Installation

As I mentioned in the previous page, the 3800+ processor came already placed on the board thanks to AMD. Installation of the operating system was as easy as it comes. The first thing was getting a Windows XP boot CD and getting the operating system up and running. Once this was out the way the first boot up of the new machine went fine with no problems at all with the detection process or with the first run of the motherboard bios.

If you want to run the AMD's Cool‘n’Quiet technology, you will have to have a motherboard, drivers and cooler that also supports it, not only that, once you have Windows up and running you will need to install the Cool‘n’Quiet software off of the AMD website.

AMD Cool‘n’Quiet™ technology is an innovative solution available on AMD Athlon™ 64 processor-based systems that can effectively lower the power consumption and enable a quieter-running system while delivering performance on demand, for the ultimate computing experience.

AMD and its partners have worked together to implement Cool‘n’Quiet Technology as a system feature that consists of: a processor with Cool‘n’Quiet Technology enabled, motherboard, supporting BIOS, software driver and CPU cooler.

The good news though is that Cool‘n’Quiet works really well. If you are wondering what the benefits are then check them out below. In the tests I ran in the house the first thing I noticed was obviously the reduction in noise, it was quite a major reduction on my review system too. Next we have the power consumption, when running in Cool‘n’Quiet mode, the voltage would drop to 1.136v and the system would operate between 900 and 2400 mhz, depending on what programs were running, but it tended to sit at 1000mhz when not in a great deal of use.

The benefits of Cool 'N' Quiet are the following:

• Reduced power consumption. (Lower Electric bills)
• Reduced noise in house and business environments.
• Lower operating temperatures.