Overclock 9600 non-pro help?

[ale_x13]

Ive heard alot of different stories on how to overclock. How exactly do you test the stability after increasing the clock speeds?

I have downloaded rage3d tweak, but im not 100% sure on overclocking so havent started yet.

What are the increments i should adjust? i.e. 5mhz core and ram speed each time, or is 10mhz acceptable?

current settings (all standard, non-clocked)

AMD Athlon 2600+ Thoroughbred B (2.08Ghz)
Gigabyte GA-7N400 Pro
512MB DDR400 (PC3200) KingsMax RAM (one stick)
HIS Excalibur Radeon 9600 non-pro (128-bit, 128mb, 8xAGP, Catalyst 3.7)
Seagate 7200rpm "Barracuda" 80GB 8mb cache ultra ata-133
Windows XP Pro

my current 3dmark2001SE score is 8,736

i would like to get to 10,000 though i would prefer if i could get closer to 12,000 if possible (though i dont want to spend much extra on cooling, im on a major budget, so i understand this may be unreachable)

can anyone help me with this?

[shawshank62]

well to test your overclock you want to play games (or you do 3dmark) and see if it anything is freezing...in general if it freezes the core has been overclocked too high. You also want to look for artifacts that may flash on the screen...if this happens, usually a lowering of the memory fixes it.

i have had a radeon, but in general, i think its a good idea to burn it in over a few weeks/month. up it a little every few days or once a week, as for how much to up it, i dont know....never had a radeon.

[GRECS]

yah i agree. burn ur card in little by little till u start to see artifacts then back donw a bit and thats ur limit. WHen i oced my 9600 non pro i got a stable score of 9768 so close to 10k

[shawshank62]

what make was your card, grecs?

also...what did you get it up to?

[ale_x13]

how do u burn ur card in?

also, what are artifacts? i hear them mentioned alot, are they basically just flaws in the picture or what?

how long should i run 3dmark to determine if its stable? and on what settings? so up it maybe once a week?

also, i have the catalyst 3.7 drivers and have heard that with the non-pro, you need catalyst 3.4 or lower as overclocking has been disabled in the later drivers, is this true?

thanks for the quick reply! i think i will either up it 5mhz at a time, 2 times a week or 10mhz at a time, once a week.

[tony_j15]

"Burning in" means to use stressfull programs like 3dmark to make sure the card doesnt glitch. Yes, you want to OC little by little, but 5-10mhz a week is bull. Its gonna be a year before you hit the cealing. I do it by the day(at the longest). As for 3dmark settings, use at least defaults with AA turned on. I have never heard anything about catalyst drivers disabling OC.

[ale_x13]

check overclockers.com

basically every thread talking about overclocking 9600 non-pro says that you cant do it with any higher than catalyst 3.4

ill check if thats true in a couple days, at the moment im waiting on a monitor so i can use it! this is really bad, i have had my comp for 2 weeks now and cant use it yet because i dont get my monitor till friday!! AHHHH im going crazy.

as to my other question, how long should i run 3dmark to burn in before OCing more? once, twice, for an hour, for 5 hours, for 12 hours? im going to buy a fan for my v/c as well, since it doesnt have one.

[tony_j15]

Run it once and play games, or if you arent gonna be using it much that day, run a cycle of 2 or 3.

[shawshank62]

i was talking to grecs, and he was telling me the same thing, he had to roll back to 3.4 because they disable ocing in the 3.7's.

artifacts are flaws in the screen, like little lines that pop in and the such.

[ale_x13]

hmmm ok I have overclocked to 330/207.25 and it just reset itself, though I have now managed to get 8956 on 3dmark2001SE

I think I too will have to roll back to the 3.4 drivers.