Overclocking my GPU is causing a lower result

beany_bot · 21 May 2016 at 11:12

Im a a bit stuck OC my GPU guys.
Its a 390x (Asus Strix)

And when I add 50mv, the score goes down? it's only 77 degrees so I cant imagine thermal throttling?

Here was my working. You will see that 1180Mhz is worse than previous. This is using afterburner and heaven

Scottland · 21 May 2016 at 11:17

Have you increased the power limit? If it's hitting the power limit it will throttle the same as if you're thermal throttling.

beany_bot · 21 May 2016 at 11:19

Scottland said:
Have you increased the power limit? If it's hitting the power limit it will throttle the same as if you're thermal throttling.

I haven't, i couldn't find anything about that that made me comfortable playing with it. can you advise?

Scottland · 21 May 2016 at 11:26

If you increase the clock speed and voltage, it will in turn increase the amount of power the card uses. Increasing the power limit allows the card to use more power (over the specified TDP of the card) before it decides it's using too much and throttles to keep it within limits.

From my perspective I'd prefer to to raise the power limit than increase the voltage, but I'd suggest having a read around until you're happy you know what you're playing with

Radox-0 · 21 May 2016 at 11:37

Happens to my Fiji card's. Nano does not like anything over +12Mv. Adding more MV, while allowing me to stabilise a higher overall overclock, the overall results and FPS actually shows a net decrease in performance. I believe its fairly commonplace and a huge discussion on OCN forums.

Try upping your Mv in smaller increments and find the spot which if you go over it reduces the overall score.

beany_bot · 21 May 2016 at 11:39

Im finding myself adding loads more power, volts all for 1fps. I think I should quit at 1160 with no increased power or volts.

LegendaryDread · 21 May 2016 at 12:12

beany_bot said:
Im finding myself adding loads more power, volts all for 1fps. I think I should quit at 1160 with no increased power or volts.

Max out the power limit and leave voltage at stock, to start. As a rule of thumb, Voltage is for increasing stability at higher clocks (in the case of visual artifacts or crashing), at the cost of increased heat, power draw, and potential damage to the card.

Increasing the Power Limit has no proven detrimental effect on GPU health.

TheRealDeal · 21 May 2016 at 12:20

Yea the first thing i do is push the power limit to 50% and see what i can get stable on the core before volts. Even sitting at stock clocks i have my power limit set to 50% as it really won't do anything unless the card needs extra power which it shouldn't.

beany_bot · 21 May 2016 at 12:40

Ok thanks. That's sounds simple and sensible. Only thing is... I'm kinda on my limit of my PSU so didn't really want to go power mad. What you think? (my build is in my sig).

Also I'm reading that typical OCs for this card are around 1200. So not sure it's worth stressing my PSU for the sake of 40mhz. Like 2fps max.

Gregster · 21 May 2016 at 12:46

For one so vocal in the GPU section, I thought you would have known to move the power slider to the max brother

But yer, adding +50mV and move the power slider to the far right will give the card the extra wattage that is needed

TheRealDeal · 21 May 2016 at 13:10

beany_bot said:
Ok thanks. That's sounds simple and sensible. Only thing is... I'm kinda on my limit of my PSU so didn't really want to go power mad. What you think? (my build is in my sig).

Also I'm reading that typical OCs for this card are around 1200. So not sure it's worth stressing my PSU for the sake of 40mhz. Like 2fps max.

I think you should be ok on that Psu with one card to push without worrying. Amd Matt was running 2 x 290x's on a 750w overclocked. You should be fine on one card just using the power settings and adding some voltage. For everyday usage i like to run no voltage and max power overclocks. You get most of the performance this way and not much extra heat from the voltage added.

beany_bot · 21 May 2016 at 13:18

TheRealDeal said:
I think you should be ok on that Psu with one card to push without worrying. Amd Matt was running 2 x 290x's on a 750w overclocked. You should be fine on one card just using the power settings and adding some voltage. For everyday usage i like to run no voltage and max power overclocks. You get most of the performance this way and not much extra heat from the voltage added.

That's interesting. I wonder why it's different to cpus. Where is all about the mv to make it stable. Thanks for advise. What temp would you say are safe in heaven. 80? 85?

TheRealDeal · 21 May 2016 at 13:35

beany_bot said:
That's interesting. I wonder why it's different to cpus. Where is all about the mv to make it stable. Thanks for advise. What temp would you say are safe in heaven. 80? 85?

Yea those temps are fine. With 150mv on my cooler the card never seems to go over the mid 70's. The reference cooled 290x cards were getting way up into the 90's. I wouldn't worry about anything in the 80's.

beany_bot · 21 May 2016 at 14:45

OK. After hours of testing. This is her maxed out at 84 degrees. It's absolutely all I can get out of her. No higher clock speeds are stable, even at increased voltages. Gained 5fps. Not astounding lol. But learned how to clock a GPU.

beany_bot · 21 May 2016 at 14:58

God damn.... just loaded GTAV and im getting Artifacting!! Now I have to start all over again using GTAV as my stress test....sigh!.

yashiro · 21 May 2016 at 16:59

Not worth the hassle if all you gain is 5 fps.

LtMatt · 21 May 2016 at 17:09

beany_bot said:
OK. After hours of testing. This is her maxed out at 84 degrees. It's absolutely all I can get out of her. No higher clock speeds are stable, even at increased voltages. Gained 5fps. Not astounding lol. But learned how to clock a GPU.

Put the fan speed up to 100% if going for high overclocks. A cooler running core will require less voltage and create less heat, which will increase your overclock and your FPS. Sometimes a GPU will produce artifacts once it hits a certain temp, but each GPU is different so you should always try and keep the temperature as low as possible.

Memory overclocking using works best in increments of 125Mhz, so I'd put it back to 1625Mhz and focus on the core instead, that's where most of your gains will come from. The 390X has a 384Bit bus so it has plenty of bandwidth already.

TheRealDeal · 21 May 2016 at 17:13

beany_bot said:
God damn.... just loaded GTAV and im getting Artifacting!! Now I have to start all over again using GTAV as my stress test....sigh!.

Add in an extra 5mv of Voltage to see if that gets rid of the artifacts and as Matt said try ramping up the fan. Often slightly more voltage can stop those artifacts.

LtMatt · 21 May 2016 at 17:15

TheRealDeal said:
Add in an extra 5mv of Voltage to see if that gets rid of the artifacts and as Matt said try ramping up the fan. Often slightly more voltage can stop those artifacts.

You really want to keep temps below 80c at these voltage levels, the lower the better. Put on some headphones and forget about the noise, that's what i used do with my 290X reference cards.

BluD · 21 May 2016 at 17:19

and just make sure your playing really loud games