__THISRES__80689.jpg "Morbidity by `sjade1 1 week 6 days ago")
Overclocking the 8400GS
Right, I signed up for a competition in overclocking an XFX 8400GS graphic card. I'll be receiving the card one of these days and start overclocking it! There are 49 other participants and the best 10 will advance to round 2, in which they'll receive an 8800GT to overclock.
Winner of that round gets 2 brand new 8800GTs (since you're likely to demolish the oc'ed one), 2nd place gets 1 new 8800GT.
Anyway, I hope I can get some good scores in the assigned benchmark, which is oZone3D Fur
Some of my opponents have announced they're going to use LN2 or Dry Ice. I personally don't think that'll be needed for a 8400GS, so I'll save the trouble and keep it simple with air coolers. I might need to voltmod the card though.
I'll be keeping you updated.
Winner of that round gets 2 brand new 8800GTs (since you're likely to demolish the oc'ed one), 2nd place gets 1 new 8800GT.
Anyway, I hope I can get some good scores in the assigned benchmark, which is oZone3D Fur
Some of my opponents have announced they're going to use LN2 or Dry Ice. I personally don't think that'll be needed for a 8400GS, so I'll save the trouble and keep it simple with air coolers. I might need to voltmod the card though.
I'll be keeping you updated.
6 months 3 weeks ago
Good, if i understand well, you have to fry a vga that you haven't paid --> it's the best because paying a card and the burning it : very very lame; but burning a free vga is ten thousand times better and if you win 2 8800 : it's something i can't even describe.
Good luck.
You can do it. Just a question, you can change the cooling system or you'll have to stick with the original one ?
Good luck.
You can do it. Just a question, you can change the cooling system or you'll have to stick with the original one ?
Heres some help if needed :
http://forums.vr-zone.com/showthread.php?t=212901
http://forums.vr-zone.com/showthread.php?t=200820&page=2
Also (Might not be my place to say this) but try mounting a nice CPU cooler onto the card, this works exceptionally well :)
Good Luck and have fun :)
http://forums.vr-zone.com/showthread.php?t=212901
http://forums.vr-zone.com/showthread.php?t=200820&page=2
Also (Might not be my place to say this) but try mounting a nice CPU cooler onto the card, this works exceptionally well :)
Good Luck and have fun :)
The XFX card we have to use has different chips than the ones described in those Vmod tutorials. On the competition website the right one is given for the Vgpu, but nobody seems to be able to find the Vmem, lol.
I have the card installed now, but my HDD turned out to be damaged, so I'm now installing Windows and everything on a new one before I can start overclocking. But now I kinda lost my mobo driver disk, lol. Got to find it fast.
About the cooling, I've now mounted a Zalman cooler and I'll be using chilled air. My budget doesn't allow me to go further than that really. I might install a CPU cooler indeed, if the temperatures are getting too high.
Oh yea, they found out that the initial benchmark (Fur) wasn't that good because it was only affected by clock/shader speed, which means the one with the best cooling wins. And that's not fair. So we now have to use the Nature benchmark of 3Dmark01.
I have the card installed now, but my HDD turned out to be damaged, so I'm now installing Windows and everything on a new one before I can start overclocking. But now I kinda lost my mobo driver disk, lol. Got to find it fast.
About the cooling, I've now mounted a Zalman cooler and I'll be using chilled air. My budget doesn't allow me to go further than that really. I might install a CPU cooler indeed, if the temperatures are getting too high.
Oh yea, they found out that the initial benchmark (Fur) wasn't that good because it was only affected by clock/shader speed, which means the one with the best cooling wins. And that's not fair. So we now have to use the Nature benchmark of 3Dmark01.
Well I hope you do well in this comp :) heres a tip, if you can some dry ice then put it inside your case for some extra temp reducing action :)
Do your best GA, come out on top :)
Do your best GA, come out on top :)
Case? What case? 
I just ordered some potmeters for voltmodding. It'll be the first time for me, so I hope I don't screw up and burn my card ^__^'. Ah well, my chance in winning is pretty low, but I might be with the first 10 to at least get an 8800GT.
My biggest problem is the gmemory, it won't go over 428Mhz, while others get 450Mhz. Hopefully a Vmem mod will get me there too.
