Is my e4300 rubbish? Pls help! DS3 settings seem ok?

Hi there - really could do with some help here:

My setup is as follows: e4300, Gigabyte GA-965G-DS3, Corsair 6400-C4 twinx, cooler-master hyper tx, radeon x1950 pro.

In the BIOS, I have followed numerous guides and simply cannot get my computer to boot past an FSB of a fairly lowly 270. My settings are:

Robust Graphics: Auto
Clock Ratio: x9
CPU Host Clock Control: Enabled
CPU Host Freq: 270
PCI-E freq: 100
CIA2: Disabled
System Memory Multipler 2.00 (put the memory at a lowly DDR2-540 unless I increase the multiplier)
Memory setting 5-5-5-15
Everything else on Auto
DDR2 is at +0.2
PCIE: normal
GMCH: normal
FSH overvoltage: normal
CPU Voltage 1.35v

I have also disabled C1E, EIST.

So - I'm clearly not stressing my ram which can I've tested and can run quite comfortably at 5-5-5-15 at DDR2-900 speeds.

If I go one FSB above 270, my system won't boot. I have tried raising the cpu volts up even gradually to 1.45 with no luck. I have also done minor raises to the other voltage settings with no difference.

I tried lowering the multiplier to 8x but the FSB wouldn't go above 270. I've tried going to much higher levels as well like 300 but this doesn't work.

Does anyone have an idea of what's going on? Could it be that I've got a rubbish e4300 or have I missed something? Any help would be hugely appreciated before I start hunting for a new processor!

Thanks in advance