OC or not? 9700pro.

[BoomAM]

Hi,
Im toying with the idea of OCing my Sapphire 9700pro.
Im not exactely certain if i should though.
Im not a n00b to OCing either, as ive done the following in the past.
S3 Savage4 32mb from 115/115 to 150/150
GeForce2 MX from 166/183 to 210/210
GeForce2 GTS from 200/333 to 220/366
GeForce3 Ti200 from 175/400 to 230/510

But is it really worth OCing a 9700pro? Is the stock cooler (ATI one) any good at cooling it?
I`d like to aim for at least 350/650, perferably 380/680, and would like to see 400/700.

So...should i go for it? or not.

Opinions?

 

[NYHoustonman]

Overclock it if/when you actually need the performance, but in today's games I just can't see any reason to.

 

[BoomAM]

Thats what i was thinking.
I`ll probably OC it when i go down the water cooling route with my system, in about February.

 

[WaTaGuMp]

Lets get real here about overclocking vid cards, its not like your going to see 50 FPS more doing this lol. I have tested every card I have had with overclocking and yes you can squeeze out some FPS but its not the end of the world mind blowing increase that will make your games run so much better.

The card already runs MOST games at frame rates that make the games look and run well so why push the card for minimal increases. If you running games at 40 to 60 FPS already whats the big deal to go to 45 to 65 when it will look the same.

 

[BoomAM]

Cos a few extra fps can mean that slightly higher resolution, or higher AA setting, or higher AF setting, or combination of all three. And that does increase image quality!
And like you said, it runs most games. Not all games. There are still a few games that occasional stutter on my PC, and a OC will "cure" that.

 

[WaTaGuMp]

Originally posted by: BoomAM
Cos a few extra fps can mean that slightly higher resolution, or higher AA setting, or higher AF setting, or combination of all three. And that does increase image quality!
And like you said, it runs most games. Not all games. There are still a few games that occasional stutter on my PC, and a OC will "cure" that.

Like I said man the card should already give you enough FPS for the higher resolution and AA you so desire. I dont O/C mine and it runs fine except for BIG battles in PS and even O/Cing didnt help that.

I run 4x AA and can run 1600 res in almost all games if I choose to do so, I am not against O/Cing but with this card I havent found a need for it.

 

[BoomAM]

I guessing that you have a pretty good PC backing it up though. 2ghz+ , DDR ram?
Im only running an XP1800 and SDR ram, so already, with the SDR alone, im losing 10% of my possbile performance.
Im not saying that the card is slow. Is very far from that.
Its just some games, C&C Generals, EF2, U2, does`nt exactely run that well. C&C Generals stutters wihen theres 100+ units on screen, EF2 doesnt run well when shadows are on, Unreal2 doesnt run that well either, with occasional stuttering in fire fights (3 or more enemies).
Now obviously in many of those cases, its limited by the CPU, but a OC will add a few more frames and will hopefull increase the frame rate from sub 25fps to beyond 25fps. Even if its only increased from say 23fps to 26fps, it`s still smoothed it out.

 

[WaTaGuMp]

Yeah I am running a 2.8 now just built this a few weeks ago, but I have had this card for almost a year now. Even my old system was a 2.0 at 2.3, you are right about the CPU helping to boost performance no doubt about it.

Even running your system I still dont see how 3 fps from 23 to 26 worked wonders for you but if it does cool.

 

[BoomAM]

Originally posted by: WaTaGuMp
Even running your system I still dont see how 3 fps from 23 to 26 worked wonders for you but if it does cool.

Because under 25fps is jerky, 25fps or above isnt. You do know that, that was just an example bty?