Overclock suddenly unstable?!

Spetznaz · 25 Jul 2009 at 17:09

Was running a modest oc @ 3.2ghz (2.66ghz default) all fine for maybe 3 months or more play games most days (mainly L4D) now all of a sudden I notice the screen flickering slightly, cant explain but doesnt look like my tft was the issue so I open catalyst centre and go to the avivo video thing with the flying flag, then the screen keeps going blank and coming back until i exit back to windows and it just flickers a bit.. so I think uh oh take the card out check the PSU is producing 12v on both the inputs.. fine so it must be card right?, stick the card back in everything seems suspiciously ok so I play L4D for about 10mins before it locks up and bsod. So then I think better try resetting bios to default which is where I am now and just completed L4D campagin (over an hour) and no issues.

I just dont get how it can be stable for ages then suddenly decides to become unstable, all the temps seem ok so that is not the issue. I think bclock was only 160mhz so surely its not the board becoming unstable?, for now I'm stuck @ default

.

Defcon5 · 25 Jul 2009 at 17:12

My 7900GS has been playing up recently - it has been thrashed with a large OC from day one, and I just put it down to components failing due to the stress being out on them.

Obviously your parts are a lot newer, but could be something similar?

Spetznaz · 25 Jul 2009 at 17:24

Well I did install the new catalyst driver (9.7) but that was 2-3 days ago and it was fine the other night playing games + dont really see how a driver could make the card flicker in windows.
The card is an XFX 4890 and it does do the dreaded 'squealing' noise under load so I'm wondering if this is related..

Rroff · 25 Jul 2009 at 17:48

Defcon5 said:
My 7900GS has been playing up recently - it has been thrashed with a large OC from day one, and I just put it down to components failing due to the stress being out on them.

Obviously your parts are a lot newer, but could be something similar?

Suprised its lasted that long... 7900GS were notorious for memory failure after 12-18 months.

almighty15 · 25 Jul 2009 at 18:03

45nm chips degrade over time as they have smaller 'lanes' due to them being on a 45nm process and excessive voltage eats these 'lanes' rather quickly depending on the Vcore.

I've seen/read about it loads of times, even know a guy who had a E8500 degrade that bad it needed 1.4v just to run stock.

Voltage hurts 45nm chips

It also could be your memory, have you run memest?

Was your original overclock Intel Burn Test stable?

Spetznaz · 25 Jul 2009 at 22:28

almighty15 said:
45nm chips degrade over time as they have smaller 'lanes' due to them being on a 45nm process and excessive voltage eats these 'lanes' rather quickly depending on the Vcore.

I've seen/read about it loads of times, even know a guy who had a E8500 degrade that bad it needed 1.4v just to run stock.

Voltage hurts 45nm chips

It also could be your memory, have you run memest?

Was your original overclock Intel Burn Test stable?

I didn't do Intel test but it was Prime stable and no problem in any games. Originally I had it @ 3.6ghz but it was a bit unstable (games would ctd randomly) so I cut it back to 3.2 and all was fine until now.

The way it was behaving with a weird shimmer/flicker and the screen going blank to me looks like the gfx card is the the issue but I could be wrong?.

I still have my 4870 so I suppose I could put that back in and test I'm just confused as to why people with similar setups seem to get 3.6ghz+ fairly easy and this thing is unstable at 3.2?!?!.

I will do a memtest when I get the chance but it was not running overclocked so I guess that is unlikely?.

boldenc · 27 Jul 2009 at 19:03

I have flickering with catalyst 9.7 when I OC memory but with catalyst 9.6 no flickering

Jay Bee · 27 Jul 2009 at 20:32

squaling sound

Well I did install the new catalyst driver (9.7) but that was 2-3 days ago and it was fine the other night playing games + dont really see how a driver could make the card flicker in windows.
The card is an XFX 4890 and it does do the dreaded 'squealing' noise under load so I'm wondering if this is related..

The sound is more than like the fan stopping and then card goes down OVERHEATED give the fan a bit of TLC and see if it sorts itself out