SC:3 Legacy (DDR2)

Subcategory 3 takes us back a little way in time to the DDR2 era of hardware that involves Intel Core 2 Duo and Pentium D chips alongside AMD Athlon 64 processors and GeForce 9800 GTX graphics cards.

• Stage 1: PiFast - Socket 775 (Average of 3 best CPUs)
• Stage 2: 3DMark03 - NetBurst 775 + GeForce 9000/8000 (Average of 3 best CPUs)
• Stage 3: Wprime 1024 - Mobile Core/NetBurst
• Stage 4: 3DMark06 2x GPU - K10 + HD 3000 (Average of 3 best GPUs)
• Stage 5: 3DMark Vantage - K10 + HD 2000
• Stage 6: CPU Frequency - AM2
• Stage 7: Memory Clock - DDR2

For PiFast Stage 1 we had several Wolfdale CPUs at our disposal, logically the E8500 and E8600 had our preference due to their high multiplier (9.5 and 10X) However we ran each time into FSB issues with my Gigabyte EP45-UD3P, limiting our max frequencies at around 5.6-5.8Ghz. Not bad, but not good enough. Thanks to MacCleod for bringing his ASUS Rampage Formula board which unleashed our E8600 to nearly 6.1GHz.

Stage 2 was all about clocking the Pentium D Netburst CPUs to their maximum even though the 3DMark03 benchmark seemed at first glance all about raw GPU clocks. Our initial scores had limited CPU clocks at around 5.3-5.6GHz as we were limited at max 1.6Vcore. Changing the board's BIOS and cooling down to the right temperature allowed us to boot at 1.85Vcore, thus our CPUs reached easily the 6ghz mark and even beyond. A big thanks to Blind for volt modding all of our cards. Gamer's Geforce 8800GTS was impressively easy to clock, my 8800GTX had memory coldbug issues below -45°C. The 9800GTX is also limited in temperatures around -40/45°C. The trick with 3DMark03 to get efficient GT1 and GT2 scores is to boot your setup at maximum CPU speed. The 8800GTS and 9800GTX scaled well with added CPU power, the 8800GTX not really above 5.3GHz. Thanks to team Xtremeoverdrive for making us push our boundaries!

Stage 3 in both Legacy and Vintage was a real pain in the butt. Our Aopen Yonah board did not show any sign of life, so we had to revert to an old Acer laptop. A score was set, but far from efficient. Nevertheless each point counts in the end.

All Stage 4 scores have to be credited to our in-house Tweaker Oldscarface who managed to push the bus speed +290Mhz. Well above the 265Mhz I managed to do on a similar ASUS board. The Pro tip here is to run with a single Dimm and not in a dual Dimm configuration as me. The elevated HTT, coupled HT link and NB speed made the overall subsystem to become way more efficient, thus us scoring way higher than any of the other teams in the dual GPU 3DMark06 stage. Way to go Roger!

Stage 5 took most of my time in the last week  of this Team Cup competition. On water I managed to pull of a 7128 Vantage score, however an insider told me at least 7460 was needed. I could not manage the same clocks as Bullshooter, my nearest rival could run 1160/1060, so I needed to focus on pushing the AMD 1090T CPU and its NB speed to get a better score in. Resulting, after nearly 15L, in a 7493 score, just enough to claim top spot in this stage.

Me and Roger had acquired several AM2 CPUs, though he killed his ASUS AM2 board during pre-testing for Stage 6. I only could manage to pull of a 4080Mhz score at -25°C on the 6400+ processor. Sadly I forgot to add the CPU mem tab and that ruthless admin Websmile pulled my score. You biatch lol!!

The raw memory DDR2 frequency score for Stage 7 was also improved during the final week. During the first team bench session the Crucial Ballistix stick reached on air a nice 783MHz, though more was needed, as again our Italian friends from XtreemOverdrive constantly raised the bar. Re-benching with the same stick on LN2 gave us a nice 816.1MHz, enough to consolidate top 3 in that stage.