How in the hell do you overclock the 7800 GTX cards????

[eclypse]

Hey guys i finally got my new evga 7800 GTX SLI cards installed with water cooling and first thing i notice is that i cant overclock these cards at all. I used to use ntune just to quickly set the core and mem clock and now that program says "No clocks reported".. Tried installing the newest version and same crap.

In the nvidia control menu under there clock tabs i cant get it to allow one single mhz more on neither the core or mem.

I've installed the coolbitz hack and that didnt do anything either.. Though i didnt go into the reg to mess with it if thats what you have to do.

I believe i'm using the 78.11 beta drivers.. Just installed those.

So what do ya gota do to have some fun?

[eclypse]

WOw now i'm starting to freak out.. Tried benchin 3dmark 2k1 and 2k3 and both come up 4000 marks slower then my previous cards "6800 Ultra SLI". WTF!! :(

er make that 3000.. from 33,000+ to 30,000 and 24-25,000 to 20,000. :nono:

[Mr. Tinker]

rivatuner

[Major_A]

I use Powerstrip, my eVGA card wouldn't clock with Coolbits or RivaTuner. Only bad thing about Powerstrip is it takes up some resources.

[mnewxcv]

id say use powerstrip, when u find a nice oc, bios flash it to set it to that speed on boot up.

[eclypse]

Ok i'll give that a try.. Where can i get it?

[Major_A]

http://www.entechtaiwan.net/util/ps.shtm

[eclypse]

oK i've installed it and overclocked it to 525/1400 and theres no difference in speed.. So i'm thinking these drivers dont let me overclock..

[craig588]

Chipset drivers?

[Major_A]

oK i've installed it and overclocked it to 525/1400 and theres no difference in speed.. So i'm thinking these drivers dont let me overclock..
What are you running for reference to the new overclock? If you have Far Cry or SC:PT use those. Crank up the settings and see what happens. Also you can try to use Everest Home Edition to see if it's picking up the new clocks, just to make sure it is overclocking.
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v634/ssb2121/th_Clocks.jpg (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v634/ssb2121/Clocks.jpg)

[eclypse]

Chipset drivers?

Current offical 666 drivers..

I've only used 3dmark as a graphic bench since i dont know how to bench the current crop of games.. back when i used Q3.

Now i'm using the 7.77 graphic drivers and i believe i can clock up the mem mhz since i've managed to finally get the system to lock durring 3dmark 2k2.. eheheh first time in my life i was happy about a lockup since it showed that some overl:banana::banana::banana::banana:ing must be working.. I managed this by clocking it way high with powerstrip.. 1450 on the mem locked it up.. so i think its stable at 1425Mhz. I dont think the gpu clock is working since i set it at 550 and it didnt lock up.. So now i just need to find the first offical 7800 driver set and then i should be able to find the max core clock.. Then i'll find out how to flash the bios to the new clocks...

But to tell you the truth.. so far i dont see any major improvements over the 6800 Ultras i have on the table.. unless i'm cpu limited.

Are these cards just faster at higher res?

[Major_A]

I've only used 3dmark as a graphic bench since i dont know how to bench the current crop of games.. back when i used Q3.
What games do you have currently?

Now i'm using the 7.77 graphic drivers and i believe i can clock up the mem mhz since i've managed to finally get the system to lock durring 3dmark 2k2.. eheheh first time in my life i was happy about a lockup since it showed that some overl:banana::banana::banana::banana:ing must be working.. I managed this by clocking it way high with powerstrip.. 1450 on the mem locked it up.. so i think its stable at 1425Mhz. I dont think the gpu clock is working since i set it at 550 and it didnt lock up.. So now i just need to find the first offical 7800 driver set and then i should be able to find the max core clock.. Then i'll find out how to flash the bios to the new clocks...
Get the 78.03 drivers off of www.nzone.com. They are the ones that fix the shimmering issue.

But to tell you the truth.. so far i dont see any major improvements over the 6800 Ultras i have on the table.. unless i'm cpu limited.

Are these cards just faster at higher res?
You very well could be. Both 3DMark and Aquamark default to 1024X768. If you bought a 7800GTX SLi setup to play at 1024 then you really wasted your money. The main reason people are buying these are to game at 2048X1536, whereas 1600X1200 was the optimal resolution for a 6800 SLi setup. Try a game benchmark and run it at 1600 with 8XAA and 16XAF and tell me there is no difference between the 7800's and your 6800's.

