is evident by looking at the packaging.
 |
 |
 |
Looking closer at the CPU you’ll see the stepping isn’t burned into the core as in the Palomino, but
instead labelled on the chip itself. Also, the top of this 1700+ is much more crowded than the
Palomino chips, a number of components were moved to the top.
Stepping on my core
In the picture it’s a little hard to make out, but the revisions/stepping
are as follows:
AXDA1700DLT3C
JIUHB 0310XPMW
0310 signifies the tenth week of 2003, so it looks like this chip was cut about a month
and a half ago (many thanks to leishi85 over at Icrontic
Forums for correcting me on this code). Now I should also mention that I have heard
mixed impressions of these CPUs based on the XPWM and WPWM codes. I think the general concensus is
that the WPMW are better overclockers (note the W). But, looking again at
Lowyat.net, no significant
difference can be seen between the overclocks on these chips.
Let’s move on to our overclocking tests and see how this CPU can handle a little extra speed…
Overclocking
Let’s look at our test system first:
| Motherboard: | EPoX EP-8RDA+ A1/C1 Northbridge |
| RAM: | 1×512MB Kingston HyperX PC3500 |
| Video Card: | MSI GeForce4 Ti-4600 @ 317.3/729.0 |
| CPU Cooler: | Thermalright SK7 & TT Smart Fan II |
| OS: | Windows 2000 |
Since this isn’t a comparison review, I’m not concerned with how many FPS the
chip can pump out vs. this that and the other thing; I’m really only interested in what kind of
OC I can achieve and still run stable.
All tests are run at 200MHz FSB with the HyperX running in synchronous mode at DDR400. RAM timings
are at 2-4-4-8, 2.77VDIMM (except at 2.4GHz, I had to increase to 2.9 for a totally stable system).
These RAM timings are somewhat slow, but for the tests I would like to reduce the number of factors
involved in system stability.
As previously mentioned, this CPU comes at a default voltage of 1.5v, with a default core speed of
1.47GHz. Amazingly, I was able to bring the 1700+ to 2GHz solid on 1.5VCore. That’s 2,000MHz running
stock voltage! In other words, a full 36% OC without even upping the power to the chip. A
lot of people would be happy at 2GHz, but let’s move on and give it some more VCore. The following
chart shows our clock speed, voltage settings and idle temps at 2, 2.2, 2.3 and 2.4GHz:
| Clock speed | VCore | Temp (c) |
| 2GHz | 1.5v | 33° |
| 2.2GHz | 1.65v | 39° |
| 2.3GHz | 1.7v | 42° |
| 2.4GHz | 1.8v | 45° |
As you can see, temps rose appropriately as we increased VCore. The chip hit a wall at 2.5GHz,
refusing to boot all the way up to 1.9V. While it may boot at a slightly higher VCore, I am only
interested in stable overclocks. Idling at 45c is high enough, and another .1 VCore would certainly
bring temps near 50°C. This is too high for a stable overclock, in my opinion, therefore I’m stopping
at 1.8v and 2.4GHz.
We might guess that heat is already holding us back from 2,5GHz, but monitoring temps in BIOS they
were at 49c after a few failed attempts at booting. I have never seen a XP chip become unbootable
at anything less than 60°C. The Thermaltake Smart Fan II is working like a champ, running full blast
at 4800RPM and pumping out 75.7CFM of air. This HSF combo keeps load temps within a 5°C range of
idle temps in all situations I have monitored.
Regardless, at 2.4GHz we have achieved a nearly 1GHz OC! The 1700+ runs at
1.47GHz stock, which would work out to a 930MHz OC at 2.4GHz. This is a phenomenal overclock. There
is nothing to complain about here, and it just goes to show how much the T-Bred core helps this chip
out.
Now we can move on and see a few details of performance at each of these speeds.
Benchmarks
I am using the SiSoft Sandra Arithmetic, Multimedia, and Cache & Memory benchmarks to test the speed
of the chip at the various frequencies. Tests are run three times apiece, and the best score is
recorded. To test stability, 3DMark is run twice in succession, and instead of running even more
synthetic benchmarks I put it to the real test – two hours of Battlefield 1942! If the system
depicts any problem, quirks, or unacceptable latencies, the score is discounted and I move on.
