the significance of oc'ing

[elitebear4]

to what extent does ocing increase gaming performance? are we talking about say 10 fps in games like hl2 here or more around the ballpark of 2-5 fps?

[Brood_Star]

Depends on card

[elitebear4]

could you have at LEAST given me some information about your experience with ocing?

[Brood_Star]

I got like 10 FPS more on CSS with 325/196 to 460/240

[darksparkz]

Meh, I say there are more noticeable advantages in benchmarks, the few fps points may not be worth the extra heat and noise coming from your video card, unless you have an aftermarket cooler.

[R4z0r4mu5 Pr|m3]

Meh, I say there are more noticeable advantages in benchmarks, the few fps points may not be worth the extra heat and noise coming from your video card, unless you have an aftermarket cooler.

amen to that, if a card is gonna play a game, it's gonna play it, if it won't, it won't even if you overclock it - 90% of the time

[Yuriman]

A 25% overclock will usually yield a 25% improvement in framerate. At a 25% overclock, if you had 35fps before, you would now get 43.75fps.

[3DFlyer]

You are asking a question that has a million answers. It depends on the system, the game, the speciffic card, how high the CPU OC is, drivers used, tweaks on the OS, card mods. On a forum like this, you'll get a 1000 different answers to that question.

The short answer is it depends on too many fatcors. You have to "bound" your question some to get any useable data.

A 25% OC does not necessarily translate into a 25% FPS rate. In fact, that almost never occurs. There are always variables that affect the final FPS.

[Blackmage]

A 25% overclock will usually yield a 25% improvement in framerate. At a 25% overclock, if you had 35fps before, you would now get 43.75fps.

i must dissagree. i overclocked my 9800NP from 325 to 420 about 30% and i didn't notice 30% worth of improvemrnt in games the FPS went up form 50 - 57 a bit over a 10% improvement.

[JigPu]

To restate Yuriman's answer, if you get a 25% OC, a 25% framerate boost is the most you can expect. You'll usually eke out less based on other factors though. If the bottleneck in performance is your video card then an overclock will provide much more of its theoretical gain.

JigPu

[Nexus Realized]

I'm sure there are occasions where I would have been pretty laggy, but stayed above an acceptable framerate due to it being OC'd. IMO it's worth it.

[TUK101]

Back in the Voodoo 3 era and Geforce 1 and 2 video cards, some games where much improved by a good OC. But nowdays with faster everything and DDR being more relevant to alleviate some of the bottlenecks an OC doesnt seem to make as big of a difference. Now if you are trying to run HL2 with a GF3 TI200, then OC'ing the card might just enable you to eek out an 800X600 res compared to a 640X480 which is about crap imho. But if you are already using a descent and modern enough video card, then OCing your card is mostly just going to make you feel better lol. Going from 55fps to 58 or 60fps isnt going to yield you much of an advantage. But dont get me wrong, every game has a few spots in it to where the going gets tough enough and there are enough lights and action going on that bumping up your core and memory a few notches will definately make those instances more playeable. Back in the late 90's though when PC games where becoming more 3D and relied more on eye candy, you almost had to OC though to make a game playable it seemed like.

[Yuriman]

Well, some cards do gain quite a bit from overclocking. My X800GTO², for instance, was stock at 400mhz core, with 12 pipes. I unlocked 4 more pipes, and overclocked it to 540mhz. That gives me 80% more fill rate.

I think the reason overclocking doesn't seem to have suck a big effect anymore, is that the graphical settings don't look as different as they used to. Sure, overclocking might let you bump the resolution up from 1280x960 to 1600x1200, but the difference is much less noticable compared to moving from 640x480 to 800x600.

[Blackmage]

Sure, overclocking might let you bump the resolution up from 1280x960 to 1600x1200

:shrug: i, don't even know what to say.

your x800GTO2 has also been unlocked and overclocked thats why you have seen massive gains if you didn't UNLOCK your card the gains from the overclocking would have been alot smaller.

[Yuriman]

Yes, but what I am trying to say is, moving from my X700pro to my X800GTO² really wasn't that big of a difference. Moving from high detail to very high, and going from 1280x960 to 1600x1200, really isn't that much of a difference.

[Blackmage]

Yes, but what I am trying to say is, moving from my X700pro to my X800GTO² really wasn't that big of a difference. Moving from high detail to very high, and going from 1280x960 to 1600x1200, really isn't that much of a difference.

i agree, but it's always nice to no that your card is capable of runnig at high resolutions with no problems. also people buy video cards based on thier needs.

[Tyreal]

OVerclocking your card will help if you are able to play a game at a pretty good fps most of the time but when the action gets going it slows down. Depending on your overclock, you can minimize the fps drop. I managed to do this a couple times with CS source on my 9600 XT.

We mostly just overclock to get higher benchmark scores, not so much for games but it does help.

[TheGreySpectre]

I think its worth it. I notice an improvement. a

[ziggo0]

If you can get a fairly decent OC on xxx card, you will see a fairly decent (noticable) increase in your FPS

[Aidenswarrior]

i oced the memory on my card just to get rid of some slight screen lag i had. Completely worth it.

[speed bump]

Depends on the game and your setup. An FX-57 at 3+ghz with a 9800pro overclocking your video card makes alot more difference than a stock speed 2.4c with a x850x pe.

Personally I don't like running extra things open(and I am to lazy to open them) so I rarely overclock when gaming. If I am playing around I might though.

[TheGreySpectre]

If you are on the edge of good/medicocre FPS OCing can take you over the edge to good fps