How safe is overclocking?

[pillowboy]

I have XFX 5900nu, its currently running at default speed at 400/850, I downloaded coolbit.reg and the autodetect set it on 470/1000, however I didnt go with that setting because I've had many computer problems before therefore i am afraid to change setting , the card is running at 54C. If you OC your videocard, please post your comments ty

 

[Corporate Thug]

its safe. just run 10 loops of 3d mark to check for stability and artifacts

 

[yhelothar]

Antidetect is unreliable. I think it detect what the card can run at 2D. I used antidetect and it tested my card to run at 520/1000, I loaded up a 3D game, and there were tons of artifacts at the screen menu
just use the highest setting that never crashes... ignore the temperature, if it gets too hot, your games will crash. Use instability as your sign of your chip failing and not temperature

 

[Robor]

Every single one of my computers is overclocked and I've been overclocking for nearly 10 years now. The main thing you have to be concerned with when overclocking is heat. Overclocked parts generally run warmer than those at default speed. Make sure you have good cooling (a well ventilated case and quality heatsink/fan combo) and you'll be fine. You'll be surprised how much extra "free" speed you can get out of your system. Example...

My P4 2.4C is running at 3192Mhz and my 9800 non-pro is flashed to a pro and overclocked well past the default pro speeds. If I were to have paid full price for a "real" 3.2Ghz CPU and 9800 Pro I would've spent several hundred dollars more. Why do it when the parts can do it anyway?

 

[yhelothar]

Yes heat is the enemy to overclocking, because it is an electrical resistance and will hinder the chip's max capability.
Another thing to note is that the parts won't get much hotter if you don't overvolt it, which when overclocking the video card, you can't overvolt it unless you did some serious modding.
Oh yeah, don't use low level overclock from rivatuner. It supposedly overclocks on the chip's pll(clock generator) level, and is supposed to give a little more performance.
I had my geforce3 @ 250/550 for a year without a single problem on driver level overclock, and one day I decided to use low level overclock at the same frequencies, the card began to have artifacts and died in a week.

 

[Chesebert]

heat is bad but its not the worst. Increased voltage will surely kill your component faster than anything. Eventhough your die temp is say 60c that doesn't mean the temp at the interconnect is that low. They usually go up to 90c easy Yes I know you get electron migration as K increases, but the migration is minor and unless you decide to keep your CPU/GPU for like 10+ years its not gonna do anything

Plus most modern CPU has ECC in their ALU and FPU...(have to double check on that one)

Most time when OC fail is because the clock is too high and your clock is scewed soo much because of higher temp (electron moves slower at higher temp btw).

In theory, you can clock as high as temp allows (until CPU burns up) if your clock has 0 scew in the clock tree...or a clockless design...hmm..

 

[Richdog]

It can get you killed, and is considered illegal in some countries.

 

[titanmiller]

Overclocking is very safe assuming you dont give the chip more volts. As far as temperature on your GFFX goes, run a game in windowed mode and then look at the temp! I'll bet you it gets near 100ºC after 10 minuets or so, but the temperature drops so fast after you exit a game that it reads ~50ºC once you can get the driver opened.

 

[Evdawg]

It can get you killed, and is considered illegal in some countries.

Let me guess, when Hillary clinton is president (oh god please no) she'll ban overclocking and say that its harmfull to the air. THERE'S SILICON BURNING!

 

[Atlantean]

How do you tell what speed your video card is running at. And overclocking is fairly safe as long as you do it in steps and not just a big jump like that. Although overclocking can cause some problems so just check your temperatures and if you get artifacts lower the speed.

 

[nRollo]

A better question would be "What's the point of OCing?"
To get three-five more fps? Big deal. Not worth risking destroying the equipment.

 

[Chesebert]

More than 3 fps!

sometime it's between playable game and slide show

 

[Richdog]

Originally posted by: Rollo
A better question would be "What's the point of OCing?"
To get three-five more fps? Big deal. Not worth risking destroying the equipment.

Rubbish statement! Depending on the card you have, overclocking can make the world of difference. Making a 5900nu into ultra, or a 9800np to a PRO is nothing to be sneezed at and can save you serious money. Even on lesser cards, overclocking can net you a 10-20% increase in performance, therefore could make the difference between playable and unplayable in games.

 

[pillowboy]

another question, how is the new nvidia driver?

 

[nRollo]

Rubbish statement! Depending on the card you have, overclocking can make the world of difference

Oh yeah, it's a "world of difference", alright. Let's take a look at Richdog's assertion that OCing up a notch is a big deal:
Wow Richdog! I'd risk my vid card for puny gains like this!
Look at that! OCing the 9800XT got them 2fps! And a 5900U is 4 fps faster than a NU! Woot!

