Brent you might be the best...

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 4:47 pm

At telling me if OS and other hardware, ie cpu,mobo has an effect on a video cards o/ced results? For some reason my Albatron 4200p turbo won't o/c much at all as ive seen everyone elses.
Mine reads 250/554 @stock.
specs:
1.4 tbird
kg7 mobo
256pc2100
300watt

Post by **YeOldeStonecat** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 5:03 pm

What power supply are you using, and capacity in watts?

Is the vid card sharing an IRQ with anything else?

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 6:12 pm

300watts generic and its one its own irq.. this cant right..this 3.3ns ram is made for 603mhz but i cant get past 620mhz when it should be able to hit 700mhz

Brent · Post by **Brent** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 6:15 pm

YeOldeStonecat's on the right track

PSU - Generic 300w

3.3ns can do 303Mhz (606 effective) as its max clock

of course nothing is guarenteed

but yeah you should get to at least 650

any cooling on the RAM chips?

i haven't looked at the albatron card yet

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 6:30 pm

Ya somebody else said the psu could be the reason, along with very sheety cooling but the vid card itself has ram-sinks and a nice copper heatsink. It doesnt make any noise hardly,even my ram-sinks arent that warm either. Lots of other ppl with this card have no prob getting it past 300/650 even past 300/690. So your guess would be better then mine

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 6:34 pm

would there be other factors besides heat etc in o/c ability?
mobo or software?
9300 3dmarks
9720 o/ced

Brent · Post by **Brent** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 6:43 pm

Originally posted by Mr White
would there be other factors besides heat etc in o/c ability?
mobo or software?
9300 3dmarks
9720 o/ced

the motherboard or software will hae nothing to do with the overclocking abiltity of the card

its all about the card, cooling and power

if the ramsinks aren't even getting warm they may not have good transfer of heat between them and the ram chips

take the ramsinks off

try oc'ing with out em.. in some situations it actually does better with them off, especially if they weren't conducting right in the first place, it'll just hamper the chips actually making them warmer...

or put some good epoxy on em yourself

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 6:47 pm

Ok never done that before, how do i take em off right? And what should i use to put them back on if i need to?

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 6:53 pm

Not sure if this means anything but its in conflicts.

I/O Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 PCI bus
I/O Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 Direct memory access controller

I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF AMD-761 Processor to AGP Controller
I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4200

IRQ 5 VIA Rev 5 or later USB Universal Host Controller
IRQ 5 VIA Rev 5 or later USB Universal Host Controller
IRQ 5 OHCI Compliant IEEE 1394 Host Controller

Memory Address 0xE8000000-0xF7FFFFFF AMD-761 Processor to AGP Controller
Memory Address 0xE8000000-0xF7FFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4200

Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF PCI bus
Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF AMD-761 Processor to AGP Controller
Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4200

I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB AMD-761 Processor to AGP Controller
I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4200

Memory Address 0xF8000000-0xF9FFFFFF AMD-761 Processor to AGP Controller
Memory Address 0xF8000000-0xF9FFFFFF NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4200

Post by **YeOldeStonecat** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 8:30 pm

All yer specs are fine there, you'll have shares between mem and the AGP bus...that's what AGP does.

I disagree about the hardware having nothing to do with the overclockability of the card, some mobo's are able to supply more juice to devices than others...no matter what kind of power supply is sitting up top. Also other various BIOS compatility issues which ripple down to all/any devices on the mobo.

All the Albatron turbo P reviews I read, they just about hit or passed 700 on the RAM, 720 even....and they do a good job on the cooling...heat sink application and all. But of course, it all comes down to yield...and if you're lucky enough to get a card with lucky yield chips on it, or the once in a while lemon.

Have anything in there prior to this? Leftover old detonator drivers...perhaps make sure their all gone with detonator destroyer.

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 8:49 pm

Thank u and good points Cat.. Im just kinda dissapointed and wish i knew what the cause was, if there is such a cause and its not my bad luck with the chips.
Regarding det destroyer, since im using winxp, it wont work. When i install winxp, it puts drivers in by default and sp1. After i uninstall these drivers, it reboots with and installs them again b4 i can blink. So how do i completely remove the det's from winxp and boot back in windows without them installing again?

A_old · Post by **A_old** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 10:47 pm

just a thought mr. white, not all cards are created equal..just like some processor batches, some will oc well and others will not.. it's not for sure.. that could simply be the issue. my radeon 8500 for example..will do only 290 max on the core w/ a crystal orb...or 281 stock cooling..ram will do like 320 w/ artifacts or 315 without (630 ddr)..while most 8500s will do like 300/310 or so.. i got a crappy OC'er..altho it's still over what ATI's spec is for it.

Amro

terrancelam · Post by **terrancelam** » Thu Nov 21, 2002 12:50 am

how much are you raising your voltages?

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Thu Nov 21, 2002 1:10 am

Well im not getting stable speeds much past stock which is complete bs for this card. I've noticed my heatsink on the core is fairly loose and it doesnt feel very warm, actually room temp. I dont think its cooling my core properly and i have no idea how to fix that.
Voltages, ive tried default and ive raised vcore,ram...no agp avail.

terrancelam · Post by **terrancelam** » Thu Nov 21, 2002 1:27 am

if its on loosely that might be your problem right there. Do you know how to remove the heatsink? Many methods of how, but main thing here is the removal, once it's off, we'll find a better way to have it connect.

Usually the heatsink is mounted to the PCB board though holes close the GPU area. If this isn't enough, maybe one of the mount holes are loose or broken. If this isn't the case, just take it off carefully and apply some sort of thermal paste to better the transfer of heat and see if that helps.

