Confused as hell - OCing 9800m GT in M860TU

Alright, so as stated in my signature, my 9800m GT is able to go 3dmark06/ati tool stable on 620/945 @ 1.05v using Ntune/BIOs flash.

Since it doesn't seem that I've maxed out temperature wise, I've been trying to push it higher, but the problem lies with 3dmark06.

Every time I push it any higher, at some point in my test I'll get this error:

IDirect3DDevice9: resent failed: Device lost (D3DERR_DEVICELOST)

I'm assuming this means that my GPU failed at some point during the test, and the test had to be stopped.


The odd thing about this is though, I'm able to push this card all the way to 650/970 without ANY artifacts on the ati tool stress test, and with my temps topping out at 80 degrees.

So what gives? Can anyone make sense of the error 3dmark06 is giving me?

 

try a different clock, sounds like it may not be stable for you.

 

Different programs crash at different clocks. You're "stable" once you find clocks that nothing crashes at.

 

sure. your over clock is too high. that clock might run if your laptop was off for about an hour then you turned it on and ran 3dmark..(speculation of course)

over clocking gpu with 3dmark06 usually only makes substantial changes to canyon flight, while these other test stay pretty close to the exact same. depending on how fast your cpu was running at the time of testing.
Nvidia 9800GT @ 620/945/1550<--- does this score give you your 16,633 score?
and ati stress tool is just that..."ATI" your using nvidia. i never trust ati stress tool, although they're are those that live and die by it..im not one of them. ran it for an hour,then ran crysis and crashed after 3 minutes. but hey...your welcome to have faith in it.

 

Yes, that is the clock that I get 10,633 with.

I suppose the given clock just isn't truly stable enough for 1.05v. Since we can't up it any further, I guess I'm stuck with what I have now.

 

you probably could have gotten away with
630/930/1600...maybe.

you will need to over clock your cpu if you expect to hit around 12k range

 

What is the "best" driver for 3dmark?

 

176.25 or 176.09

 

Ok, thank you.

 

no problem

 

Nice chat here lol.


Why the 17x.x series? From my experience, the 180.x series output better results...

 

now see...you didn't read his question. lol

what is the "best" 3dmark06 driver he didn't ask for the "best gaming" driver.

 

The problem with overclocking my CPU is the PCI-E bus.

Can't do both overclocks, my video card can't handle any more.

If there was a way to lock the PCI-E bus on a laptop, I'd be all for it.

 

I meant gaming and 3dmark wise
At least that`s what they do for me...

 

just personal opinion here, but the factory drivers are best for benchmarking 3dmark only.
179.28 seem to work very well for nvidia trying to pick up the reins in the notebook department.
185.20 seems to stutter and lack cpu umh when benchmarking 3dmark06 or vantage mark. and lags in games like crysis and far cry 2. (for me it did)
dox 180.84 seem to wrok well between the both, but wont net super gains in 3dmark or vantage mark, but will give you smoother game play while gaming.

best all around drivers are going to be 179.28/180.84-83
i haven't been testing any others lately.

hows that el?

 

I have experience the same issue. The thing is that the stress test doesn't really simulate the actual stress and temperatures that the card experiences in gaming.

My solution was heating the video card with furmark or the video card stability test and running ati tools in paralel. Below 78C everything was fine, when it gets above 80C artifacting begins in ati tools.

Maybe that can help you in better finding the right clocks.

 

So just a follow-up, because I'm finding this to be extremely weird:

My 9800m GT apparently hates anything higher than 600 core clock clock. I've had it running at almost every possible combination of clocks from 600/950/1500 to 600/1000/1600. Every time, so long as I'm not raising my core clock any higher than 600, I'm 100% stable in both 3dmark06 and any game I play.

Seems like the weirdest thing to me... what kind of issue could be isolated to the core clock specifically?

 

you need to up the voltage more than likely....

 

But then how are some people showing up with 620 and 640 clocks at the same 1.05v? It doesn't make sense to me.

Its not like its the PSU power draw, since the rest of my components are lower power than the people with those clocks.

 

humm, didn't know you upped the voltage already..

then your nvidia settings are probably messed up. you need to reset them all back to factory. all back to quality mode and application controlled.

then bench at stock to see what you get.

also try benching with the factory drivers first. these drivers are the best for over clocking and benching 3dmark06.

 

I'm on official 179.28 at the moment, so everything should be default. I just installed them today.

I'll try the original Clevo drivers tomorrow I suppose.

 

now when you install the factory clevo drivers...DO NOT UNINSTALL your 179.28's

just do a have disk upgrade. this will keep both drivers on your machine. you will be perfectly fine having both and you will be able to switch between the two