The Official Nvidia 8800 Series Thread!

[Jachyra007]

I haven't really overclocked my gfx cards yet. Increasing my 7600gt kos from 580/750 to 605/805 using the detect optimal seems like it wouldn't add that much, unless its completely different that the "25mhz isnt worth it" sense I get from o/c'ing processors.

 

Is that all thats involved with putting an o/c on a gfx card - popping it into the system and detecting optimal? I know there's volt mods and resistor mods, but that adds a lot of heat. I've looked for a better cooler than the stock one - namely an Arctic Silencer 5 - but I can't seem to find any. Are there more coolers that would fit besides watercooling?

 

Not that it matters I guess if I'm stepping up to the 8800, still curious though.

[uneedav8]

Is that all thats involved with putting an o/c on a gfx card - popping it into the system and detecting optimal? I know there's volt mods and resistor mods, but that adds a lot of heat. I've looked for a better cooler than the stock one - namely an Arctic Silencer 5 - but I can't seem to find any. Are there more coolers that would fit besides watercooling?

 

Not that it matters I guess if I'm stepping up to the 8800, still curious though.

 

The AC Silencers work good but like you said....hard to find. Zalman has some VF series coolers that should fit that 7600GT. You can use detect optimal settings but I think most prefer small manual adjustments in GPU and mem and then using ati tools or 3d benchmarks to see if there are artifacts. Once artifacts appear, back down on the overclock.

[uneedav8]

I was experimenting trying to find ways to lower my 8800GTX temps since the temps have always been so high out of the box. A danger den water block would do the trick but I don't feel like going down that road quite yet...already have other H20 PCs. The idle temps have been at 64c with the room temp around 79 degrees. Gaming temp in the mid 70c and higher. I tried different adding additional fans around the GTX. My case has a 120mm fan on the rear, a 120mm on the top of the case and an 80mm on the door next the video card. I have though about purchasing an after market solution but I not too happy with the selection even though some of them work good. I first used rivatuner like many have and set the GPU fan at 100% all the time. I didn't notice too much of a difference in noise and need the extra cooling so I am happy. This alone brough down the temps on my card to around 59c on idle and lowered the gaming temps....didn't keep track of what it was exactly. With some extra cooling fans around, I was positioning some 80mm in different locations inside the case to see if I can improve temps. I finally got some temp improvements that are pretty good. On my Expert board. I have the 8800 place in the upper PCI-E slot and a X-fi and NIC on the lowest 2 PCI slots. That leaves me with 3 slots between the cards which are empty. I place a 60x25mm Vantec stealth fan directly against the back of the case vertical against the PCI slot covers (with the PCI slot covers removed of course) blowing hot air out the back of the case. The 60mm fan fits perfectly between 3 PCI slots. I uses a piece of cardboard and some electrical tape to seal the open areas just leaving the opening for the fan. I fired up the comp and had the system on for a while.....the idle temps stayed dead on 54c the whole time. Reaching right where the 60mm fan blows air out of the case feels like an oven. I tried a slot cooler fan also but it wasn't as effective and was too noisey. I am really happy with this "el cheapo" mod. I am sure gaming temps will improve also when I start playing stalker. Thought some of you may be interested in this.

[Imsochobo]

Im gonna pick up a gainward 8800 gts 640 mb.. Choosed gainward due to afraid of nvidia been it for many years.. and nvidia STILL got issues with error %.

my ati cards have i tested alot actually.. Unplug the fan, and it still works perfect, my first really bad experience with nvidia was a gf4 ti 4600, the gpu cooler attachments melted, cooler fell of while playing, the whole crap melted partially, my serial number got screewed. it was 1 week old, was msi, and have always had some strange issues with nvidia cards. hope this is not the case.

 

Ati 2900xt wasnt on storage either, that card got lotsa potential.. not released by ati at all though.. so was nvidia now, proper linux drivers aswell out now

 

Gonna try some sick oc on the card aswell.. gonna buy a waterblock and try

[wevsspot]

The 8800GTS 640MB card is an excellent video card. I have been 100% satisfied with mine. It was a complete revolution coming from my X1900XT.

 

No more ATi CAT crap, no more Microsoft .net and the nVidia drivers just work. They work right on all my games, ability to run 1680X1050 resolution and high eye candy just makes for a super sweet multimedia experience.

 

I don't think you'll be disappointed.

[Jachyra007]

The AC Silencers work good but like you said....hard to find. Zalman has some VF series coolers that should fit that 7600GT. You can use detect optimal settings but I think most prefer small manual adjustments in GPU and mem and then using ati tools or 3d benchmarks to see if there are artifacts. Once artifacts appear, back down on the overclock.

 

I had my 7600gtko's up to 585/800 using the auto-detect, but after a while of gaming I had multiple a BSODs citing the nv4 disp drivers. MBM5 didnt detect any errant temperatures, sometimes it wouldnt register any temps for anything during gameplay - so I backed them down to stock.

 

When changing out the coolers, is it necessary to apply thermal tape to the memory chips, or can regular AS5 work fine? I'm worried about a different cooler not making good contact woth the memory - should I be worried?

 

Side note: Got my 8800gts SC 320mb in the mail today - thats one sexy piece of PCB! just waiting for an OCZ700GXS, then its bye bye sli!

[wevsspot]

You will have to check the clearance between the new gpu cooler and the memory chips. More often than not the aftermarket gpu coolers are designed such that there is enough space between the cooler and the chips specifically to allow for the height of the thermal tape.

