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Geek Culture / What is CPU Clock Frequency?

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Fallout
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Posted: 1st Jan 2006 17:02
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I've always wondered what CPU Clock Frequency is. This is not the clock speed of my processor. I have an AMD4000+, but when I boot up I get a message telling me my CPU Clock Frequency is 200mhz. I believe in my bios I can tweak this up to 400mhz. Anyone know what this is? Is it the cache bus or something?

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re faze
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Posted: 1st Jan 2006 17:15
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windows may report the speeds of amd processors incorrectly.

Dont code slowly be SWIFT about it!
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Fallout
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Posted: 1st Jan 2006 17:39
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No, it's totally unrelated to clock speed. The internal clock of my AMD4000+ I think is 3ghz, but this clock frquency is the external clock - 200mhz. Someone must know what it is.

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tpfkat
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Posted: 1st Jan 2006 17:51
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clock frequency is either
a: the speed of the fsb in which the cpu can talk and recieve to the memory.these need to be matched else they will work at the lowest setting.
b: the clock pulses ( the frequency is the electrical signal)from the cmos.

the programmer formarly known as thicko.
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Fallout
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Posted: 1st Jan 2006 19:11
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Yeah, I think you're right about the FSB. I was looking through the bios settings and it seems to be the FSB. I had a further look on the Gigabyte site and it looks like I've boughts a Mobo which is packed with overclocking features. Might leave me alone though until my compo gets too out of date, and then I'll have to read up on overclocking.

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TKF15H
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Posted: 1st Jan 2006 19:13
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at 200mhz it's probably the FSB.

WarBasic Scripting engine for DarkBasicPro
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PowerSoft
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Posted: 1st Jan 2006 21:49 Edited at: 1st Jan 2006 21:49
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FSB...?

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re faze
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Posted: 1st Jan 2006 21:59
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front side bus.

Dont code slowly be SWIFT about it!
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tpfkat
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Posted: 1st Jan 2006 23:51
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the channels that the proccessor talks to the memory ( front side bus) or the electronic highway 200mhz ( is it me or is that slow)
other buses on the board are the address bus and the data bus working at ( presuming you have a newish mobo) 32 bit or 64 bit.

the programmer formarly known as thicko.
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CattleRustler
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Posted: 2nd Jan 2006 01:21 Edited at: 2nd Jan 2006 01:25
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It had something to do with core speed versus a clock multiplier. It was like a relation to how many clock cycles occur vs. how many actual instructions could be carried out in that same time frame. I am guessing most here havent built their own pc's, or if they have, havent built many older pc's (circa 386-486 ). Back then, before the mobo's sorted the clock vs. multiplier level for the cpu, you used to have manually set jumpers (google: jumpers ) to set the frequency correctly for the cpu. So for example the cpu was say a 400mhz processor, but the core was 100mhz, you'd need to set the clock jumper to 1x (or 100) and the "multiplier" jumper to 4x (1*100 * 4) in order for the cpu to be set up correctly. Luckily these days we needn't deal with that arseness.

Well anyway it was something like that
/me sips beer

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Fallout
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Posted: 2nd Jan 2006 01:37
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Yeah, that's spot on. That's what I've been reading about. My 4000+ runs at 3ghz, and this clock frequency is 200mhz. Somewhere there is a multiplier set to 15 in the bios. Apparently I can tweak the bios using MIT so that the multiplier goes down to 14 or lower, increasing the speed of the bus and increasing CPU performance (retrieving data) without overclocking the CPU. I'm not gonna do this, but that's what I've been reading.

200mhz sounds slow to me too, but that seems to be the case for AMD systems. I think the mem trigger occurs on the up and down cycle, effectively running at 400mhz (kinda like ddr ram). I'm not really clued up on this, but it all sounds snazzy ......

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CattleRustler
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Posted: 2nd Jan 2006 01:49 Edited at: 2nd Jan 2006 01:59
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Quote: "Yeah, that's spot on"

Thanks, my oldness shines thru.

And to clarify what I said above, where I said "386-486", this manual thing went on well into the pentium era, until there where slot 1 processors, iirc. The bioses finally caught up, and all was well in the world with not having to do cpu math anymore, from that point forward.

Quote: "That's what I've been reading about. My 4000+ runs at 3ghz, and this clock frequency is 200mhz. Somewhere there is a multiplier set to 15 in the bios"

sounds right, 15*200 = 3000Mhz (or 3 Ghz). Only thing there is why does AMD name it a "4000+" ? The overclock ability? I guess its kinda like how the DSL sellers here always advert with the catchy "768kbps" (which equates to like 80+ KB/sec) but the cable company says "100 times faster than dial up" which could mean 200-500 KB/sec, immensly faster than dsl. But most people (since they are dumb) think dsl is faster than a cable modem (in the same monthly price bracket). Numbers....*sigh*

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Fallout
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Posted: 2nd Jan 2006 12:18
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My guess with AMD is they name their chips 4000+ etc. to compete on the same name bracket with Pentiums. I could be completely wrong, but if someone is not in the know, and they compare a P3.4ghz with an AMD3ghz, they're gonna assume the Pentium is faster. Obviously AMD have the edge in their architecture, which means their 3ghz chip is faster (performance wise) than a Pentium 3.4. They need to name them to confuse the market. There could very well be a more professional and technical reason for it though.

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dab
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Posted: 3rd Jan 2006 05:23
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Quote: "windows may report the speeds of amd processors incorrectly."


No, it reads it correctly, it just reads the current speed it's running at. For example, I have an amd athlon 64. It was made (i'm not sure about other amd processors) to only work as hard as it has to. So, when I'm not doing anything that requires much cpu speed, it stays at 900 mhz, when I'm doing something a little more CPU needed, I use all 2.2 ghz of it. I found that out the hard way.


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Osiris
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Posted: 3rd Jan 2006 07:29
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While we are on the subject, how do I know what kind of processor I can buy I have an AMD 2400+ right now, but I want something faster, what can I buy that is fast but relativly inexpensive?

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tpfkat
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Posted: 3rd Jan 2006 11:03
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amd are sneaky barstewards, intel name their cpu after its speed like the 4000 is 4gig. amd ( i always use amd ,this is just a little gripe) however call them names like 4000+ or 2800 and that is not the actual speed,the 2800 runs at around 2ghz and the 3000+ runs at about 2.2ghz. luckily i have a mobile athlon 2800 with a low voltage thus can be overclocked,but im thinking when the prices come down to get somthing much bigger ( 4.somthing 64 bit )

the programmer formarly known as thicko.
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Osiris
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Posted: 3rd Jan 2006 23:20
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Well, so how do I know if a processor I want will work in my computer or not?

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CattleRustler
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Posted: 4th Jan 2006 00:31
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see if your mobo can accept the cpu youre interested in

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Osiris
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Posted: 4th Jan 2006 02:15
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But how? What do I need to look for?

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