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Thu Nov 21, 2002 1:45 am

I looked at i carefully but ive never done this before so im lost on what tools to use. Looks like there are 2 white pins to push down and a few screws under the fan, but i think thats just to remove the fan. Damn i remember seeing a review where the guy took the thing off with this exact card. How do i handle this, i dont want to make it worse lol..

terrancelam · Post by **terrancelam** » Thu Nov 21, 2002 1:50 am

haven't seen your specific card yet, but the white pins should be spring loaded to force down the heatsink. I'm kinda tired and out of it at the moment, so I'll wait till tomorrow to give you advice (don't want to be giving you half baked advice). Maybe Brent will be around for this.

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Thu Nov 21, 2002 1:55 am

Ok thanks ill wait.

HongKongPolice · Post by **HongKongPolice** » Thu Nov 21, 2002 8:13 am

Ya push out the white pins 'n the heatsink will come off, but it wont' really affect OC ability. As for the ram, there is crappy double sided tape under the ramsinks.... They might be slowing you down a bit, but my guess is that they some how stopped making high quality Turbo cards.

I had the exact same card 2 weeks ago before it died and i refunded it. It could only do 305/635

I measured the GPU and Ram voltages and they were exact, so i'm guessing they started using cheaper components for the cards.

A_old · Post by **A_old** » Thu Nov 21, 2002 8:32 am

Originally posted by HongKongPolice
i'm guessing they started using cheaper components for the cards.

i really do think that's true. not all cards are created equal

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Thu Nov 21, 2002 12:06 pm

So you had this same one huh? mine was getting unstable at stock,pos. Why would the heatsink be the problem too? Its not on very tight and it doesnt really get that warm, was yours the same? I contacted about RMA so ill see what they say.
When you push those pins in ,it doesnt come off easy ,can you explain exactly how?

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Fri Nov 22, 2002 11:37 am

Bump>

please help this

HongKongPolice · Post by **HongKongPolice** » Fri Nov 22, 2002 9:36 pm

I took off the HS, lapped it and put on some AS2 and it didn't help me OC the GPU any higher.

As for the unstability, if the GPU overheats, the whole system will HARD lock, everything is frozen and you gotta use the reset button. Is that the case?

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Fri Nov 22, 2002 9:42 pm

yes wtf is going on... now the most recent thing is its locking up giving me an error report.. Im not o/cing it ,its normal stock and its giving me flickering ever so often in quak3 ,opengl games i notice it more...I must find the instability somewhere or ill die..
Ive reinstalled winxp 3x ,used every driver ,all the same now..the problem seems to be getting worse as time goes on...please help

Another thing is its kicking me to my desktop too ..then my gamma gets jacked up lol pos

HongKongPolice · Post by **HongKongPolice** » Sat Nov 23, 2002 11:51 am

Well if the games are "flickering" its cuz all nVidia cards default to 60Hz refresh rate for games in Win2k and XP. You gotta get rivatuner to force higher fresh rates. There are tonz of other options you can fool around with in rivatuner as well.

Of course, make sure you've got the newest drivers for EVERYTHING. Detonators, mobo drivers, everything.

If your GPU is overheating, then make sure its making proper contact with the heatsink, and that the fan is working.

Personally, i would just refund or exchange it cuz of the weak memory OC

HongKongPolice · Post by **HongKongPolice** » Sat Nov 23, 2002 11:56 am

Also, use hardware doc and monitor your voltages. Put the comp understress and see if the voltages flucuate more than 5% or so, and make sure the readings aren't more than around 8% lower than normal.

IE, if your 5v rail is reading 4.5v, you need a new PSU

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Sat Nov 23, 2002 2:51 pm

Its not the refresh rate becuz im using 85hz. Can you give me a link to that hardware doc? I cant find it.

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Sat Nov 23, 2002 3:29 pm

Ok i have it.. the lowest ive seen it go is

12v=11.65 (lowest=11.59)
5v=4.76

I see this flickin in Quake3 ,at the title screen it does it more..the fire logo will flicker a bit as does the middle of the screen too

HongKongPolice · Post by **HongKongPolice** » Sat Nov 23, 2002 4:02 pm

Your desktop maybe set to 85Hz, but once you enter games, it defaults to 60Hz, do you have RivaTuner installed?

Both your voltages are relatively low, especially the 12v rail, cuz usually, that shouldn't dip below 12 since only drives and fans use it, which suggests that the PSU is under a lot of stress.

I'm not 100% sure that the PSU is the problem, so I wouldn't recommend you get a new one yet, but if you can, try to borrow a 350watt+ PSU 'n try that.

Other than that, make sure all the cooling on the video card is tight, all the newest drivers.

Also maybe try fiddling with your AGP settings, disable fast writes and force AGP 2x or even 1x, and try different aperture sizes.

If all else fails, try http://www.memtest86.com dl the program, make a bootdisk and let it check your ram.

Mr White · Post by **Mr White** » Sat Nov 23, 2002 6:32 pm

Ok thanks for the help. Ya ive set the refresh rates in games aswell from the console. After lots of testing i figured out the flickering is from the dets 40.41 to 40.72 which i cant understand... 41.03 give me all the better performance and im almost positive the flicking is gone now

I hope im done seeing that crap but the only problem i have now is my 290/630 clock caps but i can except that i guess.

Voltages, i plan to get a new case and psu (430watts) so i hope everything runs smooth after that. Your right about it being under stress, i get 2 entirely different readings for temps. Hardware monitor is saying cpu 46c idle/system 40c idle, but sandra says cpu 40c/27c system both idle. Im lost here?

oh ya did the memtest and no errors.

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Brent you might be the best...

Brent you might be the best...

well

Hmm

hmmm

Hmm