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ASUS introduces ROG OC Station for all your on-the-fly overclocking needs
ASUS is doing what it can to bump up its gaming cred a few notches with its Republic of Gamers (ROG) OC Station. The bay-mounted overclock assistant lets you tweak parameters on the fly, even in the middle of a game, without ever having to dive into the BIOS. It's got a 3-inch LCD display, too, for keeping an eye on things or, apparently, showing your pictures in a slideshow. All this power comes at a cost, and not just financially: you're gonna have to give up two 5.25-inch bays to install this bad boy. It also looks like it only works with ROG motherboards, which is gonna limit the market even further. If you are, however, an anxious and willing member of that demographic, we hate to say you're gonna have to wait an undisclosed time before you can pick one up for an undisclosed number of Benjamins. [Via Engadget Spanish]
Corsair DDR3 memory clocked at 2533MHz, women swoon 'round the world
Corsair -- the swashbucklin' favorite of privateers in need of RAM and SSDs -- has just announced that its Dominator GT DDR3 memory has been overclocked at a pretty astonishing 2533MHz. As you'd expect from a company made of braggarts and rogues, its claiming the world record for itself -- unless, of course, one of you other memory manufacturers feels like taking this bad boy on. Kingston, we're looking at you. Hit that read link for all the salacious details.
AMD's Phenom II pushed to 6.5GHz, 3DMark record demolished
Ha, and you thought a 3DMark06 score of 5,086 was intense when AMD's Phenom II was overclocked to a blistering 3.85GHz. Just after CES, a team of hardcore speed freaks with access to liquid nitrogen and liquid helium created an environment for OC'ing one of AMD's latest Phenom II X4 chips in -232 degrees Celsius weather. Once the silicon was appropriately chilled, they proceeded to push the clock speed to a staggering 6.5GHz, which proved nimble enough to deliver a patently absurd 45,474 3DMark05 score. The best part? The adoring public was there to bear witness, and every nail-biting second of it is hosted up in the video just past the break.[Via Digg]
Project Monolith case mod takes water cooling to unbelievable extremes
It's not often that pictures truly are worth a thousand words, but this is one of those rare exceptions. We won't even bother explaining what kind of hardware is packed within Project Monolith, but it's clear that its creator is at least partially off his rocker -- not that said condition is a bad one. Hit the read link for loads more images, but don't expect it to get any easier to comprehend.
Overclocking guide shows what Intel's Core i7 is / isn't capable of
Oh sure, we've seen just how far Intel's most potent Core i7 chip can be pushed under the most extreme conditions, but honestly, how's that helping you? In short, it's not. To that end, HotHardware has whipped up a useful, easy-to-digest guide on overclocking the Core i7 920, complete with benchmarks, recommendations and tips for dealing with excess heat without hooking up a liquid nitrogen tank. Interested to see how to crank a stock 920 to a level that outpaces the pricey 3.2GHz Core i7 Extreme Edition? The read link, friends -- hit it.
The gigahertz Centro, also known as 'the Palm-powered grenade'
Personally, we wouldn't want to be within 15 feet of a Centro being mercilessly overclocked to a mind-numbing 936MHz, but we reckon that's where our fearless readers come into play. We're told that this sucker reached prompt criticality and melted into the Earth's crust shortly after this screen shot was taken, and you know what? We can't say we blame it.[Thanks, Jason]
AMD Phenom II processor bought, benchmarked, coveted
AMD, a company not exactly known for meeting its own deadlines, seemed to be trying to avoid news of painful delays for the Phenom II by simply not letting anyone say when the thing would be available. Now the chip is apparently in the hands of one lucky gamer at the HardOCP forums, Table21, who was kind enough to run it through its paces. The Phenom II 940 running at 3GHz scored a 4,091 on 3DMark06 and, once OC'd up to 3.85GHz, delivered a score of 5,086. It's rather too early to draw any conclusions from these numbers, and we don't know what he paid for the thing, but that performance does fall well behind Intel's Core i7 Extreme that was similarly benchmarked last month, scoring 6,608 at the same clock speed. That's quite a gap -- but nothing a little liquid nitrogen won't fix.[Via PC Perspective]
Intel's Core i7 Extreme Edition 965 overclocked to 5.5GHz
Right, so Intel's 3.73GHz Core i7 Extreme Edition 965 is fast enough for the vast majority of PC users across the globe, but not for Japanese overclocking enthusiast duck. Oh no -- duck decided to pair the chip up with ASUS' ROG Rampage II Extreme motherboard, which facilitates hardware-based OC'ing, in order to reach a top speed of 5510.09MHz. The point of the exercise? Just to say he could, not to mention set the bar for OC Team Italy to try and demolish.
