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PaulW · Post by **PaulW** » Tue Jun 03, 2003 2:27 pm

Well its been such a long time since I’ve used a working BP6 board (12 months), I though it would make sense to come back here to check up on things, see if there was any more news on PIII SMP capabilities, etc, and I certainly have missed a lot!! New interface, which confusing at first, I am now getting used to, and must say its much better from when I last visited the site when my BP6 was still in the land of the living!
However, bad luck came upon me, and my BP6 decided to go postal on my, and destroy both CPU’s, Memory & GFX Card, as I was running it as a Web/File server (Windows 2000 Server). I found that the Q6 VTT mod I did had blown, as I never attached a heat sink to the capacitor, and it just got so hot it melted, shorting out a few tracks on the board, causing it to just go bang. I never did get another BP6 board, I went the cheap option & built another machine out of an old PII 450, which made do.
Now I’m bidding on another BP6, as it was much more efficient as a server than my current system, and as I’m expanding my network, I need something which will cope, plus I also miss the fact I can just say Yeah, I got a Dual CPU Server at home! (Saying you’ve got a single CPU server doesn’t have the same grin factor

) All I need to do is find some CPU’s, some RAM, and I’m up and running!

What I’m a little unsure about is whether I go for a dual PIII mod, as having read the guide to modding the board to support them, I’m a little weary as whether to attempt it. I have 2 PIII 1.1Ghz CPU’s, FSB 133, which are just lying in my spares box. I noticed there was a mention about PowerLeap producing a custom adaptor for the BP6 to enable PIII in SMB, and having a look at there website I found this http://plpadmin.tempdomainname.com/PL370SMP.html. I am unsure if this is for the BP6, as it doesn’t say, but it does say it is for SMP, so would it work on my PIII’s without any board modifications?? Otherwise I will have to hunt done a pair of Celeron 533A CPU’s, but even that is much better than my current setup!

Thanks

Paul

Wolfram · Post by **Wolfram** » Wed Jun 04, 2003 2:51 am

Can´t say anything about the PIII-Mod, just that people always recommend to practise some SMD soldering before you try it on valuable parts.

There´s no news on the Powerleap SMP adaptor. It doesn´t seem to be available.

If you plan to use your PIIIs, keep in mind that the BP6 only has 1/1 and 2/3 AGP dividers, so the AGP slot will be overclocked to 89 Mhz if you set the FSB to 133. Though that seemed to work on my BP6 with both a G400 and a GF2MX (I accidently left the divider at 1/1 when I clocked the FSB to 100), many video cards do not like higher AGP speeds.

Another question is if a modded BP6 would be stable in SMP mode at 133 Mhz FSB.

Finally, if you decide to go for some Celerons, I would get two 366s (or one 366 and a faster one) and try to overclock them to 550 (FSB 100). Second best choice would be 400 IMO, which would get you to 552 @92 FSB (lowest FSB with 1/3 PCI divider, IIRC). But that´s still a bit risky: I´ve had three sets of 366s that were not completely stable beyond 523.

There ARE some lucky bastards that got not only to 550 but to 600 and beyond, but not many...