Moar Advice

[AmagicalFishy]

Hello, again, folks.

I've been doing a lot of research since my Graphics-Card problem, and have become fairly curious about something, and I trust you guys like an old person trusts tube televisions.

I've a few options regarding drivers and forceware:

-EVGA drivers, NVIDIA drivers, or (well-reviewed) 3rd party drivers.
-EVGA forceware (Precision), NVIDIA forceware (NVIDIA Control Panel), or 3rd Party forceware (RivaTuner).

Which should I go with? I've heard some pretty nasty things about NVIDIA's control panel, which makes me a bit reluctant to continue using it.

I'm also looking at clocking. Not necessarily overclocking, but I'm sure my card (8600GT) could handle a bit higher clocks. I'm downloading 3D Mark as I type this.

So, what do you guys advise?

 

[Neodude1123201]

Mate the 8600GT is a MAD overclocker,i could get mine to 675/800 stable.

 

[AmagicalFishy]

I already knew my CPU sucked.

3Dmark showed me the vast extent of its suckiness. Intel Pentium Dual CPU E2160.

Also, I'm totally nublet at overclocking and the like, so, now that I know that 8600 is great at OCing, I just need to know... everything else. What's the best I can do without overclocking any voltages?

 

[Cabbs]

The best you can do is the best you can do. Every graphics card, CPU, motherboard, and RAM of the same model overclock differently. Just go until you run into stability.

Personally I don't like 3DMark. The results are meaningless because it's not a game you actually play. Because card A does better than card B in 3DMark doesn't mean it's the same situation in Call of Duty 4 or Fallout 3.

I was able to get my 9600GT up to 980 Mhz on the memory and was 3DMark06 stable. I tried to play Call of Duty 4 and my monitor kept refreshing as if I was constantly changing resolutions. My 4870 did the same thing when I pushed it a little too far also.

 

[Remeniz]

I use the NVIDIA driver for my card and it'll work with yours too. Driver 178.24.

Does the job for me and I use RivaTuner to OC my graphics card.

I'm running a nice stable OC.

 

[Teny]

i use the forceware and precision.
I OC my card by 100mhz each with the core and memory.

 

[AmagicalFishy]

Alright.

I'm at:
Core Clock - 701 MHz
Shader Clock - 1542 MHz
Memory Clock - 850 MHz

I've been playing WoW on max settings for a good 30 - 45 min. now, and the temperature hasn't gone above 65C. I see significant improvement. It's grand.

How safe is this for an 8600GT? I know everything's a bit situational, but, is there a general standard?

3D Mark got it up to about 80C, at which point I stopped.

I think, if I just stick to WoW, it'll be safe, eh?

 

[Cabbs]

Even at 80C it should be fine. Graphics cards can tolerate high temperatures just fine. Nvidia starts to throttle their cards at 125C. If Nvidia's software doesn't allow it, download Rivatuner and up the fan speed.

 

[Remeniz]

As above really.

Your card is safe and if you use RivaTuner then you can have the fan on auto. As the card warms up the NVIDIA software speeds up the fan. Makes for a quiet computer.

I did a full 3D Mark test yesterday and I was gonna cop out as the fan got pretty fast. But I left it alone and it sailed through.

Took 4 minutes for the fan to settle down to inaudible speeds again though.

 

[AmagicalFishy]

I'm not using the control panel anymore, just RivaTuner.

I turned up the fan to 75%, and it's still relatively quiet. (That may be because I have a large window-fan, on low setting taking place of the case cover. )

It seems as if RivaTuner only affects the fan mounted on the graphics card, though, not the other case fans.

Also, I'm looking into overclocking my CPU, also. Not by a lot. It's 1.8GHz, I want to get it to maybe 2.5.

That seems like it'd be a bit more dangerous, though.