TIP: Don't fall for the OC version or superclock!

[Bill Brasky]

More backfires than a 1971 Pinto.

 

[Bman123]

I have always bought standard cards but I got a hd4850 before that wouldn't go 100mhz higher on anything. You win some u lose some. I say if the card has a way better cooler and is only like $20-30 more and is already clocked high then why not

 

[LiuKangBakinPie]

When vendors give OC out of the box, all that means is they changed the voltage at the factory and OCed video card a bit.

Dont fall for that. Do it yourself

my card is Vanilla , on purpose,, cuz I wanted control over voltage and OC that I want, plus its less expensive...
and you can see my sigrig I OCed the busheshezeees out of this card. heheh 😀😱

Eh? We buy the with the better cooler normally. That will be a non reference SOC version normally plus you get a nice warranty on it. Now you go and buy a reference on with a junk cooler go oc it by yourself and watch how the heat gets hold of it. Now you go out to buy a cooler for it your nice warranty expires you accidentally damage the card when replacing the cooler (happened a lot just ask the people over at guru3d and the 4870 x2) and you sit with nothing where you couldve just spent 30 to 40 extra for the cooler.

 

[insurgent]

Like the others I buy cards with non-reference coolers. Better cooling and they usually come with a nice OC already as a starting point for your own, and only for a few more bucks too. 10 bucks for a 10% OC with a better and quieter cooler is worth it for me.

 

[Seero]

When vendors give OC out of the box, all that means is they changed the voltage at the factory and OCed video card a bit.

Dont fall for that. Do it yourself

my card is Vanilla , on purpose,, cuz I wanted control over voltage and OC that I want, plus its less expensive...
and you can see my sigrig I OCed the busheshezeees out of this card. heheh 😀😱

I see the opposite, why not simply buy pre-clocked version. Chip vendor make chips like making candies, not one by one but as batches. They however do QC them one by one. In short, a chip can operate at lower than normal voltage, a chip can generate less heat then normal. That isn't what QC is concern, but rather it meets specification. If it does, left bin, if it doesn't right bin, next.

So MSI brought 10k of these which comes in different shipments, they will re-bin them again with a different specification to catagorizes these chips and use the worst to make stock version, and better ones for OC version.

So, although the card may look the same, they are actually not. In fact, better chips are always being sold as the highest OC version manufacturers offer. All that for 20 bucks more. Why not?

 

[bryanW1995]

I think most people would want to keep the warranty on their card.

Some vendors (like evga and xfx) support overclocking. You can get the best of both worlds with them by getting a "normal" card, then overclocking it to SSC or FTW levels (and sometimes even higher) while still keeping your warranty.

 

[Pohemi]

I figure if a card is OCed from the factory, the manufacturer has already pushed the hardware beyond "stock", and it may reduce the leeway for further OC...

I.E. I had a BFG 6800 Ultra OC that came from the factory with 440MHz GPU clock (normal was either 400 or 425). I couldn't OC any further without producing artifacts and instability. I paid $500 for the card at that time.
My roommate bought a "regular" BFG 6800 Ultra (non-factory OC) a month later for only $400, and was able to OC his GPU to 460MHz, so...yeah. He ended up having a faster card for less money.

Of course, as usual, YMMV.

 

[tweakboy]

I think the blue PCBs are much more effective in cooling since blue is a cool color. If you have a red PCB color you're going to over heat and cause lots of problems. Black? Forget about it. And green? Only if you're some hippy tree hugger.

Hehe Nintendesert your funny! hehheh thx. gg and gb

 

[CVSiN]

When you are paying $500 for a video card, the extra $15-20 is nothing.

this..
I dont ever OC my Vid equipment as I like my warranty so I always get the FTW version of the EVGA cards I like..
OCed max from the factory and full coverage for doing so..

few extra bucks for a hard coded OC and possibly better binned chips.. I'll take it.. never let me down so far.