Liquid nitrogen-cooled MSI Wind U100 overclocked to 2.3GHz
When MSI rolled out its v1.09 BIOS, we're willing to wager it absolutely did not have anything like this in mind. The mad scientists in Team Australia are at it again, this time overclocking a netbook to the point (almost, anyway) of implosion. The unafraid members grabbed hold of a hopeless Wind U100 with 2GB of RAM, hooked up a little liquid nitrogen and proceeded to push the poor 1.6GHz Atom N270 CPU to an amazing 2.385GHz. No telling how quickly the whole thing was over, but still, this is pretty ridiculous, mate.
Palit's Radeon HD 4870 X2 has preposterous clock speeds, marketing hype
Hong Kong-based video card manufacturer Palit is excited about its Revolution 700 Deluxe video card -- so much so that we're a little frightened by the force of its enthusiasm. The ATI Radeon HD 4870 X2 GPU is no slouch to begin with, but this iteration has cores overclocked to 750MHz and 2GB of GDDR5 memory at a face-melting 3.8GHz. As imposing as clock speeds are, they likely can't measure up to the epic hype from Palit. "All other cards beware," the press release boldly cries, "there is a new king in town and it only comes from Palit!" Tap the read link for the whole thing -- best enjoyed while listening to the Mortal Kombat theme song.
MSI Wind v1.09 BIOS update makes overclocking easy
We've long since known that MSI was a fan of overclocking. After all, just about every last one of its gaming notebooks come with one-button OC'ing courtesy of the Turbo Drive Engine technology. Now, it seems that the company is giving the spoils once reserved for the Crysis crowd to those with netbooks, or more specifically, the Wind. The freshly released (and absolutely official) v1.09 BIOS update enables simple overclocking by mashing Fn+F10, giving users the ability to push things 8%, 15% or 24% beyond their normally specified limits. Electric Feel over at ElectricVagabond has found that the update provides up to a 30% boost in performance, which he claims is quite noticeable in processor-intensive apps like Photoshop. You know you're dying to give your Wind a little lift, so hit the via below for the step-by-step of getting this installed.
MSI ships AMD-powered GX630 and GT735 gaming laptops
If the Intel-based GX620 and GX720 were too, um, Intel-y for your liking, how's about a fat slice of AMD? MSI has just announced the availability of its freshest duo of AMD-powered gaming notebooks, the GX630 (shown above) and GT735 (shown after the break). Both units pack a Turion X2 Ultra dual-core processor and possess the ability to be overclocked by up to 15% at the touch of a button with the Turbo Drive Engine technology. The former also boasts a 15.4-inch LCD, NVIDIA's 512MB GeForce 9600M GT, up to 4GB of RAM, gigabit Ethernet, WiFi, optional Bluetooth 2.0+EDR, integrated stereo speakers, a 4-in-1 card reader, VGA out, a 2-megapixel webcam and a DVD writer (Blu-ray optional). The brawnier GT735 steps it up with a 17-inch panel, ATI's 512MB Mobility Radeon HD 3850, a five speaker system including a subwoofer and most everything else already found on its partner in crime. Snap either up now for $1,049.99 / $1,249.99 in order of mention. Full release is after the break.
AMD unveils 'Fusion' gaming utility for speeding up your PC
AMD today launched the Fusion Gaming Utility, the first in what the company is calling a major push in rebranding (Cinema 2.0 is part of that), complementary to the AMD Game! Initiative it launched earlier this year. We had a chance to talk with AMD Gaming Strategist Brent Barry and PR representative Matt Davis, to grill them on the odds and ends of the new software and AMD's push to capitalize on the mainstream core gamer.
Team overclocks Core 2 Quad to 5.1GHz, claims world record -- too bad it's not
So we hate to break it to the good guys at Tom's Hardware, but while we're impressed that they managed to overclock a 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Quad 6600 to 5.1GHz using a cryogenic cooling system, it's not nearly close to the world record they're claiming -- we've seen P4's at up to 8.18GHz, and just a couple months ago someone jacked a Core 2 Extreme QX9775 on a Skulltrail board to 6GHz. Still, it's always fun to watch people pour liquid nitrogen over a mobo -- video after the break.[Via PC World]
AMD including hidden overclocking functionality in tri- / quad-core Phenoms?
