INFO: Building/Buying a Desktop (PC or Mac)

[DisgruntledOrangatang]

Where can you find the older drivers? Since I am using windows 7 should I not grab 185.50? It isn't even displayed when I go to archived drivers and choose 275, and windows 7 or windows vista 64, 185.50 doesn't show up on the list.

Just checked my core temps, they are all between 30-35, grabbing 3d mark vantage now.

Edit: Hmm I think Windows 7 auto grabbed the newest driver when updates ran. It says this for driver 8.15.11.8585 is that the bad one?

[Xandax]

The drivers I recommended are 182.50 not the 185.50. Didn't think about the 275 not having drivers because it's the newest card I thought drivers worked for any card in that generation. Anyway get the latest you should be fine. I'm still on my phone so I can't see what driver that is, go to evga's website and grab the latest x58 mobo drivers. I'll post an i7 overclock guide in a few hours or you can look one up.

[DisgruntledOrangatang]

Just ran the 3d Vantage test, I have no clue how this compares, but I didn't like all the freaking lag I had in a buncha the tests, here are my results:

3d mark score: 5391
GPU: 4387
CPU: 17173


Is this any good? The physics engine tests and cloth tests killed my FPS. Keep checking my core temps and they stay anywhere from 30 when in low use to 45 when I am churning a lot of shit. Like I said I have no experience, but all that lag did not impress me for the quality of the graphics in the test, but I was really expecting more for what I bought.

When submitting my results it appears I am in the lower half of the graph ><. After searching for results I am pretty sure mine sucks mega dick, everyone other result I am checking has well over with with same hardware...wtf.

[Xandax]

No something is definitely wrong, it's not a hardware issue i'm sure, it's either drivers or something software related. And by the way the CPU tests in vantage are designed to bog down the FPS a ton because everything is being processed by the CPU and the GPU is freed up. You should still be in the 13-14k right now. Read up on RivaTuner and stock overclocking the video card a little and try running vantage again to notice a difference. Then work from there. Look up an i7 overclocking guide. I'm sure you can get to 3.6ghz easily without worrying about temperatures. I've gotta sleep, but i'll tune in tomorrow and see where you're at. Get 3dmark06 as well and run that.

Post pictures of the results, the FPS per each test; get a screenshot of GPU-Z and CPU-Z etc.

Stock i7's should net around 15k in 3dmark06. Overclocking will really unleash your video card's potential as well. The point of overclocking is to get the highest speed for the least amount of heat and voltage. i7's get their clock speed by multiplying the mulitplier (locked at 20 for i7 920's times the BCLK (base clock). So a stock i7 has a BCLK of 133. To reach 4.0 you'd need a BCLK of 200 with that multiplier of 20. But to reach that BCLK of 200 or, 180 for 3.6, 160 for 3.2 whatever... you need to increase the voltage going to that part of the motherboard or wherever to have it sustain a higher frequency. Increasing voltage does infact damage the chip more, but only until a certain point does it really reduce the chips life time. Increased voltage also produces more heat. Intel has a guide to the recommended voltage and temperature limits for their chips, it is generally a good rule to follow, but for overclocking extremes or a quick benchmark its ok to go past their recommended voltage limit.

Here's a newbie OCing guide. Note not all chips are the same, some require more or less voltage.

How to OC i7 and EVGA X58 mobo to 3.5-4Ghz?

[Jysin-DW]

I always shake my head at people who really worry about "voltage damaging their chips". Does it degrade them? YES Will you realistically ever see it? Probably not, unless youre doing some absurd clock / vCore. Say instead of your processor lasting 20 years.. maybe you cut it down to 10-15 years, by which time that processor will be sitting in the $0.99 bargain bin at a garage sale.

Ive had my QX9650 running 1.40 vCore and 4GHz (3GHz stock) for 18 months now without so much as a hicup. I have had the occasional 4.2GHz+ benchmark runs as well. Its nearly impossible to kill these things nowadays unless you are trying to suicide run benchmark. Hell, they can even throttle themselves down from overtemp conditions.

Most overclockers know all of this, but you hear A LOT of first time builders shying away from OC'ing worrying about their systems exploding and burning their house down or something.

