Dual core goodness for $60 - fo' realz!
Earlier this year the tinkerers with chips were pleased to hear that AMD triple core (X3) processors could be unlocked by some motherboards to gain an extra processing core.
However it turns out that the cheap as er, chip single core Sempron 140 can also be unlocked to provide a 2.7 GHz dual-core processor for just $50.
According to Vmodtech, you need to use a motherboard that supports the unlocking feature. It is called 'Advanced Clock Calibration' in the BIOS.
It only works sometimes, but if it does you can unlock a second core on the Sempron 140, effectively turning it into an Athlon II X2.
Generally AMD disables cores that aren't working right on the CPU and uses them for the single core Sempron parts. However, if it didn't have enough chips in the fab plants that had a dysfunctional core, it would disable working cores on CPUs in order to fill Sempron production quotas.
It is a gamble of course, but if you know what you are doing you can build a pretty good PC on the cheap.
theinquirer.net (c) 2010 Incisive Media
Issue: 133 | February, 2012