Overclocking a GTX 580

[RobertR1]

Hi Green Team,

I bought a Zotac GTX 580 AMP. It comes OC out of the box but as they say more is better.

Currently, using MSI afterburner, I'm at the following:

voltage: 1.1v
core/shader: 920/1840
memory: 2150

The rest of the specs are:
2600k @ 4.7ghz
Haf X Case
Asrock Z68 Extreme 4 Gen 3

How far can I SAFELY push this card?
Should I keep the memory at default and focus on core/shader?
Is my voltage safe? The cooler on the card is stock

 

[RobertR1]

Anyone?

 

[amdhunter]

lol. I just picked one up at Microcenter and was wondering the same thing. The card is frikken fast as hell, but I have a sneaky suspicion my X6 just isn't enough @ 3.2GHz.

It just feels like it should be faster for some reason. I envy your 4.7Ghz.

 

[StrangerGuy]

lol. I just picked one up at Microcenter and was wondering the same thing. The card is frikken fast as hell, but I have a sneaky suspicion my X6 just isn't enough @ 3.2GHz.

It just feels like it should be faster for some reason.

Display resolution to make a difference over your previous card?

 

[lehtv]

X6 is equal to X4 for gaming because games don't use those extra cores. But I doubt an X4 would bottleneck a single GTX 580 - it's just that an i5 sandy bridge is a lot better gaming CPU.

 

[amdhunter]

Display resolution to make a difference over your previous card?

2056x1152. Everything looks watery smooth, except for some mouse lag when I enable AA.

It's weird, my previous 4890 had no lag at all (ran at 2056x1152 with little AA and AF.)
Gonna re-do my computer when I get home later today and try to get more out of my motherboard/CPU/Mem.

 

[amdhunter]

X6 is equal to X4 for gaming because games don't use those extra cores. But I doubt an X4 would bottleneck a single GTX 580 - it's just that an i5 sandy bridge is a lot better gaming CPU.

Yeah - I kinda get the same feeling. I may get an i7 setup after I see what bulldozer does.

(apologies to OP for threadjack.)

 

[blackened23]

good luck and have fun, zotac uses reference cooling so you're playing the silicon lottery.

Even at stock speeds my 580 gets hot at load, you probably won't be able to push anything crazy like 900+.

 

[RobertR1]

If you read the first post, I'm already at 920/1840/2150 and my temps are low...

Anyway, I'm going to leave it at this setting and see how well BF3 performs.

 

[Jhatfie]

If you read the first post, I'm already at 920/1840/2150 and my temps are low...

Anyway, I'm going to leave it at this setting and see how well BF3 performs.

I think 1.1v should be okay as long as your temps are held in check. I am actually running 1.125v for my OC (940/2275) , although my galaxy uses the Arctic Cooling triple fan setup. Even with that certain games (Crysis 2) heat it up to 77-79C after a while.

 

[WT]

What is the highest fan speed you are seeing on the Zotac 580 ? I read somewhere that the fan on the 580 wasn't throttling up like it should, which either Afterburner or Trixx would fix.

 

[blackened23]

I think 1.1v should be okay as long as your temps are held in check. I am actually running 1.125v for my OC (940/2275) , although my galaxy uses the Arctic Cooling triple fan setup. Even with that certain games (Crysis 2) heat it up to 77-79C after a while.

1.1v on stock cooling? sounds like a BAD idea

The AC accelero is far cooler than reference fan, by about 30 degrees at load...what you can do with the accelero isn't what you can do with reference

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

I didn't feel comfortable using any amount of added voltage on a stock 580. Even just bumping up the clock speed on the reference 580 overwhelmed the stock cooler IMO. I took that back and bought an asus dc2 CU 580 and I was in business.

Going 1.1v on a stock cooler is irresponsible IMO. Maybe I'm crazy but I see no benefit in frying a card and having the manufacturer send me another one. I don't think it's fair.