[eclypse]

10,148 in 3dmark 05???? Come on! My old setup did damn near 12,000.

I got this score with the card clocked at 500/1400.

I think something serious is wrong here. I ran just a single 6800 ultra last night at 440/1230 and it did over 6000.

I hear ya on the higher rez and you may be right but damn, this setup runs slower then 2 6800 ultras?

[ugp]

@eclypse
I want to see a picture of your system...you are going to have pretty much the same water cooling setup as me...I would like to see how you did it...

[Major_A]

Uninstall your current drivers. Boot into Safe Mode and run Driver Cleaner to get rid of nVidia traces. Reboot normally and install the 78.03 drivers. If that doesn't help clear up your problems try reinstalling your chipset drivers, primarily the GART driver.

All else fails........reformat.

[cadaveca]

Uh, there is no GART in pci-e.... :confused:

[Major_A]

Uh, there is no GART in pci-e.... :confused:
Shows what I know, lol.

[eclypse]

Ok seems to be a cold bug for the reason.. If i turn down the fans on the rads so the cards will heat up a tad to 37C from 35C the cards will run at full speed.. I get 30,898 insted of 21,000 in 3dmark 2k3! hehe.. Now.. If the 2nd card would just heat up a bit i bet it would go faster.. Right now the highest it will get to is 34c.. :( hehe.. wierd. The 2nd card cools about 2-4c cooler then the first.

So.. I hear its a bios prob. and i'll start hunting for a better non cold bug bios tomorrow morning.

Thanks for the help guys!

[Major_A]

I haven't done much reading but that seems dumb to have a cold bug that high. Glad you figured it out.

[eclypse]

http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20050707_151857.html

[ugp]

Is this bug present in the BFG6800GT OCs?

[cadaveca]

http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20050707_151857.html


Uh, tom's has it wrong, as it doesn't matter which driver i use. Period. I have tried every driver that supports my card, and i even went as far as to re-install windows for each driver, to ensure that no left-overs from previous driver install were there... :slapass: nVidia lies. :fact:

[IYP]

this is the bios your looking for http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=67249

[eclypse]

this is the bios your looking for http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showthread.php?t=67249


:D Why THANK YOU VERY MUCH! I'll check that out and get on it asap.

:toast: :woot:

[IYP]

:D Why THANK YOU VERY MUCH! I'll check that out and get on it asap.

:toast: :woot:

np man ;)

[i found nemo]

so how'd it go?????

[eclypse]

Still testing out a bunch of different bios that i modded to see what works best.. Almost done i think.. just one more bios to try out to finally come to some conclusion.

[eclypse]

Well, i've come to find out that using either a modded bios made from a member here in another thread with no temps nor throttle mode and my original bios edited by taking out the throttle mode made no difference in overclock and final 3dmark score.

So its not like the only thing you can do with water cooling your card is loose the temp monitoring to get these cards to run full speed.

Onto the overclocking..

So far i'm limited to my mem cooling.. Since these OCZ BGA copper heatsinks have been used before twice and now the double sided tape is trashed and not making perfect contact by any means i can only get less then 1400Mhz on them stable.. ruffly around 1386Mhz. I have 2 sets of 8 frozencpu monster BGA copper heatsinks on the way :)

The GPU i have benched up to 530Mhz.. now i cant remember if thats 530+40 or just 530.

Not bad i guess with no mods done.. YET!

Strange part is that i can get the mem to bench at 1400Mhz or more only if i down clock the GPU to say under 500.. Like 480-490.. So i dont know if thats just like a power issue or what.

My top scores right now for 3dmark off the top of my head:

3dmark 01 = 35,800+
3dmark 03 = 32,000+
3dmark 05 = 13,000+

Do these scores seem about right for my rig? I'm using the 78.03 drivers i believe.

[eclypse]

oh yeah.. i'm glad i got these insted of with the KO version! 490/1300 cant touch this!

P.S.

I forgot to mention i have volt mod parts, STASIS 7800GTX "NV7800PRC" Power Regulator Heatsink Upgrade (http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?p=3988410#post3988410post3988410) and new OCZ Monster BGA Copper heatsinks for the ram on the way so i can mod these babies up early next week when i have a few free days.