GPU losing its' Overclock?! Help

[LYNCHIN]

Hi All, Haven't been around here in a while.

Ever since I installed Win 7 Ultimate 64 Bit I have been on a mission to max out my Overclocks one more time to squeeze every last FPS I can out of my Rig while I can. But I am running into some issues. While I was just trying to OC my GPU Via EVGA precision and using ATITool's Artifact scanner, I was getting some very frustrating results. Before I upgraded my OS, I was able to OC my GPU's Core to at least 720Mhz without getting any Artifacts (While leaving my shader clock at 1452 and Mem at 1100Mhz). And I knew I could push it more before the new OS install, But there really wasn't a need to because I could play my games at the max Settings and run them at acceptable FPS(35-60 FPS). Now with new games coming out like Stalker COP just to name one for this post, I am seeing that I need to really push my GPU and CPU to levels higher than before if I want to keep the Eyecandy on while maintaining decent FPS.

So, I just tried a mild OC of 680Mhz on my Core while leaving my shader at 1452Mhz and Mem at 1100Mhz. I ran the Artifact scanner, And two mins later I get some very small dots on the screen. So I abort the test and here I am wondering what is happening to my once decent Overclock on my GPU. I even backed my Mem down to its' stock speed and I was able to hit 700Mhz on the core before I got little artifacts. But this is nowhere near what I was able to hit before

So I am wondering if I run the EVGA Voltage tuner and add some voltage to my GPU will I be able to get my Overclock to go higher without gettting artifacts?? And BTW, My temps during these little tests where very good, My GPU never went higher than 70C.

I guess I am wondering is my Core clock Overclock artifacting limited to Voltage? Will adding voltage help my GPU not Artifact? Or will it just make things worse?

And also BTW, When I was hitting my previous higher Overclocks I hardly ever used them. I usually just kept my GPU at stock clocks unless I was playing Crysis or Benching, And even then it was not for very long periods. So my GPU was not abused just to clear the air.

What is happening guys? Why is my GPU now not able to hit 700 Mhz and not Artifact

Cheers

[LYNCHIN]

Can no one help me out? Will adding Voltage Via EVGA Voltage tuner help with Artifacts? I used to have a nice 720 Mhz Core Overclock. Now I get Artifacts trying to push 700Mhz. So Will adding voltage help acheive this?

Thanx

[Zertz]

Voltage will help, but go easy with it! Increase it a notch, test, and so on. Make sure you watch temps too, heat stacks up quickly in a GPU

[Boinker]

I know I cannot help you very mush as I am not much of a gpu oc'er But i can tellyou that if you could ost your system specs more people will be able to help. I am assuming that you are running a Nvidia card just looking at the clocks but that may not be correct. Add some information about yor system here and people will likely be able to help you better or more accuratly. Oh and if oyur going to shove moe power to the GPU core then I strongly reommend either getting an aftermarket cooler for the GPU or turning the fan in the GPu way up.

[LYNCHIN]

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Computer Specs C2D XEON [email protected], EVGA GTX260 , G-Skill 4*1GB sticks F2-6400CL5D-2GBNQ, ASUS P5B Vanilla Bios 1604

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