16/6 XFX 6800GS agp oc'ing

I was able to unlock my XFX 6800gs agp with rivatuner to 16/6 and not have any artifacts in both 3dmk03 and 3dmk05, which I cannot say the same with the eVGA 6800gs agp I RMA'd. But once I unlock both the pipes rivatuner won't let me overclock one sliver past stock without a bad test. Should I try 16/5 or 12/6? My fast writes are on and my graphics aperture size is 256mb, should I disable or lower that?

hmm?

Have you tried using coolbits? If that doesn't work try testing both configs.

I also think you should disable fastwrites.

Apparently Powerstrip does not use the internal test...
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=169

Ok, I got it to overclock with powerstrip and overclocked it to 375/1050. When I ran a benchmark 3dmk03 test stopped and my monitor turned off right after cpu test 2. Does that mean my cpu is getting too hot, or the clocks on my gpu are too high? Also what would cause the overclocking test to fail in coolbits and rivatuner?

After a few tests I got it to 400/1103 @ 16/6 with a load temp. of 70C O.O
3dmk05 5313 w/o artifacts http://service.futuremark.com/compare?3dm05=1985234

do you know which driver for 6800gs agp is approved for furturemark?

blank screen with probably be due to the gpu locking up. It a cpu test, but it still uses the graphics card, just on setting the cpu is stressed by.

Riva tuner has the ability to disable the driver testing by nvidia. Its a flag (1 or 0 ) in the poweruser option. For an explanation goto the overclocking area where you set the clocks, click the little ? next to the X in the border and click on the test button. At the bottom of the tool tip is says it can be diabled etc. Anyway, took me a few secondd to find the setting and switch it. Went from 1070 max on my mem to 1125.

Don't be supprised if you get artifacts at very low overclocks as the pipes that are locked by default didn't pass quality testing for the 6800GT, hence they are in the GS and locked. therefore, don't expect to much of them.

I believe the test fail (nvidia) because the driver is trying to determin if errors have occured. I don't know the detail, but i suppose it emulates a complex calculation (of graphical type) and checks for errors with out displaying the test. Either way ive only ever found them to be very conservative at best. Riva fails the tests as by default it uses the nvidia tests that the nvidia console uses. As mentioned above, this can be turned off. It then display the new setting for a short period so the user can detirmine if the test has past. Then move onto 3d stress testing.

As for fast writes, i leave them on. Not sure of the pros/cons, but it sounds like a good thing . AGP apperture, leave it at 128 or 64. Thats what i hear anyway.

70*c load is up there, but is usual for stock cooling at stock speed.

I have read that you should turn off agp fastwrites for a more stable OC.
As for drivers, just use the newest ones from nvidia site (84.21 I believe)

I used riva tuner to unlock the 4 locked pipes and the one vertex pipe. The vertex pipe turned out to be bad, but the 4 other pipes were good! So I got my card running at 6800 Ultra Specs. I have run 3dMark05 with a score a little over 5000 and an aqua mark 3d score of 54,000. The highest temps I have seen for the card was 60c under full load and 52-54c idle. I wonder if I could push it more, not that I need to since I can run BF2, HL2, Doom 3 and Quake 4 with all the eye candy on! Not to shabby for a nforce2 system with a Althon XP 3200+ processor.

This 6800GS upgrade saved me from upgrading my whole damn system due to the PCI-e switch. So i say my system will be good for another year. After that it is going to be a ASUS mobo with the Opteron 148 and a 7800GS card with some new ram (2 gigs).

First off Shinobi,

You could push your card harder if you wanted to... just slowly increase your core by 5mhz and test (run 3dmark or a game) to test for stability and artifacts. Once you reach the max, just back it off a bit for longevity. Do the same for the memory. You may want to consider afermarket cooling if you are gonna push the card to the edge. Additionally, I have read that after unlocking the pipes/ vertex that your max OC may not be as high as if the pipes/ vertex were locked... but having the extra pipes is a real advantage over top speed anyways.

Thanks, I have aftermarket cooling right now, Zalman Reserator 1 with the VGA water block, it serves well now since I have read the review of the card on guru3d about the card running 60-90c and some threads as well stating this. I am glad that I was able to find this card here in Japan since I searched the net for hours and only found in it two places and they don't ship to military members over seas (damn haters). I think I am going to stick with the speeds I am at now, I can run BF2, HL2, Doom3 and Quake 4 at max settings with good frame rates (40+).