Selecting the Rest of the System

     This is where it can get complicated. This is also one of the most asked questions, although more in a general way. Most people that are new to building computers always buy first and ask questions later. My own personal opinion is just that there are several opinions, but so long as your system isn't prebuilt as inexpensively as possible, you probably can make a few poor buying decisions and learn what not to buy as far as upgrading. For those of you that are overclocking I can tell you right now that you will probably spend more money than you normally would since the components that you put together have to be basically top notch, but you will win in the end with more value in your system, and longer lasting products. I personally never skimp on cooling, my power supply, and my memory. Things like cases, fans, processors, motherboards can be had for a lot less money than you might think. I personally like to spend a lot of time in Newegg's refurbished section. Most of these refurb's can be had for 30-80% of the original price, and can also be purchased as a retail item, which means you get the manufacturer warranty. Buying refurbished products can have its merits in that the previous person may have not the capability to use the product effectively by not reading the instruction manual, or might have skimped on the other stuff like a power supply or memory which lead to a deeper problem completely unrelated to the product they returned. Another way to cut your budget is to buy used stuff from hardware forums such as Anandtech, HardOCP, and our own ClubOC for Sale/Trade forums. Many people that like to overclock may be upgrading to the latest and greatest, and will be selling their perfectly decent components for much less than new, just be sure to reference their buying and selling reputation and use some kind of payment arrangement that will insure that if you get ripped off you can get a refund...

1. The BIOS

     The BIOS is the critical part of your system, and one of the first things that one must consider more than anything is to read your motherboard manual. I cannot illustrate how important it is to read your "board book"! Sure you may know everything there is to know about overclocking, but you find some new features, or the infamous "F1" menu that many Gigabyte motherboards have to uncover their overclocking menu. Most if not all motherboards with any kind of overclocking ability will point out important features of their overclocking menu's, as well as, a quick description of what each features do.

2. Multiplier

    The Multiplier is a function that only Intel ES and AMD Processors have. Intel ES (engineering sample) CPU's can usually be obtained for a high price and usually don't have any kind of advantage over other Intel processors with the exception that you can lower your multiplier and raise the FSB (Front Side Bus) to take advantage of greater memory bandwidth, which when used in conjunction to a higher CPU speed can render more performance than with a "locked" multiplier. Intel processors since I've been overclocking have ALWAYS been locked, and do indeed have better memory optimization than an similar AMD setup with the exception being the $550.00 AMD Socket 939 CPU's. On the other hand almost all AMD Processor's are multiplier "unlocked" which basically means you can choose any multiplier you want, and raise the FSB. The multiplier is usually used in terms of formulating CPU speed or true core speed. For instance a Intel 3.2Ghz P4 processor has a multiplier of 16x with a 200Mhz core bus. Now the FSB is a totally different story, but lets just say the higher you get, the better. FSB has no relativity to core speed so we won't toy around with that until we get to the memory section.

Sample of a Multiplier Adjustment BIOS screen.

     Working with the Multiplier adjustment requires some finesse but it gets very easy after a few tries. There is actually nothing really working that you can other than your finger clicking the keyboard to adjust the multiplier. As mentioned before the lower you can adjust your multiplier and the higher you can raise your FSB the more performance you will gain overall. So for instance If I have an AMD system with an adjustable multiplier I can basically find the default multiplier by dividing the core speed by the FSB. So for example I have a 1700XP which has a core clock of 1466Mhz. It will look something like this: 1466/133=11x multiplier. So if I know that I have a motherboard capable of supporting a FSB of 200 than I can do something like this 1466/200=7.333, so I basically adjust my multiplier in the BIOS to 7.5x x200 and I get 1.5Ghz or something close to the default core speed. Of course this is just barely touching the whole realm of overclocking, but hopefully this will give you a general idea. I must mention that if you are using this guide to overclock, don't start yet, establishing 1.5Ghz from your 1.46Ghz CPU may be harder than you might think. There are too many variables at this point to consider beforehand.