9700pro OCing Tips & Advice.

[BoomAM]

Hi.
What programs should i use, should the card be able to run fine without artifacts, for me to declare it a "successful OC"?

I can run Halo & 2 DX9 shader programs at 350/700, but in 3dm2k1 and 3dm2k3 i get slight artifacting.
Thats after an hour of core OCing only, so the 350 on the core is stable.
At 695 mem, i still get slight artifacting in both 3dmarks.
Should i be concerned that 3dmark 2k1 and 2k3 dont run propely? Or should i just take it as stable as it runs a few of my games ok?
Ive just completed the DX2 demo and a 5 min session on BC at 350/700 and it did so artifact free.
Both 3d marks still slightly artifact though.

Thanks in advance guys/gals.

 

[SilverBack]

If you are having artifacts in any of your D3D or Opengl programs, you are seriously affecting the lifespan of your card.
The components are being stressed to heavily.
I killed a GF3 that way once.

 

[BoomAM]

Its odd.
I managed to play the DX2 demo, BC and UT2003, error free, at 350/700. But with artifacts in 3dmark2003 and 2001.
So i went out to work for 4 hours, and when i went to change some 3d options, it clocked back by 10mhz, then the 2d screen was completly corrupted. Untill a reboot, which then put it back to normal (still at 350/700). So i set it to default for the time being.
It used to do that with my Zalman, every 3 cold boots or so, it`d corrupt, which then a reset, would put it back to normal!.
Why does it keep doing that?!

 

[SilverBack]

Both the 3DMark programs use shaders as part of the tests, more heavily in 3DMark 2003 as it uses version 2.0
My guess is that the use of shaders puts an additional strain on the card increasing temps.
I would back the card down to where there are no artifacts whatsoever, then take off another 5Mhz off each to make sure your card isn't being hurt.

 

[pelikan]

There are two kinds of artifacts:
Core artifacts look like white or black dots.
Memory artifacts look like bent images or things that don't belong there.

Different programs will stress different parts of the card. So at a given overclock some games will be artifact free while others are not. Also video cards are not all the same in what programs make them artifact the most. I have two radeon cards here and one artifacts most heavily in 3DMark01 and the other in rthdribl.
I usually run rthdribl while testing an overclock because it opens and starts very quickly and its very easy to spot artifacts in it. Then I run 3DMark01 and all my games.

 

[BoomAM]

I ran two programs that are reccommended by ppl at rage3d that stress the gpu, and one that stresses the memory.
Theres rthdribl & humor water to test the GPU. Which runs perfectly.
And a real-time fur renderer for the mem, which also passes.
I just dont understand why it runs perfectly fine at 350/700, but as soon as it changes to another clock speed(ie; boots up at stock, windows then sets to 350/700), that it garbles, but then another reset sees it ok again.

 

[pelikan]

Sounds like a driver or OC utility issue. I would run cat-uninstaller and the install the Omega driver based on Cat 3.7 or 3.9 with Radclocker (Radlinker).

 

[BoomAM]

I have rad-clocker installed on Cat3.9
Why would the omegas be any better? All they are the Cats with some registary hacks as part of the install process.

 

[pelikan]

They wouldn't be better. I'm thinking if you use cat-uninstaller and put in new drivers it may solve the problem.
The Omegas offer a simple install. That's the main reason I like them. You get the overclocking utlity and don't have to install a separate control panel. Also you can install new Omega drivers right over the old ones. Supposedly the image quality is better but I can't tell the difference.