upgrading to QX9300

Hi:

I just won an auction on eBay for an used Intel QX9300 SLB5J (OEM Iguess?) for $400, A nice price. I am going to recieve it next week I guess, but I want to know evertything about it, for example:

1. Do I need a new power supply? or the 240W Delta is enough?

2. I am going to change the processor for myself, so, does this processor use only thermal compound? or it use thermal pad? or it use both? Is arctic Silver 5 ok? Is the only good one I can get here in Chile.

3. Can I overclock this processor @ 3.0 GHz 24/7??? with the stock cooling system?

4. It will be really an upgrade going from Q9000 to QX9300 or I will barely note the change?

5. I do have the M17x R1 service manual. It is helpful enough to change the processor? and how hard it is?

Thanks.

 

1. 240W is enough.

2. __________________

3. Yes, you can. I can have stable 3.2 in my R1.

4. Its a jump from 2.0 to 2.53 so you got a nice upgrade there but to notice you need a really cpu hungry application or game or while multitasking. Also a +6MB of L2 cache.

5. Mfractal has done a nice picture tutorial to go through all steps.
You can follow that.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...mal-compunds-gpu-cpu-m17x-r2.html#post6591222

 

Tyranus, does this mean you fixed your OC problem? Good luck, let us know how it turns out!

 

I just put a Q"x"9200 in mine... everything went well, I have no overclocking problems. I can use Nvidia system tools, or the Bios setting.

 

thanks for the info, I found a video on youtube either, a lot to do before reach the processor.

The issue is still there, but, I don't know, I am 2.28 GHz, thats ok for now, I was thinking going @2.4 but it isn't really a big difference. I guess QX9300 will let me overclock over 2.8 GHz, if not I will call dell.

Tell me what do you need? thermal pad or thermal compound? and what about temperatures?

 

I got some Arctic Silver 5 thermal paste from a PC shop for about $5.oo

I am running temps (with my cooler off) of:
Idle - 40-45c
Crysis - (30 minutes of play) 65-70c

I did not change the thermal pad, just the paste on the CPU. There are many videos on youtube shoeing the best way to do it... depends on the paste you get really. some are thicker than others, and require another method of application.

Best of luck to ya' and tell us how it turned out =^_^=

 

I will tell you how it works, if the guy from eBay send the cpu to me has been two days since I won the auction and the guy don't want to answer my messages or tell me when is he going to ship the cpu. And I already payed to him .

PS: He is 100% positive feedback and (614) sales/buy

 

Don't worry, just be patient. I'm sure you'll get your money back if something goes wrong.
As for the list of questions:
1. 240W is max.
2. AS-5, OCZ Freeze (highly recommended) or any other high quality paste should work fine.
3. 100%. You can go way above 3GHz, ask Scook for details.
4. Of course, in your case it's gonna be more than 1GHz jump when OC'ed and strategy games like Total War (pretty much any CPU intensive game) will run MUCH better.
5. The R1 manual will help, but as mentioned above, there are plenty of video/photo guides available. The only tricky part is to remove the touch panel. Avoid using metal screwdrivers when popping it up, plastic works good enough.

 

If you have a meat locker handy, here's what a QX9300 can really do.

scook9 - Core 2 QX9300 (2.53Ghz) @ 4333MHz - 4333 mhz CPU-Z - hwbot.org

Very nice work scook9.

 

Then I would say chances are less for him to ship it.
Last month I won a AW M17X for $750 with wararnty,260M SLI, Q9000 and other stuff.
The person was power seller with more than 150,000 but he did not shipped it to me.
Later I got my money back and left a negative feedback.
The seller replied in the feedback saying I paid him with a cheque which bounced. Well he got away with that.

Anyway hope for the best.

 

amazing.. but I am not even trying to go that high going from 2.0 GHz to 3.0 GHz is good enough form me .. But scook9 is great when it comes about overclocking, 4333 Mhz is crazy

Yeah I hate this, maybe the seller was thinking the auction go higher than $400, but Alienware is selling QX9300 for $450, so it is not that crazy to sell QX9300 for $400.