 

[Idontcare]

I'm with the school of thought that buying a factory OC'ed card means the burden of ensuring the OC falls to the manufacturer and that's a guaranteed overclock you can take to the bank.

Bought an MSI Cyclone 460, I think it's stock OC is 725MHz (or is it 760MHz?). My first one crapped out and MSI replaced it under warranty even after I told them I had OC'ed it further still above 800MHz before it died.

For a few bucks extra I got a card that is guaranteed overclock and warrantied to boot. I consider the $ tradeoff to be worth it.

 

[3DVagabond]

I'm with the school of thought that buying a factory OC'ed card means the burden of ensuring the OC falls to the manufacturer and that's a guaranteed overclock you can take to the bank.

Bought an MSI Cyclone 460, I think it's stock OC is 725MHz (or is it 760MHz?). My first one crapped out and MSI replaced it under warranty even after I told them I had OC'ed it further still above 800MHz before it died.

For a few bucks extra I got a card that is guaranteed overclock and warrantied to boot. I consider the $ tradeoff to be worth it.

The experience you had with your RMA is what I've seen is the norm. All of this, "you'll void the warranty", scare mongering is not the way people treat their customers.

Now, an obvious physical modification that in all likelihood caused the failure... different story altogether. They'll likely tell you to go a bang your head against a tree.

 

[Idontcare]

Yeah I think its true that most companies want to do right by their customer and replace dead gear regardless the cause, but at the same time they would be irresponsible if they did not safeguard themselves against the possibility of catastrophic in-field fails that would for sure push them into bankruptcy if they were legally liable to replace them all.

Provided the return rate is economically manageable I think they have no problem replacing cards in those cases where they don't see any red flags of an unscrupulous customer trying to rip them off. (I'm thinking of Zap's "can you believe they RMA'ed this" threads)

 

[LiuKangBakinPie]

^true same with Gigabyte. they got themselves a torture chamber for their motherboards coz most of their RMAs was due to overclocking. They wanted to reduce that number. And the companies uses the oc capabilities of a piece of hardware as a marketing tool. Talking about the hawk look at the Tallon they made the circuitry for you and give you the cooler to overclock that thing. Some people got to 1Ghz with it which is amazing.

 

[llee]

Eh? We buy the with the better cooler normally. That will be a non reference SOC version normally plus you get a nice warranty on it. Now you go and buy a reference on with a junk cooler go oc it by yourself and watch how the heat gets hold of it. Now you go out to buy a cooler for it your nice warranty expires you accidentally damage the card when replacing the cooler (happened a lot just ask the people over at guru3d and the 4870 x2) and you sit with nothing where you couldve just spent 30 to 40 extra for the cooler.

I think it's worth adding that even those "deluxe" coolers that venders put on their cards don't compare to true third party solutions like Arctic Cooling or Noctua. Going for the stock clocked card through a reputable company and then ocing the crap out of it with better cooling seems like the way to go.

 

[LiuKangBakinPie]

I think it's worth adding that even those "deluxe" coolers that venders put on their cards don't compare to true third party solutions like Arctic Cooling or Noctua. Going for the stock clocked card through a reputable company and then ocing the crap out of it with better cooling seems like the way to go.

yes but they are clever. Remove the stock and there goes your warranty. Only Xfx I think still warranty your card if you replace the cooler. And yes it is easy to damage the card with it. Ask a few 4870 x2 customers with Artic coolers

 

[manimal]

I buy whats on sale

 

[OCGuy]

 

[LiuKangBakinPie]

I buy whats on sale

off course otherwise its called shoplifting

 

[Stoneburner]

I'm with tweaky for the most part. I can't agree with his idea that you should buy anything, though. Design that GPU and build it yourself you lazy miscreants.

 

[artvscommerce]

I'm with tweaky for the most part. I can't agree with his idea that you should buy anything, though. Design that GPU and build it yourself you lazy miscreants.

:thumbsup: