redphoenix

I always took it for granted that when i find my perfect overclocking speeds that exhibit no artifacts those numbers would be the same across any operating system i got, but boy was i in for a surprise lately when i checked out of boredom that i could increase the gpu speed in Win7 by 40mhz more than in XP before Ati Tool starts to detect artifacts again.

Although i am pleasantly surprised, and although Win7 still is a bit slower in most games even with the extra 40mhz, i am more baffled as to why on earth my forceware drivers in Win7 seem to be less artifact prone than in XP

I am using the 191.03 drivers now and i tried older drivers such as 186.18 and i got the same results throughout

I have no idea why this is the case

But it would be nice to hear if someone has an idea about this strange story, perhaps others can bump the OC in win7 also

according to Ati Tool 0.27, i get those artifact-free speeds on my GTS 250

on xp : 780/1950/1125
on Win7 : 820/1950/1125

PizzaMan

The few times I've pushed my cards really hard in W7 I wasn't able to go as high as I could in XP. This is prbly due to the fact that I was pushing for Vantage in W7 compared to 3D06 in XP.

Can't really think of any reason why W7 would let you go further. OC stability is really more hardware then software. I would suspect that if your artifacting at those speeds in XP then its really not stable in W7. ATITool may just be less effective at detecting the instability in W7. Just a guess really.

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GTL testing and tweaking for all 7 series nVidia boards

redphoenix

ok thx Pizzaman

so this is the update for this story

i no longer think it is a OS/forceware issue, i think it's an ati tool issue

first, after i read that ati tool has 'old' and 'new scanning' methods, i tested it with the old and in xp it started to tell me that my gpu limit is now 800 instead of 780.

so as i was googling around i discovered that ati tool is no longer supported and got replaced by GpuTool a more modern and up to date alternative scanner.

i tested with GpuTool and now i get a constant read across both XP and WIN7 of a max artifact free limit of 840 for my GTS 250.

so i guess it was an issue with the accuracy of the scans of old Ati Tool on my newer GTS 250.

i'm using the new stable gpu limits found by GpuTool and so far my system hasn't crash or shown signs of artifacts that my eyes could pick up.

so i guess the end of this mystery story comes with a lesson to not trust Ati Tool so much these days hehe

Al8888

Well u got a max core clock speed of 780 before it started artifacting and i suppose this isnt too much as i was able to get around 805 or 810 easily and i use xp.