WINDOWS doesn't recognize AMD
w@r10ck
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Joined: 26 Dec 2006
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I have AMD Athlon 64 3500+ (2.21 GHz) but it seems windows XP HOME doesn't recognize it fully. It recognizes only manufacturer and model but it says it has 994 MHz or sometimes 1 GHZ. I have SP2 installed and all newest drivers installed. What should i do?
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jeffd
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Joined: 04 Oct 2003
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This isn't a windows problem, it's a mother board problem. Many motherboards have what are considered 'safe' defaults. These defaults tend to throttle amd cpus by about 30-50%.

You have to correctly configure your motherboard, then windows will see it correctly, windows can only see what the motherboard tells it is there. In this case you will probably need to increase the FrontSideBus speed from maybe 100 to 133 mghz, possibly to 166. That's my first guess anyway. Or more, it depends on the motherboard and what it supports natively.

You can see what the motherboard speed is in the bios if you turn off the default stupid graphics mode bios boot and return to full text bios, then you can see what is being loaded item by item. You can also freeze the display of boot information by hitting scrlk key at the moment the text you want to read more closely is on the screen.

My guess is that once you have your bios correctly configured, you will see the correct cpu speed on the screen, and windows will see the correct cpu speed as well.

Important!!!: read your motherboard manual on configuring the bios. Do not configure it until you have read it. Do not blame me or anyone else if you break your system because you did not read the directions, and then accidentally did something silly like overclocking your board by accident. Read the directions. If you don't have them, download them from manufactorer website.
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w@r10ck
Status: New User - Welcome
Joined: 26 Dec 2006
Posts: 3
Location: Europe
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I looked up in BIOS in CPU and it looks like that:

CPU configuration

CPU TYPE AMD Athlon(tm) 64 processor 3500+
CPU SPEED 2200 MHz
CACHE RAM 512 k

AMD K8 COOL 'n' QUIET control [enabled]

-to me it looks OK in BIOS but windows still doesn't recognize it in Control Panel, System

-. is this going to affect(effect or whatever) in games? (sorry for bad english)


by the way my config. is

AMD Athlon 64 3500+ 2.21 GHz
1024 MB DDR2 RAM by kingston
Asus motherboard, FSB-AMD hammer, basic frequency 200 MHz, effective frequency 200 MHz (i saw this in Sandra Standard v. ?.?)
BIOS- Phoenix Award BIOS v6.00 PG
graph. ATi Radeon X1300 PRO 256MB
sound card. Realtek AC 97 audio
HD- SEAGATE 160GB 7200rpm, Ultra-ATA/100
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jeffd
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Thanks for the details, that clarifies it. What is happening in this case is that you have done everything correctly, and you have installed and activated some cpu limiting software that automatically lowers the cpu frequency when it's not required.

I use the same type of software, and my cpu frequency in fact shows also at about 1 gigaherz with 2 gigaherz amds, although that's with Linux, but it's the same idea.

The easiest way to verify this is to do some cpu intensive task like ripping or compressing a dvd, that should shoot the frequency up to the full value.

In other words, everything is working, and working the way it is supposed to work. One of the motherboard software/drivers includes an application to drop the cpu frequency automatically when load is light, or the motherboard itself has that option, it can be in different places, cool and quiet might do that as well, I don't remember.

cpus are kept cool by underclocking them when the system does not require their full speed, which is by the way almost never with today's processors and speed.
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w@r10ck
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Joined: 26 Dec 2006
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Location: Europe
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Ahhhhh... now i feel better. Thanks for help, ill try that thing with ripping or compressing dvd.
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