[M]ovie - Athlon XP Tbred 2200+ Unlocking

Howto by jmke @ 2002-10-26

Got a new Athlon XP? One of those Tbred models? I´m sure you just want to drop that multiplier and push the FSB of your system. Unlocking these Athlons is surprisingly easy compared to the vanilla XP. In this little howto article I´ll show you what it takes to get yours unlocked in less then 5 min!
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Unlock the Night



Madshrimps (c)
AXDA2200DKV3D



Introduction:


With the introduction of the Athlon XP we saw an increase in performance up too 15% at same clock speed compared to the Athlon Tbird. But not all was good; unlocking your CPU with a pencil was no longer possible. You had to use a silver pen/paint to connect the L1 bridges on the XP. This can take a while and the risk for making a mistake increased 10 fold!

Luckily we saw some manufactures take some good actions by releasing all-in-one Unlock Kits. They include all the tools necessary to connect the bridges that would cause the CPU to be unlocked.

The Athlon XP is now being replaced by a smaller, faster and cooler CPU, the Tbred. These CPU´s also have some bridges cut and unlocking can only be done with silver paint.

And that is exactly what I´m going to do here. To unlock the Tbred you need the connect the last L3 bridge, this will result in making the lower multipliers available (up to 12.5x). This way you can really push the FSB to the limit!

The Tbred Unlocked:


What you need:


  • Silver paint/pen : The silver paint can also be found in carshops named Rear Window Defrogger kit.
  • Wax color pencil : The one used by children to draw on almost anything.
  • Sharp needle
  • Tape & Cutter
  • Nail Polish Remover (NPR) : to correct any mistakes that are made, removes the silver with ease.
  • a Q-Tip : to be used with the NPR
  • Good light source : cause it´s hard to see things in the dark :)

 

What you need to do:

Madshrimps (c)
Connect the last L3 bridge

 


  • Clean the surface around the last L3 bridge with the NPR and Q-Tip.
  • Use the wax color pencil to fill the hole between the 2 contacts.
  • Clean the contacts with the needle (be carefull and be gentle :) )
  • Use the cut some pieces of tape (4 to be exact) and place them in a way so that will mark the area that will be painted

    Madshrimps (c)

    how to isolate the bridge (example on AXP)
  • Use the silver paint/pen to make it look all shiny, wait 5 minutes.
  • Gently remove the tape and check your work!



The Movie:


I recorded my little unlocking adventure using my camcorder and a R8500AIW to get the images onto the PC.


 


Download/Fullscreen -click here



If you have any questions / remarks , don´t hesitate to ask right here

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