 

If this is the case with your new cooler, then you are stuck using thermal tape.

 

However, your new gpu cooler should have thermal tape included for use on the memory chips.

[jaz]

I got the evga 8800gts ko acs³ version, stock speed 589/920 according to rivatuner, (speeds aren't consistant with what new egg says, in my sig so I'll have to get another program to see what speed it's at. the freakin' stupid CP doesn't say, so I'll have to hop on over to evga's site and see what they got.) and I have the fan settings programmed the same as the tutorial on it @ guru3d on auto, and it works great. My idle temp right now is 53c fan speed 80rpm. I tested it with a program called simply enough "video card stability tester", which shows 2 modes. One with a big picture of the earth turning, and the other with 2 smaller earths turning, and as i watched the temps climb, the fan sped up.

 

It maxed out @ 62c, fan speed 100%. And you know those little "e" shaped slots near the end of the card where heat can get into your case? Well, i put tape over them so all the air escapes through the vent right out the back of the case. And my temps are still great. I haven't even used AS5 yet, but i plan on doing it soon. My benchies aren't very consistant though. For example, Travis and i have the same card, but he has an intel core duo @ 3.2 and i have the amd x2 6400 @3.2, and i barely beat his 3d mark '03, he barely beats my '05 and he beats both cpu and gpu and overall score in aquamark.

 

I haven't DL'd '06 yet, as it's a real long DL, and i will do it tonight while i watch tv...lol.

But i love this card. Glad i didn't get the ati one(s).

[badarthur]

I just wanted to say thank you again. As you can see my system aint no slouch but it's along way from being the monster rig's some of the guy's are running. But the deal is every time I run 3DMark06 ide get around 9870 or so and it had me wondering because everybody else I see running something around the same deal were breaking 10,000pt's and I just couldent figure out what had me in slow mode.

 

Well I was reading Angry's Post about his 8800 and I rememberd the only thing i never OC is my video card. I like to be able to sell them, an when I upgrade and dont want them to burn out on one of my friend's. The deal is my EVGA8800GTS is the stock vanilla card running at 513/1600 something and on everybody's post I read they are either useing a higher clocked card from factory or they did it themselves. So I just thought Ide try the next rated speed for 8800GTS's cards' and I tryed 575/1800 and what do you know the darned thing did a 10,435 on the 06Mark right up there with everybody else.

 

So now I know what was holding me back. Thank's Again [Judge]BadArthur

[jaz]

ok, here are my scores. I thought they would be just a little higher, but oh, well.

I have the slider in the middle for performance-quality, 4X for anisotropic filtering, anti-aliasing-app controlled. Stock speed as in sig.

 

Aquamark; 132,554

cpu-14,171

gfx-24,909

----------

3dmark

'03-32,347

'05-16,600

'06-10,011

----------

My hard drive was a mess during '06 because I forgot to defrag it after DL '06, so I'll have another go at it.

And the other scores were with 33 procceses running in backround with a commit charge of around 360.

 

I looked at the real requirements for Crysis, and that game is very demanding. same as World in Conflict. Like Travis said these new games will bring even an ultra to it's kness. I see evga has a trade-up program. I was thinking of trading my card in for this;

 

GeForce 8800Ultra KO 768MB

Performance

NVIDIA GeForce 8800 Ultra

636 MHz GPU

128 Pixel Pipelines

400 MHz RAMDAC

 

Memory

768 MB, 384 bit DDR3

2250 MHz (effective)

108.00 GB/s Memory Bandwidth

 

Interface

PCI-E 16X

DVI-I, DVI-I, HDTV

SLI Capable

 

Resolution & Refresh

240 Hz Max Refresh Rate

2048 x 1536 Max Analog

2560 x 1600 Max Digital

 

Requirements

Minimum of a 500 Watt power supply.

(Minimum recommended power supply with +12 Volt current rating of 34 Amp Amps.)

Two available 6-pin Molex hard drive power dongles

 

I couldn't find my reciept for my card from newegg, so i called them to have them mail me one. When i was talking to the guy, i mentioned the step-up program, and that i was thinking of ordering another card instead.

 

He said that i would be better off trading up for an ultra, and that i would get better performance and quality from one super card than with 2 of my cards. I paid about $320 for mine, and the one i just listed is about $750. With the trade-up program, they give you credit for what you paid for your card (90 day limit), plus i have to send my card in 1st, pay for shipping, and have to go w/o a Vcard for almost 2 weeks.

 

But i would be future proofing myself for more demanding games, and i saw some comparisons of these evga cards, the one i have my eye on seems like it could be overclocked a little more if i wanted, but i would rather pay a little more than do it myself and fry the dam thing. Besides, they have better coolers on the ultra's, and i would stick some AS5 on it anyway. Dam gaming industry is sending me to the poorhouse! :eek2:

===================

 

Edit; they guys at evga say that you can't trade in a factory overclocked card for another foctory oc'd card, but you can get a regular unclocked card with your factory oc'd card with their stup up program

[Coors]

Jaz what resolution do you run? Since you just recently bought your card 9800's might be out by the time you can still Step-up.

[jaz]

I have a "19 lcd and run in 1280x1024 native res. When are the 9800's coming out? And how much will they cost? Any info? I didn't see anything about them, but haven't really searched. But i definatly want a better card. One ultra is a lot better than 2 of my cards.

I got 90 days from 9/21/07 to trade up.