The auction was weird from the beggining, first some random guy push the auction over $400 , thats when I stopped offering money, then he retracted, and the auction went down to $150, then, 15 minutes before the auction end some other random guy offered $399, and pushed me to pay $400.. I don't know if I am being paranoic or what but I am starting to think the first random guy in a way forced me to offer $400 and the second random guy, forced me to actually pay $400, becauses why does he stopped exactly at $399? thats has no sense

PS: I payed this guy with Paypal.. so there is no excuse there

 

Damn.. eBay Buyer Protection, will not take my case because they think is too "soon".. I need to way untill dec. 5 ... I think is pretty obvious the seller is not going to ship anything..

Anyway when I get my money back AW are selling QX9300 for $450.. thats a good deal anyway.

 

Looks like the seller had another user account or he was letting one of his friend to bid on this item to sell it for max selling price.
Anyway you are safe with paypal but I really hate the dispute thing because it takes around a month and freeze my money which I can use to buy other thing.
And the worst part from my experience, when I got the refund paypal deducted $10 for their paypal charge. So I didnot got full refund.
I really dont understand if I am bound to pay paypal fees even when I am getting a refund.

 

I can see in my M17X bios that it can be pushed upto 4.4 GHZ but I thought it was just there but cannot be done.
Looks like a shorcut to trash you pc or is it safe?

 

$10 for what??? that sucks... reading about ebay buyer protection, they say they refund to you item cost+ shipping .. they never say anything about taking $10...

This kind of "sellers" (scum) should be banned from eBay.. they literally steal money.

 

I got my Q"x"9200 form an Ebay seller (laptopmonkey). I payed with paypal the moment I won the sale, and within 12 hours he shipped it to me. it came in just five days later. LaptopMonkey is a great seller, and had nothing but great feedback. if you need a seller on ebay I would recommend him.

P.S. always check feedback B4 buying anything from anyone on Ebay

 

I'm about to purchase one from him, have you overclocked yours yet?

 

I just recieved an email from the seller:

I have not idea if that's true, but I want to believe !! Lets see if the seller actually sends the CPU.

 

I bet you will get it! I buy/sell on Ebay all the time and it is amazing how many people don't have any concept of good customer service there!! Please let us know how it works...I am seriously considering the same upgrade.

 

When going after a world record, playing it safe is not at the top of anyone's priority list.

 

The T9900 is really fast !! I don't know how it performance against a QX9300, I guess you will see a difference only in multi task.

 

T9900 is a beast when it comes to overcloccking. I vaguely recall stories of how Mandrake got the CPU to 3.5GHz stable. However, in the longer run a proper quad-core with 3-3.2 GHz stable is certainly the better option, along with twice the L2 cache.

 

yes... yes I have

 

Is 2.8 GHz the maximum stable overclock you can get? and how did you get it?? rising the multiplier only? or rising only the FSB or both of them?

 

In Bios, I raised FSB only. I tried it with Nvidia tools FSB only, works great too. I went as high as 3.0Ghz, but there is no need as all my games are running perrr... fect at 2.80 "keeping it simple"

 

And what is better? overclocking rising FSB or changing the multiplier? I guess you can go even higher if you change the multiplier

 

Do'no dude, I just tested raising both, seems fine. the easy way to do it is Nvidia, also doing it that way will be safe... if it goes to far, it will shut itself down. Find a safe clock speed with Nvidia, then "if you want" set it all up in Bios.

Edit: Steps - With Nvidia raise the FSB by 10-15 points, apply, test, rinse and repeat. Find a high "safe" clock speed, and set it in Bios.

 

I found a post by someone with a Q"x"9200, he did this:

Q9200 running @ 3.05 Stable for 48 hours nonstop in OCCT.
1222 Mhz FSB 10x Multiplier. If I do multiplier OC alone I can’t get it stable past 2.8 for some reason. Using 1066 MHz RAM.

It was nice to find this because it has the FSB numbers for an M17x ready for ya' If I was you, I would test lower... not all CPUs are the same, your safe/stable clock speed could be different.

 

It is realle necesary to rise FSB in RAM? because in BIOS you can rise FSB for CPU only if you want, whats the advantage of rising the RAM FSB? can I go higher if I rise the RAM FSB? I really know so little about overclocking CPU. I know that if you overclock using Nvidia system tools, NVST overclock both CPU FSB and RAM FSB.

