WTH did I do? Radeon 9700 Pro OCing

[Messiah]

System is a P4 2.53mhz (no OC), a stable Asus P4S8X, Windows XP Pro w/ SP1, DirectX 9 Final, latest Catalyst 3.0 build and an ATI Radeon 9700 Pro 128MB.

Installed the latest build of PowerStrip 3.30 (registered), inital default core read of 324.50 and deafult mem read of 310. Played around with various combinations of overclocks to both and found 345 core/345 mem to be the ceiling at which the display corrupted even in Windows (had to reboot and then reinstall PowerStrip to even set back to adapter defaults) and best OC seemed to be 335 core/315 mem w/ no artifacting in 3DMark 2001 or games.

Tried installing the Rage3D Tweak 3.7 to try some of those settings as well. Had some issues (artifacting and display corruptions) occur, I quit out of the Rage3D Tweak and launched PowerStrip, set the clock and mem back to default speeds and rebooted. Default core now shows in both PowerStrip and Rage3D Tweak as 324 and the default mem reads as 310.50. Any attempt to tweak the clock and/or mem above the default ends up in either a sync error with monitor that does not recover (requires system reset) or a screen of vertical multi-colored lines that do not recover (also requires system reset). I've tried uninstalling Rage3D Tweak 3.7 and leaving only PowerStrip, but I still can't up the core and/or mem without the sync error (and screen garbage) or vertical lines. Uninstalled and reinstalled PowerStrip and still no go.

Still getting 3DMark score of 13500's with the 'new' default core and mem of 344/310.50 and I don't really care now if I can overclock again, but, what the hell did I do? Did I damage the card, the vidRAM or the BIOS chip?

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I'm not thrilled with the idea that I might have damaged a $400 card.

Thanks,
Messiah

 

[Krux]

so whats your question? why can't u over clock your card? if u clocked it back down to its stock speeds and it runs fine then there is no damage. I do believe your card has a bios lock on it but you would need to ask Sazar about that.

 

[Friend of Bill]

Doubtful that you damaged the card. Had similar problem with 8500 128 DDR. I uninstalled the video drivers, removed Rage 3D Tweak and PowerStrip from my system. Reinstalled drivers and everything was back to normal. Never installed Rage 3D Tweak or PowerStrip again. The few FPS ain't worth it.

 

[Sazar]

Originally posted by Krux
so whats your question? why can't u over clock your card? if u clocked it back down to its stock speeds and it runs fine then there is no damage. I do believe your card has a bios lock on it but you would need to ask Sazar about that.

lol kruz... you make it sound like I know everything but this is not the case..

anyhoo... the 9700pro's should not be coming with locked bios's unless the 3rd party resellers are adding their own features and such....

the one thing to remember is that there is no GUARANTEE's with your card when it comes to overclocking... the cards generally net around 10-15 mhz oc at least on most systems...

also do remmeber that any oc'ing immediately voids your warranty

if there is no garble with your gpu @ stock clock speeds than you.. the mem should be able to be clocked higher than the core but since you reached a ceiling and then have garbage even with lower oc's you may have caused SOME damage... cant say for sure... still if it is working @ default.. let it slide

 

[Krux]

Sazar when it comes to video cards your like the goto guy you usally seem to have information that others can't even find. Thats why I said ask you

 

[Sazar]

Originally posted by Krux
Sazar when it comes to video cards your like the goto guy you usally seem to have information that others can't even find. Thats why I said ask you

thanks... but I am no guru...

but thanks

 

[Messiah]

May be OK...

Originally posted by Sazar
lol kruz... you make it sound like I know everything but this is not the case..

anyhoo... the 9700pro's should not be coming with locked bios's unless the 3rd party resellers are adding their own features and such....

No locked BIOS. Shipped with the ATI 8.004 BIOS and it's a Rev.3.0 card.

the one thing to remember is that there is no GUARANTEE's with your card when it comes to overclocking... the cards generally net around 10-15 mhz oc at least on most systems...

This I know, which is why I spent a full day tweaking both the core and the mem in 1-2mhz increments, running 3DMark 2001SE, repeat. Only after hitting 345/345 did I hit a real ceiling when, immediately after clicking 'Apply' on the OC changes, the screen displayed garbage and the monitor displayed it's on-screen 'Invalid Sync' error. I was able to reboot to the desktop w/o issue, but could not even launch PowerStrip without the display going through the same unrecoverable (had to warm reset) corruption. I then uninstalled PowerStrip, rebooted and reinstalled the most recent build of PowerStrip 3.30. Was able to OC again. Only installed Rage3D Tweak after the second PowerStrip install. After an hour or so of having both installed and testing, PowerStrip suddenly just stopped letting me OC at all w/o causing display corruption that doesn't seem to recover (requires reset) or the display garbage and monitor 'Invalid Sync' error (which also requires reset). Funny thing is, after writing the original post, Rage3D Tweak will let me up the core and memory from defaults.

also do remmeber that any oc'ing immediately voids your warranty

This, sadly, I also know and is the reason I'm worried since it means that, if the card is damaged, I am now the proud owner of a damaged Radeon 9700 Pro.

if there is no garble with your gpu @ stock clock speeds than you..

Not sure what you meant at the end here. At stock speeds, I don't think there is a problem, but I'm not entirely sure. After the problem started occurring, I went back to stock core and mem speeds and then ran 3DMark. Got a score of 13566, which is what I've been expecting and getting on average from stock speeds on my system. Ran 3DMark about twenty times, stable through all bench cycles, continuously averaged scores between 13400's and 13500's and noticed no artifacting or problems during the benches. Only thing I notice at all is some minor texture gap (a white pixel or two) between textures on the roof edge on the T&L merry-go-round. They may have always been there for all I know.

