A question about cooling..

[Skii]

I notice that a lot of you guys can hit awesome 3DMark speeds with fairly mid range gfx cards, and after some experimenting I've fond that I'm starting to make some progress with my new card (9500 Pro)

I reckon (as a relative n00b to overclocking) that my 9500 Pro reaches around 335/300 core speeds safely before I start to see some pretty nasty glitches in 3DMark.

This limit I assume to be a result of overheating - what do you chaps do to additionally cool your cards? (I'm on a budget here!)

[Nox]

ooooh, 9500 pro you say ? is the memory in a kind of 'L' shaped layout around the fan/heatsink by any chance?

Nox

[Skii]

Originally posted by Nox
ooooh, 9500 pro you say ? is the memory in a kind of 'L' shaped layout around the fan/heatsink by any chance?

Nox

Like this

(courtesy of Hexus review)

[[GSV]Trig]

Whats the ns rating on your chips, I guess yours arent bearing heatsinks either?

[0iD]

Watercooling! cheap, effective & when set up correctly, reliable.

[Skii]

Originally posted by [GSV]Trig
Whats the ns rating on your chips, I guess yours arent bearing heatsinks either?

No heatsinks, just the same as the photo. Not sure what you mean by ns rating m8, core speeds are 275/270 mem speed at 540Mhz

[Skii]

- Cheers Trig - 3.3 on each chip - and there's 8 of them !

[[GSV]Trig]

U understand all of that?

[Skii]

Originally posted by [GSV]Trig
U understand all of that?

Yep - got it

[Richie]

Originally posted by Skii
- Cheers Trig - 3.3 on each chip - and there's 8 of them !

Get that memory speed up then cause 3.3ns is capable of 606MHz

I have my 3.3ns memory running at 685MHz from the stock 550MHz

[Skii]

Even with my case open, I get graphics glitches if I clock my memory over 300

I need some ramsinks desperately !

[CocoPops]

300 is 600 at DDR isn't it?
so if you were running at 335mem speed it is actually 670mhz?

[Nox]

shame skii, the 'L' shaped cards have a chance to be flashed to *almost* 9700 pro speeds oh well. i think a lot depends on good air flow in the case, then work on getting the chips cooler.

Nox

[Moby-Dick]

Originally posted by Skii


Even with my case open, I get graphics glitches if I clock my memory over 300

I need some ramsinks desperately !

got an old heatsink ?

cut it up and stick it on with thermal epoxy

[SilentDeath]

if your mem chips are infinion, you wont get mroe than 315 without vmods
you can get a few more mhz by sticking a heatsink with as3 or ceramique to the heatplate at teh back, this will give your mem and gpu more stable voltages
mem needs memsinks, wont help in overclocking but they will get very hot otherwise and risk killing themselves. dont pay loads for them! get an old heatsink (or even a new one) made of alu, cut it up into 1cm3 cubes, use thermal epoxy or tape to stick it on. (as3 is fine for the ones that arnt upsidown!)

with watercooled core you should reach 400mhz on core without voltmods, with them you should be able to reach 500mhz or more.
mines at 470 and will eb going higher soon.

mem cant really improve much, vmods for it can risk killing your card. the mem volt mod is vmem but you need to increase vref aswell (reference voltage so it can tell diffeernce between 0 and 1) and vref can kill card v quickly form what ive read.
vgpu is 100% safe htough if it doesnt get too hot and you dont go too high. 1.6v is the max i would use on aircooled, if it could even get high enuf to need it on air!
mine runs at only few degrees higher temp than the water at any speed, due to my uber silver waterblock

[Skii]

Cheers chaps

Silentdeath - yeah its Infinion stuff.

Right then - an update

I popped into PC World (no - hear me out) and got some Coolermaster Memory Sinks in Copper - £5 for a pack of 8

- here's the result



Time to see if I can push it any higher..