What part of "doing it right" or "Look at the Toms Hardware or overclockers websites" don't you understand.
Or perhaps you would like me to put up a warning post along the lines of the warning on the side of tobacco products.
Give me a break, I give the people on this board credit for having more common sense and intelligence than the average person.
Dude, are you in love with computer chips? You sound like it is a very personal thing with you and chips. You are the overclocker protector of computer chips or what.
"That your system has worked fine proves very little."
Yea, I guess it dosen't prove jack shit, it's just another bit of worthless "anecdotal evidence" not proved by actual use FOR THE PAST THREE YEARS. I guess I shouldn't tell you that I was overclocking Celery chips (266-500's) with no problems at all.
But in the end I guess I am just an electron fueled computer chip abuser.
"I have no problem with people overclocking if they understand the risks. It's your machine, you should be able to do what you want with it, and more power to you if you want to fiddle around with its insides. It's fun, if nothing else. However, I don't agree with encouraging people to overclock and telling them there are no risks.
That your system has worked fine proves very little. Integrated circuit reliability can be described statistically, and one data point, such as your system, proves basically nothing. When IC vendors gather reliability data on the operating life of their chips, they study 500 chips at a time. Generally, one failure out of 500 chips is acceptable, and two or more failures out of 500 is not. They raise the operating voltage by 10% and raise the ambient temperature to 125 degrees C, and this compresses 20 years of operating life down into one month of stress testing. No one has collected this kind of reliability data on overclocked chips. Overclockers rely on anecdotal evidence. But the scientific evidence shows that they are shortening the life of their chips. One thing that reliability testing in the industry has demonstrated is that some chips are weaker than others and will fail first while the majority continue to work. (I'm not talking about infant mortality failures here, I'm talking about end-of-life failures.) But eventually all of them will wear out due to gate oxide degradation, the hot electron effect, and electromigration."