Straight up, this one sounds just too bizarre to ever be true, but we suppose (almost) anything goes when talkin' AMD. Now that you're suitably skeptical, word on the street has it that AMD's triple- and quad-core Phenom processors posses a half dozen "hidden pins" which can enable painfully easy overclocking when paired with the right chipsets. Yeah, this sounds way too much like some sort of Up / Down / Up / Down / Select / Start fantasy boost, but apparently a 2.8GHz Black Edition CPU can be taken to 3GHz with a SB700-equipped motherboard or an even more tantalizing 3.2GHz when used with a SB750. As expected, the release date for this tech is listed as unknown, but maybe that's just some code trying to tell us we're really stuck in the Twilight Zone.[Thanks, kris120890]
Alienware relaunches Area-51 ALX desktop with overclocked 4GHz QX9770
Hold onto your frame rates folks, as Alienware has just relaunched its more-potent-than-ever Area-51 ALX desktop. The bona fide gaming rig packs a 3.2GHz Core 2 Extreme QX9770, but rather than being satisfied with Intel's work, this thing comes overclocked to 4GHz -- it's "maximum stable output." As expected, you'll find the outfit's own High-Performance Liquid Cooling solution to keep things from turning into molten hot lava, and you'll also have your choice of twin NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GPUs or an ATI CrossFireX configuration with dual ATI Radeon 3870 X2 cards. Furthermore, you'll notice 4GB of DDR3 RAM, dual Ethernet ports, an optional Blu-ray burner, oodles of hard drive space and all the other high-end niceties you've come to expect from the company. Only problem? The $5,549 starting price that comes along with the 4GHz CPU and required 1,200-watt PSU.
Intel's Skulltrail QX9775 hits 6GHz, manages not to spontaneously combust
Yeah, we've seen other mad scientists take way more antiquated chips to higher figures on the GHz scale, but can that cryogenically cooled P4 handle all those SSE4.1 instructions? The latest feat of overclocking prowess comes to us courtesy of K|ngp|n, who has apparently taken Skulltrail beyond the 6GHz mark. You'll also notice the 1,716MHz FSB (!!!) and the fact that it's sizzling along at 1.953-volts -- but hey, no one said running Crysis would be easy, right?[Via The Inquirer]
The OLPC XO gets overclocked, loses its innocence
It's safe to assume that if you're using one of OLPC's XO laptops, you're not exactly a speed demon. Still, you probably wouldn't mind squeezing a little more power out of that innocuous Geode CPU -- and now there's a way to do it. The cats and kittens over at OLPC News have discovered a way to (relatively) safely overclock your system using a shortcut at the open firmware prompt. At least one reader reports a 21.8 percent boost in system speed, and claims that bumping the 433MHz processor to 588MHz, and the 166MHz RAM to 233MHz has resulted in a much smoother ride with Ubuntu. Of course, if you decide to try this, keep in mind that just like overclocking the big boys, you could explode your system, restart the Cold War, or attract tons of vampires.
AMD launches "unlocked" Phenom 9600 Black Edition CPU
The fury has really been unleashed over at AMD, as the cats in 2nd place take aim at the pocketbooks lowdown, dirty overclockers. Feeling like getting into it? Then you'll probably want to get your hands on the extra-special Phenom 9600 "Black Edition" quad-core processor, which allows brave souls to tweak (i.e., overclock) to their hearts content by utilizing the company's OverDrive utility. It's not all rainbows and unicorns, however, as these chips apparently contain a bug which under extreme conditions can cause the CPUs to perform in a less than stellar manner. AMD says that it hasn't witnessed any of its production installations exhibit the errata, and that only its internal stress-tests have pushed the processor into the danger zone (cue Loggins). If you're really concerned, a BIOS patch will circumvent the issue, but may suck away 20-percent of your delicious speed. The choice is yours.[Via TG Daily]
OCZ unveils "world's first" Intel Extreme Memory Modules
Get ready, OCZ is comin' atcha with some newfangled RAM technology that's likely to scare off the very market it's hoping to attract, but we're here to break things down for digestion. Put (sort of) simply, the firm's DDR3 PC3-12800 Intel XMP Ready Titanium Edition RAM will become the first memory to feature Intel Extreme Memory Profiles, which work exclusively with Intel's X38 chipset to enable the average joe (or jane) to overclock their RAM without even knowing what latency means. The sticks will come configured to run 8-8-8 latencies, but a secondary profile featuring a 7-6-6 latency can be easily activated if ran on an X38 chipset to squeeze a bit more performance out of the setup. There, that wasn't too hard, now was it?[Via TrustedReviews]
