A Brief History of OVERCLOCKING PART II A Multiplier-Unlocked Look at the Next 15 Years of Overclocking In the previous issue of TheOverclocker we looked at the first half of the history of overclocking, covering the period between 1983 and 1998. The next 15 years proved to be even more action packed, with manufacturers actively supporting overclocking and even getting involved themselves.
THE INTRODUCTION OF A CARTRIDGE-BASED PACKAGE
In the May of 1997, INTEL introduced the Pentium II 233 (S-Spec SL264), which was based on the P6 architecture used for the Pentium Pro. The micro-architecture was known as Klamath, and was manufactured using a 0.35 Îźm process. The Pentium II moved away from the Socket 7 package used by the original Pentium, moving instead to the Slot 1 cartridge system. Due to the production process, the L2 cache and processor dies had to be bonded early in the socketbased CPUs - before testing of either component could be done. This meant that the cache had a very quick access time, but it came at a price. If either the processor or cache proved to be unreliable, both would have to be discarded. This wastage was not economically viable, and made the slot-based CPU a necessity. Using the Slot 1 assembly, INTEL could place the processor and cache dies on a small printed 18 The OverClocker Issue 25 | 2013