over volting my 280m

id like to add a little power to my gpu and i cant seem to go past 600mhz stable so im thinking of overvolting my 280m.
some people have given me this summary guidelines as to how to do it:
1. extract bios with gpu-z
2. increase voltage thru nbitor
3. reflash card with nvflash

however some say it isnt exactly safe to extract the gpu vbios via gpu-z.
if so what is the best way to go about this and is there a tutorial online on how to do it as i know making mistakes here can permanently damage the card.
cheers

 

Its not very possible to damage a card this way. Seriously, that is a myth.
I have flashed several cards with totally incompatible BIOS, and nothing bad has happened to them. I just had to flash them back blindly (with a black screen). Just keep your stock BIOS handy.

Usually if GPU-Z extracts it at all, and Nibitor reads it correctly, there is no chance the BIOS is corrupt in any way.

 

so how do i reflash my card just in case things turn bad?

 

The first time you flash it, write down the exact steps you took. (ie. wait 30 seconds, then type d:\nvflash -whatever) That way, if it's a bad flash, you can just go back and reflash to the old BIOS without needing to look at the screen.

 

ok thanks
what parameters in nvflash d i need to set it to to flash the modded bios and what parameters do i set it to to flash it back?

edit:
would aslo make a difference if i used a .bin or .rom file to flash?

 

yea you flash back the some way you flash initially.

You can use either .rom or .bin with nvflash and nibitor, but I usually convert everything to .rom just because.
The Nvflah command I usually use is "-4 -5 -6 bios.rom" sometimes add "J" at the beginning, which could be more dangerous. it overrides rom straps or something.

I think you have to press Y and enter a few times too.

 

thanks guys ill give it a go

 

oh one more thing
a few have suggsted that its better to o/c the gpu thru vbios rahter than thru software overclocking.
is there a big difference between the 2 in terms of stability and performance?
my thinking is that id rather do software o/c so i can only push my machine when the power is needed and stick to stock or a lower o/c when a game is not as demanding. would that work? or is bios o/c just much better?

 

I've never seen any difference between the two.

 

Same, tried flashing and tried just with software, both gave me the same max stable clocks.

Though there might be some special case where flashing will give better results, never worked for me though (as far as I can remember).

 

thanks for the replies guys.
one last thing, is this safe to do within windows (command prompt) or should i just do it via bootable usb?

 

no, that is NOT safe. always flash any BIOS with bootable usb, never from windows.

 

thanks niff
just did it thru bootable usb and all went well. now overvolted to 1.03 with 640/1600/1000 and temps are 79*c and below still

 

one last question.
will my gpu degrade overtime if i keep that o/c but keep my temps below 88*c

 

The chip itself can handle those clocks (look at the NVIDIA Quadro FX 3800M for example). However, the power circuits (on the mainboard and to some extent on the GPU board) are not build for the added power draw - your cards TDP should be somwhere between 90W and 100W with the overclock. That might damage your mainboard over time. I'd also leave the memory at 950 MHz. You have enough bandwith as it is and the GPU memory is cooled less effectively in laptops.

You could also set the core/shader ratio at 2.6 instead of 2.5. Will give you higher performance at the same core clock.

 

thanks dh
ill keep those tips in mind. how do i check my gpu's tdp?
ive been software oc'ing my gpu to 985 memory for about a year already so i think im good with that. ill do the 2.6 ratio though.

 

Sadly there is no way to read out the GPU's power draw. By logic, if you only oc your GPU by 10%, the power draw will also rise by 10%. Actually it should rise some more depending on how efficient the design is and due to higher resistance. If you up the voltage power draw should increase quite drastically. You should actually be able to calculate the exact amount if you'd know the power draw at 1.0V.

However, the Quadro FX 3800M should be the best indicator. Art 675/1688/1000 ist has a TDP of 100W (would be good to know the card's vcore). You clocks are only about 6% lower. So your TDP should be 90-95W.

 

too bad theres now way to find out (tdp).
my temps seem good enough and i do get some decent performance gains but i was wondering if my 120watt psu is the limiting factor.
by your logic it probably is.

 

TDP for the MXM 3.0 280m is 75w.

If you're worried about draw, pick up a killawatt and measure from the wall.

 

wont that increase with an overvolt and higher clocks?

 

It will, adding more voltage increases power draw much more than increasing clock speed. Just monitor your stuff and you should be fine.

 

i noticed a few artifacts in empire total war, a game that is both gpu and cpu intensive.
i guess for games like that ill lower o/c clock speed to compensate for the overvolt.

 

Nibitor doesn't fully support the FX 3800m, but from what it does show in the voltage table editor, the voltage is 1.17V.