Uh oh! Got the big 5-10 fps going on at 16X12!
Like you could tell the difference without benching it.

Here are some HUGE OC gains. Oops. Guess Not
Xbit doesn't seem to get these big performance gains you talk about Richdog. How about posting some links to back up your flames?

In any case, the only way you can get the kind of gains Richdog is alluding to is by grossly OCing your card. You shorten it's life significantly by doing so. If I had $10 for every thread I've read on these forums where some doofus has burned up his video card OCing it and wants to know how to RMA it, I'd be the Richdog.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: Rollo
A better question would be "What's the point of OCing?"
To get three-five more fps? Big deal. Not worth risking destroying the equipment.

For video card overclocking, I agree. Too risky.

But I can run my P4 2.4C at 3Ghz without a hitch, thats a lot more than 3 to 5 fps.

 

[yhelothar]

that's why you overclock your video card, cpu, and memory... 5 fps on each.. you get 15 fps total... then you could tell a difference :beer:

 

[sugarkang]

i think you'll notice a bigger improvement when dealing with games that are totally stressing your system.
for example in aquamark3:

barton 2500+ & radeon 8500 230mhz/230mhz = 15FPS
barton 3200+ & radeon 8500 275mhz/240mhz = 18FPS

yeah that's only 3fps, but at such low rates, it's also a 20% increase! and also the difference between playable and non playable game. gta3 used to be very choppy, but it's far less choppy and *almost* smooth now. definitely worth it for free, especially when i can delay my 9800pro purchase until next spring.

if you've got a radeon 9800 now, then there's no point in OCing cause you just don't need the extra juice.

 

[Jeff7181]

Originally posted by: Rollo

Rubbish statement! Depending on the card you have, overclocking can make the world of difference

Oh yeah, it's a "world of difference", alright. Let's take a look at Richdog's assertion that OCing up a notch is a big deal:
Wow Richdog! I'd risk my vid card for puny gains like this!
Look at that! OCing the 9800XT got them 2fps! And a 5900U is 4 fps faster than a NU! Woot!

Uh oh! Got the big 5-10 fps going on at 16X12!
Like you could tell the difference without benching it.

Here are some HUGE OC gains. Oops. Guess Not
Xbit doesn't seem to get these big performance gains you talk about Richdog. How about posting some links to back up your flames?

In any case, the only way you can get the kind of gains Richdog is alluding to is by grossly OCing your card. You shorten it's life significantly by doing so. If I had $10 for every thread I've read on these forums where some doofus has burned up his video card OCing it and wants to know how to RMA it, I'd be the Richdog.

Those comparisons suck a big one. They don't show a FX5900nu @ any decent speed... all they show is a 5950U at stock and overclocked, so you can't even see what a FX5900nu @ 490/940 like mine would perform like... you can only guess because you don't really know how much the 256MB of RAM vs. 128MB matters.

Rollo, can you find some links to the burned up video cards? I've never seen a thread about someone destroying a video card by overclocking it unless they tried some stupid voltage mod.

 

[nRollo]

Rollo, can you find some links to the burned up video cards? I've never seen a thread about someone destroying a video card by overclocking it unless they tried some stupid voltage mod.

LOL, sure thing Jeff.

this guy soft modded and OCd

this guy OCd his 5900 at 2d speeds and burned it because it couldn't back down

Another winner here

I guess I could waste more time finding more, but, I don't think so unless you want to pay me to do so. Why don't you post some links to video card OC that show it making a difference instead of just saying it does?

BTW, Jeff, my comparisons don't "suck a big one". You see I was replying to

Making a 5900nu into ultra, or a 9800np to a PRO is nothing to be sneezed at and can save you serious money.

So all I really had to do was show the difference in the same benchmark between those four cards. I answered the question directly, and even showed how feeble the results of OCing are.
The question wasn't "Rollo, use your psychic powers to guess how much Jeff is OCing, then find some benchmarks to post that would match his."
Not very old or smart, are you Jeff?



Sugarkang:

yeah that's only 3fps, but at such low rates, it's also a 20% increase! and also the difference between playable and non playable game.

You think 15>18fps is the difference between playable and non playable??!!?!?!

Newsflash: both SUCK. Smooth animation is at 30fps, not 18 dude. You basically prove my point with your post, that the OC makes no difference.

 

[otispunkmeyer]

you can work out what speed u can push your ram to safely very easily.

look for a value on your ram chips, for example 3.3, 33 or something like that.

this value is the speed of the ram, for example 3.3 means 3.3 nano-seconds. which is 3.3 x 10 ^ -9 (10 to the power minus 9)

using F=1/T

1/3.3x10^-9

equals a frequency of 303Mhz

2.8ns ram = 357mhz

2.2ns ram = 454mhz