First post, by PentAmd
Hello!
I have a ASUS A7M266-D dual Socket-A motherboard with 2pcs Athlon MP 2000+. The mobo supports only FSB 100 (200) and 133 (266) MHz.
I have 1 GB (2 module) non ECC non REG memory in this mobo.
Memtest86 passed, then I installed a windows XP on it, and in the win task manager I can see the two CPU.
So everything is fine.
I wanted to have faster processor with double of L2 cache. So I checked wikipedia, what kind of Athlon MP processors were produced. I saw, that there was two Bartons, the 2600+ and 2800+ with FSB 266.
In the E-Bay there were not much Athlon MP, so I searched in my collection 2 nearly same Athlon XP 2500+ (333MHz) Bartons. These processors are known for the ability to clocked higher FSB, and can reach the 3200+.
Because my dual processor motherboard supports only 266FSB, I changed the clock multiplier by cutting thru some of the L3 lines on the processor. Thus I made a 2800+ Barton with 266FSB.
Bios post recognised it coreectly and I tested both processors individually with memtest, they passed.
After the successful multiplier modding, I converted both of them to Athlon MP (enabled the multiprocessor support), connecting the last pins of the L5 on the proccessor by using conductive ink.
According to the Bios Post screen it was successful, both of them were MP capable.
My first problem was the Memtest86. For multiprocessor systems I use the "newer" version of memtest V 4.3.7. After start, it showed the following error: "SMP: After STARTUP IPI: err = 0x4"
I looked up this kind of error on the interet, and it is related the reset of the multi processor system, which was somehow not successful. I did not have this error message with the "real" Athlon MP 2000+.
I tried to run Windows XP, but it recognises only one processor.
Everywhere on the internet forums I read that the XP and MPs have the same core. After enabling the MP feature, why it is not working? Maybe during production the Multiprocessor unit of the CPU was faulty after they tested the silicons, and that's the reason why they disabled the feature?
On thing to mention is, that the Athlon XP 2500+ CPUs which I use were made in 2003 week 21 and week 41.