The CPU-NB is perhaps the most important thing when it comes to Phenom 2's.
Increasing it improves the through put of the entire chip and increases memory bandwidth.
There's really no downside to overclocking the north bridge, You do gain a little extra heat as you're adding more voltage to a different part of the chip that's not the cores them selfa but it's 3-4c at most.
It's well known in the overclocking world that when it comes to overclocking AMD chips that the CPU-NB is just as important as the CPU clock itself.
Athlon 2 and Phenom 2 x2/x3/x4's max out between 2.6-2.8Ghz NB clock but you do get the odd chip that can do 3Ghz. Phenom 2 x6's can all pretty much do GHz due to using a newer revision.
As for AMD leaving it at 2Ghz stock, Possibly due to stability reasons, Although it's a common and well shared opinion that AMD should of released Thuban with a NB clock higher then the stock 2Ghz.
Quick article with results can be read
here
If you do a google search you'll find a few threads that back up all these results, I did my own testing with slides but they were deleted from my photobucket account long ago
Benefits from overclocking the CPU-NB/NB :
Higher memory Bandwidth
Reduced latency
Up to 16% IPC increase depending on application.
Downsides :
Require's voltage and thus produces slightly more heat
Phenom 2's are bandwidth starved at stock speeds, That's why they respond so well to the CPU-NB being raised.
I run my Phenom 2 x6 1075T at 4.8Ghz with a NB clock of 3.2Ghz as my 24/7 overclock and it flies and pretty much slaps my friends i7 960 around the place.