MB for P4 1.7G

[jimbc]

I got a free P4 1.7G, socket 478. Need to pick a mainboard for it. Any suggestion for a cheap (under 100) mainboard? Is the CPU overclockable? It doesn't have to have audio/lan, but USB2.0 would be nice. All suggestions are welcome.
Thanx in advance!

 

[dbwillis]

That chip might not be overclockable..its a Willamette (older style P4) and not a Northwood (newer style) that everyones getting the great Oc's from...

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: dbwillis
That chip might not be overclockable..its a Willamette (older style P4) and not a Northwood (newer style) that everyones getting the great Oc's from...

are you sure?
it's a socket 478
I thought the socket 423 was the willamette.
then again, it's possible the sockets don't have anything to do with the core, they might have made willamette CPU's in socket 478 format.. i am not even sure.

 

[o1die]

All northwoods have an "a" or "b" after them, and come in even denominations: 1.8a, 2.0a.2.4b, etc. The a's are 400 fsb, and the b's are 533 fsb. Your cpu is a willamette core with 256 megs of cache. I recommend one of two boards that are reasonably priced: the gigabyte 8sg667 with sis 648 chipset and agp 8x support, or the albatron px 845 pev pro with the Intel 845pe chipset, support for hyperthreading, and pc2700 memory. The albatron board has an agp/pci "lock" feature to keep your cards in spec when overclocking. Both boards are available at newegg for $85-93.

 

[jimbc]

I checked the label on the box, it says system bus 400Mhz, 256K L2-cache.
So, it is a Willamette ?

 

[mechBgon]

The 256k of L2 cache makes it a Williamette, yep. o1die, not all Northwoods have A's or B's, only the ones where there's a non-Northwood counterpart to be distinguished from (or that's what Wingnutz said, and he'd know since he works at Intel ).

 

[dbwillis]

Yes, there were no 1.7ghz Northwood P4's, so youve got an older Willamette style P4.