Hello
If buying 2000s motherboards what signs to look for if misabused and too much overclocked ?
- How to spot "a bit too over" overclocked motherboards and what symptoms appear if any permanent damage is done to the board ?
Some I have seen have 3rd party northbridge chip coolers and such...
Should I be worried ?
Thanks
After 25 years I'd say natural selection will have sorted this out for you. If people truly abused the boards, they wouldn't have lasted 5 years.
Bigger issue than excessive overclocking is good old capacitor plague, combined with (particularly P4) VRMs dying due to not being quite up to the high power draw (even without OC) of the high-end CPUs. But both can be fixed with some basic soldering.
There's no way to know for sure I'm afraid. Even a pristine looking board could have been heavily abused.
Aftermarket chipset coolers could be a sign of someone wanting to keep temps under control. I fitted them to my non-overclocked work systems where they seemed to need it. They sat in an air conditioned room and were replaced after 3-4 years of mainly low utilization.
I was overclocking my gaming systems back then and was guilty of allowing VRM temps to reach 90-100c, cases didn't generally cater for dealing with the issue and the power supply fan was fighting a losing battle. After new caps and a good clean I doubt you'd be able to spot the difference visually.
If you wanted to play it safe you could go for a system which couldn't be overclocked and had its cooling needs well catered for out of the factory.
Screw period correct; I wanted a faster system back then. I choose no dropped frames, super fast loading, fully compatible and quiet operation.
Overclocking in general is not an issue on Socket A/Pentium 4 boards.
I must be some kind of standard: the anonymous gangbanger of the 21st century.
warping/sagging of the cpu socket area
Check to see what other items a seller is selling and if the person is active on a forum somewhere.
Certain wear and tear and the modifying of the original hardware (think beefier 3rd party HSFs on graphics cards) may point towards overclocking.
But in the end, there's no way to know for sure.
A worn out board is a worn out board - long hours, inadequate cooling, overclocked or not. You won't know without first hand experience with the item. Physical damage from mishandling, modifications, manufacturing faults like the capacitor plague could have outward signs.