To get a higher overclock is necessary to get a 1333 MHz RAM? I am really confuse here

PS: You should try those number and see if you can get those nice 3.05 Ghz

 

I did try the numbers, I got a stable overclock at 'round 2.95-3.0. I did not play with the memory numbers in bios, just FSB, and the multiplier.

I have overclocked using FSB and multiplier in Bios and not memory, and I have tried boosting all three. I get a more stable clock when I do FSB and multiplier only. I dont know enough to comment on raising the memory numbers, or even why it gets unstable so quickly.

 

Maybe when it comes about overclocking 1333 MHz memories are needed, to get higher clocks, or maybe not, maybe some expert can clarify this doubt we have.

By the way the seller shipped my QX9300 That mean I will have it this week , I am one of those guys who really like to disassembly electronic devices.. So I will enojoy changing the CPU

 

Best of luck to ya' dude, I will keep this page bookmarked for updates.

 

Bump-

Any update?

 

Well the cpu was shipped yesterday from Miami to Chile, so "maybe" I will have the cpu next week, "maybe" because customs here are not working, they want more money or something like that, I don't know the exact word =P

 

Hi everybody!!

I finally got my cpu, it took more than usual to arrive, but here it is:



And here it is my M17x, when changing the CPU:



The cpu is awesome, the only problem was I was able to only reach 2.93 GHz stable in bios, going any higher gave me BSOD sooner or later.

But then I found this nice app. called ThrottleStop. Before Throttlestop I wasn't able to set 11.5x multiplier, I was getting BSOD during windows indexing score. But then rising the Voltage ID at 1.2 V I am now able to set the multiplier to 11.5x (3.06 GHz) without any BSOD and nice temperatures.

My 3Dmark06 score, jumped from 10k, to 15k+, and now I am able to play PS2 games, using PCSX2

This CPU is great, I am happy

 

nice pictures,

To get a higher OC you may have to play with the CPU voltages, and play with the RAM timimngs

But 2.93 is not bad either

 

You will not be able to go higher than 2.93 in BIOS without getting a BSOD,the CPU will need more juice,use unclewebb's Throttlestop it does miracles
Have fun!

 

Throttlestop is awesome, I would hate this computer if TS didn't exist.

I've read that as far as the 45nm CPU's go, if you are within 10% of the stock voltage and under 90C, you should be good to go. I've also read that even going as high as 1.4v will still give your CPU a pretty good lifespan (5+ years) assuming your temps are good, though i doubt you'll get acceptable temps at 1.4v (I don't).

 

Yeah, ThrottleStop is awesome, I am 3.06 GHz stable, no BSOD or anything using 1.1750 V in CPU , and yes I saw the link in Unclewebb's signature I think I am going to donate $$ to him . I am wondering how much can I get a 24/7 overclock, 3.06 seems to be pretty nice to me, but maybe someone can advice to me a higher and safe overclock. I saw some guy with 3.2 GHz 24/7 with the QX9300. The QX9300 is definitly a strong CPU, way better than my old Q9000.

So please let me know about yours 24/7 overclocks for QX9300, and voltage in ThrottleStop.

Here some benchmarks:

Q9000 @2.0 GHz



QX9300 @3.06 GHz



A Huge jump in 3dmark06.

 

Just keep an eye on your temps.
If you stay in a safe range then your OC is fine for 24/7 usage.

D.

 

personally i use the profiles,i wasn't comfortable with that at the begining but it's actually pretty simple.I use mine(QX9300 OEM) stock for light use and OC it when really need it but to be honest it's a strong chip does everything you trhow at it and prefer it over most.

 

I can do 3.2ghz at 1.3v without ever hitting 80's for the most part (BFBC2 gets a couple of cores in the 80's though). If i were forced to use those settings 24/7 I wouldn't have a problem with it, but since TS has profiles i tend to set things based on whatever im doing.

 

Hmmm, i got 15556 using my M15X 920XM and a single 5850..., ur 280m GTX SLI should be higher....how can a single card be higher then urs?