New to this forum, so hello everyone!

I have a Compaq 6512UK and in the manual Motherboard Specifications, MS-6577 (Xenon 3) it says it support Pentium 4 N, Pentium HT. Bus freq 400/533Mhz

My questions:
1. Does Pentium 4 N refer to Northbridge? and Pentium HT refers to "hyper threading"? if so there are many Pentium 4 familes with hyperthreading
2. Can I upgrade my CPU to any Pentium 4 with a buss 533 as long as it support my socket (478)?

Many thanks!

Hi, Welcome to the forum

I'm not too sure what Compaq means by 'Pentium 4 N', but it might refer to Northwood. I'm pretty sure HT refers to Hyperthreading. If you were to upgrade your CPU, I would go with a 130nm Northwood P4 with Hyperthreading. Make sure you have sufficient cooling though, that may or may not be a problem with a faster processor.

Also, just out of curiosity, how much RAM do you have? RAM can make quite a big difference, maybe a bigger difference than upgrading the CPU.

Thanks for quick reply!

I have 512mb but would upgrade to 1gb (which is the maximum on this super-PC) if I were to upgrade the CPU.

With the cooling, I thought to try with my current fan, If it overheats Ill buy a new fan...

Will start looking for a Northwood on ebay..

No problem, glad I could be of assistance

Sounds like a good plan to me, make sure to clean any old thermal paste and dust off the CPU cooler when installing the new one, and apply new thermal paste. If none happens to be included with the CPU, I can recommend Arctic Silver 5. I assume you know how to install a CPU, if you need any help don't hesitate to post again

Should be ok I was building quite a few PCs before I started uni... but then I discovered Linux and subsequently never had to upgrade my hardware... Used an XP1700+ for 6 years! However, it's very noisy (**** box, 3HDs and CPU fan) and was therefore going to swap for the Compaq PC (which was about to be binned!)... Hopefully should make so much noise!

Thanks again.