[Eomer]

^I had a couple Athlon chips that had their life shortened pretty significantly from fairly mild overclocks and voltage changes. Within about a year they would only run stable at less than stock. I don't remember exactly which ones and what the settings were, but it IS possible. However agreed, it is unlikely unless you're REALLY fucking around with stuff.

Then again, unless you've got pretty good cooling, I would say that to be on the safe side you shouldn't be boosting voltage by more than 5-10%.

[DisgruntledOrangatang]

At work right now so I can't run all those tests atm on my comp, but what are the chances the super shitty performance is due to faulty hardware?

I am comparing my results to this:

ORB - Compare

Same hardware, almost same OS9 he's using beta, I am RC 1. He overclocked processor to 3.8 and overclocked the GTX according to his notes, his score was 14349.

Another one: ORB - Compare

So it seems 13-14k is only achievable via overclocking in the 3.8-4.0 range. Wish I could find the result for someone just doing it stock.

[DisgruntledOrangatang]

Alright I just ran 3dMark06 as well, shitty score as well. =/

Here are all my images from all the apps you told me to download, also downed rivatuner but seemed way too advanced for me, it even said yo if you F with this tab you could mess your comp.

[DisgruntledOrangatang]

More results...


So what could possibly be causing this super shittiness?

[Jysin-DW]

Your GPU scores are in the floor. 7-13 avg FPS over all the 3dM06 tests? Thats nowhere near correct. Can you right click My Comp, properties, Hardare tab, click device manager and make sure you have no yellow ! icons? Then check your vid card in the same area and confirm driver version.

[Xandax]

Ok right click desktop, go into nvidia control panel. Under the 3d settings tab, go to set physX configuration. Enable it and apply. That should boost your CPU score a shit ton in vantage.

Ok here's the RivaTuner crash course. According to your GPU-Z stats right now, i'm gonna show you how to overclock the GTX 275 just slightly, and turn your fan up to dissipate heat better without increasing the noise.

1. Under the Main tab, click customize and then the first little video card icon.
2. In system tweaks, go to Fan tab.
3. Go to direct control.
4. Scroll the performance 3d slider to 50 percent. Check the save at windows start-up button.
5. Save that setting, when you boot into windows it will crank the fan up from the stock 40% up to 50%.
6. Apply it.
7. Go to overclocking tab.
8. Check the enable driver-level overclocking.
9. Go to performance 3d
10. Unlink the clocks. (A physical necessity for video cards is that the shader clock be atleast 2 times the frequency of the core clock, the change won't be made if the shader is less than 2 times the core clock.
11. Slide the Core clock bar about 30-35 mhz to the right. I hear 700 mhz is near the top end for this card.
12. Keep the shader clock at 1450ish. It will still be twice the core you currently have.
13. Slide Memory clock roughly 50 mhz to the right.
14. Apply.
15. Hit ok.

Go to GPU-Z and see that the video card now has the new clocks and frequencies. This will boost your GPU score as well. I don't suggest you saving the overclock setting just yet. I'm not familiar with 275's that much so I don't know what's the safe range.

You really need to read a guide on overclocking the CPU through the bios, I see that you had turbo on because you were at like 2.8 ghz or something like that.

You will slowly learn all this shit, then you will feel more comfortable with it. You haven't done anything wrong, the hardware is fine, just some drivers or something. I'm still looking up good vantage/3dmark06 results with the 185.85 drivers you downloaded. Haven't seen anything yet really.

[Xandax]

That's vantage by the way Jysin-DW. But those scores are still way off what they should be at.

Off-topic: If you go i7 975, do you plan on getting rid of the QX9650?

[DisgruntledOrangatang]

No yellows, gpu driver version is 8.15.11.8585.

[Xandax]

That is in fact 185.85.

[Jysin-DW]

Originally Posted by Xandax

That's vantage by the way Jysin-DW. But those scores are still way off what they should be at.

Those are '06 and nowhere even in the ballpark of where they should be. He shouldnt be worrying about OC'ing his card right now. He needs to get it working stock first.

His bottom left pic: