8800 GTX SLI Vista OC

Hey guys,

I'm new to the forum, and already have an issue.
I am running a rig based on an ASUS Striker Extreme, 2 8800 GTX in SLI, 2 GB OCZ Reaper and 2 150 GB Raptors in RAID-0. The CPU is a QX6700 oced to 3.6 GHz, and cooled by a Koolance Exos 2. The 8800GTXs and all chipsets are in a seperate loop, so that at stock speeds load temps do not exceed 57 C on either card. I have only just switched from XP to Vista, and am running into problems OCing the graphic cards.

Any help would be appreciated sending me in the right direction, but just as to reduce this thread to an acceptable number of replies, here's what I've done so far:
Running the latest forceware (163.75) and newest nTune. With NTune no luck, although an OC on the RAM appears to work, OCing the GPUs initially 'sticks' (as displayed in NVMonitor), then returns to default. The same problem with RivaTuner, ATITrayTools and AtiTool, all newest versions.

Also, it seems that in each application I can increase the frequencies in steps of 1 MHz if not smaller (AtiTool), but both rivaTuner and NVMonitor display that steps are made arbitrarily, such as 576 to 594 to 612 etc.

I know that I should probably OC each card seperately, find the smallest common denominator and then simply flash the ROMs with a custom image, but was just wondering, how everybody else is going about successfully OCing their 8800 GTXs in SLI.

Thanks so much for your help, and excuse the ranting, just wanted to include as much info as possible.

All the best

Yeah harsh on the SLi, meant RAID-0 of course. What do you mean, that virtually no gain can come from two OCed cards in SLi versus two stock cards in SLi? Or did you mean that OCing in SLi doesn' work? The problem I'm having with the GPU clocks not sticking doesnt happen after startup, it happens randomly, most times when loading a graphical app. Weird, huh? Also, I read RivaTuner 2.05 is meant to improve SLi overclockability, is that actually true?

Cheers again for everyone's help, this is one damn fast forum!

Hey Murlocke,

I dunno if you know the Exos2, but attached to a Swiftech Apogee GTX it does a pretty decent job at keeping the OCed QX6700 chilly. Not sure about my load temps as NVMonitor displays em at 25 C which is a pile of crap, but haven't run into any heat issues as yet. Referring to your GPU speeds, do you believe it to be absolutely neccessary for me to test each card seperately, or do you think that flashing each to 625/2000 is a safe bet?

Cheers.

I used to just have the Exos2 do the cooling for my CPU and graphics cards, but I figured out quite quickly that if I wanted to cool the chipset as well (which gets ridiculously hot on the Striker at a high FSB) I would have to opt for a second loop. So I have 2.5 liters pumping through the GPU/chipset loop, cooled down by 3 Silverstone 120mm Fan SST-FM121 - Cream Silent sitting on a RAD Thermochill PA120.3 Triple Radiator, which works really well. Thinking about flashing now, haven't done this before though, so naturally I'm a bit apprehensive about ruining my cards...