 

[RobertR1]

What is the highest fan speed you are seeing on the Zotac 580 ? I read somewhere that the fan on the 580 wasn't throttling up like it should, which either Afterburner or Trixx would fix.

I'm using afterburner to force the fan at 75% for gaming on BF3. On profile 1, I have the following:

1.125v, 920/1840/2250, fan at 75%. This is my BF3 profile. My temps don't exceed mid 70's.

For lesser demanding game, I'll be using the stock settings. For day to day usage, I use stock settings also.

 

[blackened23]

I'm using afterburner to force the fan at 75% for gaming on BF3. On profile 1, I have the following:

1.125v, 920/1840/2250, fan at 75%. This is my BF3 profile. My temps don't exceed mid 70's.

For lesser demanding game, I'll be using the stock settings. For day to day usage, I use stock settings also.

Just curious, what equals 1.125v in MSI afterburner? I have version 2.1 with "notches"...mine is +50 mV on a MSI lightning which I assume is, 1.050v

Its pretty annoying that they don't put the actual voltage on there

 

[Seero]

Hi Green Team,

I bought a Zotac GTX 580 AMP. It comes OC out of the box but as they say more is better.

Currently, using MSI afterburner, I'm at the following:

voltage: 1.1v
core/shader: 920/1840
memory: 2150

The rest of the specs are:
2600k @ 4.7ghz
Haf X Case
Asrock Z68 Extreme 4 Gen 3

How far can I SAFELY push this card?
Should I keep the memory at default and focus on core/shader?
Is my voltage safe? The cooler on the card is stock

Overclocking a video card is not always a good idea. The extra risk of killing the card is one thing, whether the OC does anything to visual quality is another. There should be a bit of headroom you can push without touching the voltage, simply push the core speed a bit and test it for days. Once you play with the voltage, nothing is safe anymore as the VRM may not be capable of pushing those voltage into GPU without killing itself. There will not be on screen warnings before it dies.

Proper driver update is the best way to get performance.

 

[RobertR1]

Just curious, what equals 1.125v in MSI afterburner? I have version 2.1 with "notches"...mine is +50 mV on a MSI lightning which I assume is, 1.050v

Its pretty annoying that they don't put the actual voltage on there

I have 2.1 also and I'm not seeing that. I pick voltage and use the arrow keys to slowly adjust the voltage as needed. The graphs on he right show the actual voltage.

Upping the case fans on the Haf X is now keeping the temps in the 60's. Like I said, this OC profile is only for BF3. Others games will run off stock settings.

 

[blackened23]

Thats mine i'm so confused now

 

[m3t4lh34d]

Overclocking a video card is not always a good idea. The extra risk of killing the card is one thing, whether the OC does anything to visual quality is another. There should be a bit of headroom you can push without touching the voltage, simply push the core speed a bit and test it for days. Once you play with the voltage, nothing is safe anymore as the VRM may not be capable of pushing those voltage into GPU without killing itself. There will not be on screen warnings before it dies.

Proper driver update is the best way to get performance.

While I'm sure he will take your statements into consideration, it seems he is already dead set on overclocking, so you are wasting your energy.

A game like Battlefield 3 is going to push A LOT of people to try and OC their cards to get every last ounce out of it, since 1 GTX 580 is NOT enough for BF3 at max settings with AA. Yes it may be playable on Metro, but on Caspian Border, trust me it's not.

 

[happy medium]

I'm using afterburner to force the fan at 75% for gaming on BF3. On profile 1, I have the following:

1.125v, 920/1840/2250, fan at 75%. This is my BF3 profile. My temps don't exceed mid 70's.

For lesser demanding game, I'll be using the stock settings. For day to day usage, I use stock settings also.

Temps in the mid 70's is great. I have overclocked every card I've owned to 100% and dropped it down just a tad for day to day use if the temps are right. My gtx460 runs 930 all day long and my 5750 could run 900 core ( both stock @675,700) just the same. They both are still alive and kicking.

I would go as high as you can go with your core at your current voltage and drop it down 10 core and keep your temps are below 85c.