Overclocking 9800 pro

[Mr_Threepwood]

Hi I have a Radeon 9800 pro 128 mb and I figure I may as well do a slight overclock on it to play games better. Now I'm seeking advice as what to set the overclock values. The card has a 2.8 ns memory timer so 1000/2.8 is 357mhz for the memory, should i set it to that up from its default value which is 337 mhz, also the gpu clock is at 378 mhz default, what can i safely set this to? Keep in mind im using the stock cooler for it because I dont want to buy and replace the current one. The overclocking tool I'm using is powerstrip, which seems to be the best one available. My case has many fans in it so the airflow is pretty good.

 

[PZEROFGH]

dude the stock fan on the 9800pro is crap its so small compared to my VF-700CU anyways just OC as far as it can go. do 5mhz increments on both of the speeds, play your favorite game for 5 minutes then do it again

-----------------edit-----------------

this should be in the OCing section

 

[Mr_Threepwood]

K, well what will happen if I increase it too far? Will it crash and be ok after a reboot, or will it destroy the card?

 

[Sprooty]

You will see weird texture on the screen. If you leave it to high for to long you could make the weird textures pemanent by damaging the GPU with heat stress.

 

[Mr_Threepwood]

When you say play your facorite 3D game, do you mean play one that requires a lot of resources, or will any 3D game suffice. My favorite 3D game is warcraft 3 but its 3 years old, I just reformatted and don't feel like installing half life 2 but I'll do it if Its worth it. Or could I just use 3d mark 05 as my tester program?

 

[bonehelm]

do 5mhz increments on both of the speeds, play your favorite game for 5 minutes then do it again

don't do this if your favourite game is minesweeper, though

 

[PZEROFGH]

ok play some demanding games like 3dmark LOL that aint a game FEAR BF2 CoD2 etc

 

[Mr_Threepwood]

ok ive got it at 400 mhz gpu and 355 memory, and im skeptical as to wether or not I should go any further considering I have crappy stock cooling. I was reading somewhere that people had problems overclocking on stock past 410, while others say they had theirs at 440 on stock, so I'm pretty confused at to what I should do since I dont wanna fry this (even though it sucks compared to new cards).

-Edit after this overclock i scored LESS on 3d mark 05, wtf? Do i have to change the voltages or something?

 

[PZEROFGH]

you probably went to far, downclock a little bit then run 3dmark again. what do you get in 3dmark i get aroudn 3500 anyways that stock heatsink on the 9800pro SUCKS btw lol get the zalman or artic silencer

 

[Mr_Threepwood]

You really think I went to far at 400? Ya the fan sucks but its too much work to upgrade it, easier to just get a new card at this point since the 9800 is old. 3500 is nice, I cant figure out what you have on me that would give you such a better score, maybe its my crappy kingstun valuram. I tried playing a game at 400 mhz and it ran fine. I guess ill try 390 and see how that works.

-edit after putting it at 390 i got 2765, whereas on regular clock i got 2656 and on 400 mhz i got 2616. Now I'm wondering what would happen if I incrased the voltage on the video card and tried out 400 again. Still want to know why PZEROFGH got so much better then me when we have similar system specs, does memory contribute a lot to 3d performance, maybe I should ditch the valuram.