I've noticed some scroll slow-down in C&C: Red Alert 2, but they could be due to having installed DirectX 9 and the latest Catalyst 3.0 drivers on the same day that I began OCing the Radeon.

Also noticed some issues in Everquest since the OCing, largely fixed when I forced 32bpp resolution (was seeing some textures like hair come in and out and some armor textures appears black), and the only thing I noticed now is a slight drop in framerate and some texture tearing. I know this wasn't happening before, but, then again, there is always DirectX 9.0 to consider and I've read a number of SOE forum posts indicating that a number of people have experienced graphics issues in EQ since the last patch.

the mem should be able to be clocked higher than the core but since you reached a ceiling and then have garbage even with lower oc's you may have caused SOME damage... cant say for sure... still if it is working @ default.. let it slide

I wish I could let it slide. I'm one of those personalities that get's a little locked on things like this. The thing is, I really don't give a damn if I can OC it again, but I'm bugged that something used to work and now doesn't. Ditto that I can't say for sure whether or not I'm seeing any kind of graphical glitches as a result, seeing real problems that have been caused by DirectX 9 and not actual damage to the card or just imaging the whole thing or seeing problems where there always were issues that I just hadn't noticed before. Wish there were a true ATI diagnostic available that could test the card and make sure that it's firing on all cylinders.

I may end up doing a clean reinstall of everything if it continues to bother me, just to see if maybe it's a software problem and not a hardware one. Could just be that Tweak3D and PowerStrip decided very suddenly to not get along. Could be that a registry entry for PowerStrip and/or the Catalyst drivers got wonky. Could be that I really did fry some piece of the card or (not sure if the OC utilities write to the vid card's BIOS or not) trashed a portion of the BIOS. Could just be my imagination.

Thanks to all for the advice and information.

 

[Sazar]

sry... I must have been tired when I posted.. was a bit unclear lol... sorry my apologies...

what I was saying for the half finished sentence is

if there is no garble with your gpu @ stock clock speeds than you..

[edit] you should be fine [/edit]

now concerning your dilemma.. I can see your point they way you explained it now...

it might be prudent to just clean it all off and reinistall the drivers... the most stable for me (and this may not be the case for everyone) is directx 9 with the second iteration of the cat 3.0 drivers on the ati website... they are WHQL as well so you are in good shape

I have used rage3d and powerstrip and have yet to push my card to a point where the screen is garbled... I have not oc'd my card in a while either generally just the cpu and the natural oc of the agp slot that way rather than playing with core/mem clocks...

you seem to only have a few visual discrepencies... if there was damage to the hardware ALL your games in 3d and some apps in 2d would show the signs of damage (ie texture corruption and the like)

other minor probs like a pixel here and there I Think occurs on many rigs and should not be a hardware damaged issue

if it makes you feel any better I don't think your video card is damaged...

turn off vsync to prevent some texture tearing and see if that helps..

 

[Krux]

Originally posted by Sazar
*SNIP*
turn off vsync to prevent some texture tearing and see if that helps..

don't you mean turn it on? so your card doesn't try to refresh faster then your monitor?

 

[Sazar]

Originally posted by Krux
don't you mean turn it on? so your card doesn't try to refresh faster then your monitor?

force vsync is normally ON by default... hence why I said to try turning it off...

btw the fps spewed by the video card is normally faster than the refresh rate of the screen.. take quake III for example...

by not forcing the frames to sync with the monitor refresh you could prevent some tearing IMO...

 

[Krux]

I was under the impression that if it was on that it forces your video card to sync with your monitor IE; if its at 60hz then your card will render 60fps (if it can) I dunno maybe something to look into get it all cleared up

 

[Sazar]

Originally posted by Krux
I was under the impression that if it was on that it forces your video card to sync with your monitor IE; if its at 60hz then your card will render 60fps (if it can) I dunno maybe something to look into get it all cleared up

yes that is what happens...

like i said if it is on by default and tearing is occuring.. turn it off and see if it works...

vice versa too

 

[Krux]

ahhh ok gatcha, just seeing if it helps ok.

were like right there. eye to eye, on the same page.

 

[Messiah]

Vsync has no effect. I don't think the small tearing there is a big deal. Wish I had a way (at work now) to take a screenie of what I'm talking about, so that others could compare. I'm really only talking about a pixel or two gap for a second or two at a time for a few brief sections of the merry-go-round demo. Like I said, it could have always been there and that I'm just noticing it now. Other than that there are no texture or rendering problems with any of the other tests and the score is fine for what I would expect from my setup and past benching.

I'm really starting to think that a) I'm insane and more than a little OCD about the fact that the card can no longer be bumped up through PowerStrip and PowerStrip only and b) any non-imagined/blown-out-proportion-always-there anomalies are caused by DirectX 9.0 incompatibilities and Everquest's last patch.

 

[Sazar]

Originally posted by Messiah
Vsync has no effect. I don't think the small tearing there is a big deal. Wish I had a way (at work now) to take a screenie of what I'm talking about, so that others could compare. I'm really only talking about a pixel or two gap for a second or two at a time for a few brief sections of the merry-go-round demo. Like I said, it could have always been there and that I'm just noticing it now. Other than that there are no texture or rendering problems with any of the other tests and the score is fine for what I would expect from my setup and past benching.

I'm really starting to think that a) I'm insane and more than a little OCD about the fact that the card can no longer be bumped up through PowerStrip and PowerStrip only and b) any non-imagined/blown-out-proportion-always-there anomalies are caused by DirectX 9.0 incompatibilities and Everquest's last patch.

just don't stress yourself out and have a heartattack ok

its not worth it