Arithmetic Benchmarks
Let’s look at our results then, starting with the Arithmetic test. The Sandra Arithmetic tests
stress the ALU (Arithmetic Logic Unit) and FPU (Floating-Point Unit) of the CPU.
| SiSoft Sandra Arithmetic Benchmark | ||
| Clock speed | ALU | FPU |
| 2GHz | 7508 | 3010 |
| 2.2GHz | 8279 | 3311 |
| 2.3GHz | 8580 | 3461 |
| 2.4GHz | 9032 | 3613 |
Multimedia Benchmarks
Next are the Multimedia tests, which stress similar aspects as the Arithmetic tests yet place more
stress on the MMX and SSE/SSE2 capabilities of the processor.
| SiSoft Sandra Multimedia Benchmark | ||
| Clock speed | Integer | Float |
| 2GHz | 11093 | 11848 |
| 2.2GHz | 12196 | 13006 |
| 2.3GHz | 12745 | 13624 |
| 2.4GHz | 13305 | 14234 |
Cache & Memory Benchmarks
And finally, the Cache & Memory test results. The cache and memory benchmark is testing the speed
of the CPU cache, chipset and memory subsystem. While this is a useful indicator, you’ll notice a
strange discrepancy in the figures. As soon as we hit 512kB transactions, the lower clocks start
showing faster results! Whether this is due to some kind of latency introduced with the huge
transactions at higher speeds, or if I personally made a mistake in my testing, I’m not sure. I
intend to re-run all of the Cache & Memory tests, paying especially close attention to ensure that
these numbers are correct. There is always the possibility that a BIOS setting was inadvertantly
changed, or otherwise. Rest assured I will do my best to retry these tests and update in the case
of a different set of scores.
| SiSoft Sandra Cache & Memory Benchmark | ||||
| Transaction Size | 2GHz | 2.2GHz | 2.3GHz | 2.4GHz |
| 2kB | 16235 | 17945 | 18712 | 19597 |
| 4kB | 17307 | 19044 | 19911 | 20782 |
| 8kB | 17787 | 19578 | 20472 | 21363 |
| 16kB | 14972 | 16480 | 17233 | 17996 |
| 32kB | 12429 | 13868 | 14306 | 14940 |
| 64kB | 11612 | 12777 | 13345 | 13943 |
| 128kB | 7635 | 8398 | 8783 | 9162 |
| 256kB | 6288 | 6916 | 7236 | 7550 |
| 512kB | 1305 | 1295 | 1423 | 1361 |
| 1MB | 1217 | 1169 | 1348 | 1279 |
| 4MB | 1226 | 1142 | 1318 | 1256 |
| 16MB | 1290 | 1098 | 1261 | 1178 |
| 64MB | 1253 | 1085 | 1256 | 1180 |
| 256MB | 1228 | 1075 | 1242 | 1168 |
Aside from the strange difference at 512kB transactions and above, results are as
we would expect. We can pick out the sweet spot for this chip, too; at 2.4GHz and 8kB transactions
we are seeing an extraordinary transfer rate of 21,363MB/sec!!
Those are all of the tests I’m reporting on today. It’s fairly obvious that 2.4GHz is faster than
2GHz, but the point of this was to see the OC’ability of this chip, and also to compare it at a few
levels to see how things like voltage, latencies, and other factors can affect performance as you
continue to up the OC.
Conclusion
What can I say, I think it’s pretty obvious at this point the 1700+ DLT3C JIUHB:0310XPMW is an
insane overclocker! I think these numbers help put to rest the XPMW vs. WPMW controversy, too; or
atleast show that if any difference does exist, it is most likely a very small one.
Compare this processor to the XP chips based on the Palomino core, and you will see that AMD did a
very good thing moving to the Thoroughbred. My previous chip, an XP 1900+ rated at 1.6GHz,
would do a maximum of 1.8GHz before it choked. While problems were recorded with the first
round of Thoroughbreds, the newest revision “B” cores do not suffer from this problem. We might also
want to take notice that there are two different “B” cores available, the “low B”, as we have seen
here in the XP 1700+ processor, and the “high B” (or just “B”) available in XP 2700+ chips and
above.
I’ll leave you today with a few screenies of WCPUID and USDM, so you can see that the chip is
actually running at my stated speeds. Also included is a Sandra pure Memory bench, just for kicks.
Fare well tweakers, and until we meet again, may the hertz be with you!
|
|
|
|
|
 |
| Store Rating | Store Name | Price | Visit Store |
|---|---|---|---|---|
   214 Store Reviews |  Target | $ 999.99 | 
| |
2155 Store Reviews |  eCOST.com | $ 1099.99 |
|
Related posts:
- AMD XP 1700+ DLT3C JIUHB:0310XPMW Overclocking
- AMD XP 1900 & Thermalright SK 7
- Digit-Life Review: Intel Pentium XE 955: Ultima Ratio of the Kings
- Vantec iCEBERQ4 VGA Cooling Kit
- Kingston HyperX PC3500 DDR SDRAM (KHX3500)
Tags: Case, CPU, mod, motherboard, Ram
