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Question about my video card, overclocking and 3dMark2001

S

Salvador

Diamond Member
Hello.

I just bought a Gainward GF4 Ti4200 video card, updated to the newest NVidia drivers (used a driver cleaner to remove the old NVidia drivers) and then installed Coolbits to overclock the card.

I did a base run with 3dMark2001 with the new drivers set at the default clock speeds (250 mhz core clock and 513 mhz ram speed) and came up with a pretty nice base run.

Then.. I overclocked the card to 300 mhz core clock (previous owner said it would do 300 mhz no problem) and bumped the ram by 20 to around 530 mhz. I ran 3dMark2001 again and only picked up 50 points.

Since my gains were so pathetic (probably my system limiting this), I decided to move the clock settings back to stock because it wasn't worth pushing the card for such a measly gain.

Now.. Here's my question. After I moved the clock speeds back to stock and ran 3dmark2001 again, my scores are 100-200 less than what they were initially with the fresh drivers and the card at stock clock speeds. I tried running the test at different times and even let my system cool overnight and ran it again when the card was nice and cool.

Why would my 3dMark2001 scores be lower now than what they were before I overclocked? The card was overclocked by the previous owner. I only had the card overclocked to run 3dMark once and the card was fine. It didn't get hot. I didn't get any kind of artifacts.

Any ideas?

TIA,

Sal
 
100 to 200 points in 3d2k1 is negligible. I wouldn't worry about that. But I would look into beefing up the rest of your system a bit. That should increase your scores better than o/cing in that system.
 
100-200 points would be about the margin of error... I can run it twice in a row and get results that vary by about that much.
 
I'm glad that 100-200 points variable is normal.

This system is a 1800xp (not overclocked) with only 256 mb's of PC133 CL2 RAM in a ECS K7S5A Pro mobo.

My stock number was 7940 in 3dMark2001

My overclocked number was about 8025

Now, after setting my clock back to stock settings, I'm in the 7700-7800 range.

BTW.. Thanks for the tip on bumping the ram timings. I'll give it a try. I will probably also swap out the PC133 RAM for DDR RAM and increase it to 512 mb's up from 256. That should make a bigger difference.

Thanks again.

Sal
 
Your motherboard and bus speeds are really the limiting factor.

I tried overclocking my 9800 on a KT333 with a 2500 barton and got no improvement on games or benchmarks. Until I got the A64. Now I do the same overclock on the 9800 and get 2-3k more 3d marks compared from the stock 9800 Non pro frequencies(320/290 to 415/310).

 
Woohoo! This overclocking is fun. I'm currently stable at 305/586 and my score is up to 8200. This is still with one stick of PC133 256 mb RAM and a non oc'd XP1800+.

I know.. I know.. This mobo isn't the greatest for gaming. It's not even my main system. I was just using it to test the card (just bought it used) and try overclocking. My main system is a KT333 and I have a ATI 9500 Pro (not overclocked). I didn't want to test this card in that system because it has an ATI card and didn't want to mess with trying to clean out ATI drivers and replace them with NVidia drivers.

What's the limit I can expect from this card? What will happen if I push it a little too hard? Will I fry the card or will it just start to become unstable?

Also.. Question for overclocking. How does a company know if you go to RMA a card and you had overclocked it? How would they know if you overclocked it?

Thanks again.

Sal
 
Originally posted by: Salvador
Woohoo! This overclocking is fun. I'm currently stable at 305/386 and my score is up to 82xx.

I know.. I know.. This mobo isn't the greatest for gaming. It's not even my main system. I was just using it to test the card (just bought it used) and try overclocking. My main system is a KT333 and I have a ATI 9500 Pro (not overclocked). I didn't want to test this card in that system because it has an ATI card and didn't want to mess with trying to clean out ATI drivers and replace them with NVidia drivers.

What's the limit I can expect from this card? What will happen if I push it a little too hard? Will I fry the card or will it just start to become unstable?

Also.. Question for overclocking. How does a company know if you go to RMA a card and you had overclocked it? How would they know if you overclocked it?

Thanks again.

Sal
Click to expand...

It all depends... I had a Ti4200 running 325/650 (A Ti4600 runs at 300/650). The memory speed is usually the limiting factor... but in your case, the CPU and motherboard are definately holding you back since my "XP3200" on an A7N8X Deluxe with PC3200 RAM scored about 14,500 with my Ti4200 @ 325/650.
 
It all depends... I had a Ti4200 running 325/650 (A Ti4600 runs at 300/650). The memory speed is usually the limiting factor... but in your case, the CPU and motherboard are definately holding you back since my "XP3200" on an A7N8X Deluxe with PC3200 RAM scored about 14,500 with my Ti4200 @ 325/650.
Click to expand...
Wow! What card did you get to run at 325/650? Did you do anything to the card to help it reach those speeds while being stable?

I just found the limits of this card. It starts flaking out at about 315/600. I start getting graphic streaks and then I shut down the 3dmark2001. It will run at 310/596, but actually runs smoother at 300/586. That seems to be where the card wants to be. I went ahead and set it back to stock speeds though because I don't need the added speed right now.

Let me phrase my other question another way. Let's say that I bought a video card with a lifetime warranty and for most of the cards life, it ran at stock speeds. However.. What if I did try overclocking, like what I'm doing now. Is there a way that the company would ever know that I overclocked the card? Can they run a diagnostic on it and have it tell them that the card ever deviated from the stock speeds? Or.. Is it something more obvious like if I overclocked the crap out of the card (wasn't careful like I am) and burned the crap out of it and wanted a replacement?

Just curious..

BTW.. My ATI 9500 Pro with my other system is over 10,000 in 3dMark2001. I can't remember the number now, but it does a better job than the GF4 in this system.

Sal
 
Heh.. Get this. Out of curiousity, I uninstalled the 53.03 driver, used the driver cleaner and then installed the 43.03 drivers. I picked up 800-1000 points in 3DMark2001. I'm at 8500 now running stock clock speeds.

Sal
 
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