My biggest problem is the gmemory, it won't go over 428Mhz, while others get 450Mhz. Hopefully a Vmem mod will get me there too.
GA, whats your machine specs? Your CPU is going to play a Vital Role too :/ Also you might want to try www.overclock.net and search for the FAQ on loosening mem timings on an Nvidia card which could help you push your mem further.
Also, about the Dry Ice, you could put it close to the fan thats resting on your PCI slots :)
I think I'll go buy an 8400 GS tomorrow and see how far I can push it for fun :)
Also, about the Dry Ice, you could put it close to the fan thats resting on your PCI slots :)
I think I'll go buy an 8400 GS tomorrow and see how far I can push it for fun :)
The CPU and all other specs are of no importance for the Nature test in 3Dmark01. The 8400GS will always be the bottleneck. But whatever:
-CPU: AMD A64 3500+ Venice @ 2400MHz (10% OC)
-RAM: 2x512MB Crucial Ballistix DDR-500MHz
-VGA: XFX 8400GS
-HDD: Samsung Spinpoint 160GB SATA
-PSU: Tagan Black 480W
-CPUcooler: Thermaltake Big Typhoon
-VGAcooler: Zalman VF700 Cu LED
-NBcooler: Thermaltake Extreme Spirit II, with Scythe MiniKaze fan
-Fan1: Aerocool Turbine 2000
-Fan2: Lian Li stock casefan from A10B
-Control: NXZT Sentry1
Moto, if you buy a 8400GS you'll probably get one of a different batch than me, so it's unfair, lol. And I can't seem to find that topic on memory timings.
-CPU: AMD A64 3500+ Venice @ 2400MHz (10% OC)
-RAM: 2x512MB Crucial Ballistix DDR-500MHz
-VGA: XFX 8400GS
-HDD: Samsung Spinpoint 160GB SATA
-PSU: Tagan Black 480W
-CPUcooler: Thermaltake Big Typhoon
-VGAcooler: Zalman VF700 Cu LED
-NBcooler: Thermaltake Extreme Spirit II, with Scythe MiniKaze fan
-Fan1: Aerocool Turbine 2000
-Fan2: Lian Li stock casefan from A10B
-Control: NXZT Sentry1
Moto, if you buy a 8400GS you'll probably get one of a different batch than me, so it's unfair, lol. And I can't seem to find that topic on memory timings.
Thinking about what you said makes sense.
Since the 8400GS isn't a very good performance it can't push out enough performance which would actually make the CPU bottleneck. Must've been really tired when I was typing my last message.
Since the 8400GS isn't a very good performance it can't push out enough performance which would actually make the CPU bottleneck. Must've been really tired when I was typing my last message.
More pics!
Note the one posted earlier gets updated automatically, so that's the latest view on my whole system.
It ain't pretty, but it works. The molex connector facing the camera is for voltage readout, there are potmeters on top to change the voltage and on the left there's a molex for external power (from PSU) to make sure the voltmods are stable and to provide the grounds.
Or doesn't it?
That's when I took a 40W soldering iron instead of a 15W and fried some connections. Solved it with new soldering.
Note the one posted earlier gets updated automatically, so that's the latest view on my whole system.
It ain't pretty, but it works. The molex connector facing the camera is for voltage readout, there are potmeters on top to change the voltage and on the left there's a molex for external power (from PSU) to make sure the voltmods are stable and to provide the grounds.
Or doesn't it?
That's when I took a 40W soldering iron instead of a 15W and fried some connections. Solved it with new soldering.
Lol, my system fainted after pushing 1.7Volt through the GPU core for 15 minutes. Temperatures were ok, so I have no idea what happened exactly. Now when I push the power button, I get a short reply from the system but then it dies again like the PSU isn't powerful enough or the card causes a short somewhere. I ran the system with an other graphic card and that's working, so it is definitely my OC'ed card causing the fainting.
Maybe its totally dead, so if that IS the case then what are you going to do now :/
It's not totally dead, it's just that the core can't get any power due to a fried resistor because of the large amount of ampere that I put through it. So I might be able to connect the core with an external power source and it'll be running again. But I have no idea how I'm gonna do that.
Ok I gave up. Reviving the card would cost me a lot of time and money and I have neither of them. I had a fun time and learned a lot, so thanks for your support!