[rookie123]

My rig only scores a 2377 on 3dmark06, i expected better. I want to make my rig good for gaming, any one have any suggestions on where I should start, specs are in sig.

[White_Pawn]

sounds like your pci-e is running at 1x... OR your psu isn't good enough.

[rookie123]

the mobo manual says it runs at 8x... can my rig score any better the way its setup already or do i need an upgrade or maybe oc?

[OnDborder]

Download and install cpu-z. Check under the "mainboard" tab

[rookie123]

Ok i ran cpu-z, under link width it says x8, under max it says x16

[Karbon]

You should be able to overclock your 8500GT a lot, I dug up some scores on hwbot and apparently overclocking as much as 300mhz on the core isn't all that uncommon. http://www.hwbot.org/result.do?resultId=675043

Check out the stickies in the graphics section

[White_Pawn]

OHHHHH i thought you had a 8800GT 512mb.

okay.

8500GT 512mb is just slightly better than the 6600GT 256mb. That would explain your low score. Try to change your pci-e width to 16x and download rivatuner and begin cranking the clocks. Your main concern i believe would be increasing the core, as there is more than enough bandwidth for the 8500GT.

[rookie123]

I overclocked my card, the core to 750 and the memory to 500, i monitered the temp and it stayed at about 50 deg. My benchmark score actually went up to 3321 which is a pretty good increase. Should I overclock anything else, cpu, memory? Im new to this overclocking I find this stuff pretty interesting.

[jmsanders2]

What temp did you monitor? If 50C was a reliable gpu temp you can probably go further on the gpu clock with some tweaking. The gpu is the major component on 3D scores, cpu OC and mem OC will help some, but not as much as gpu OC.

[rookie123]

Im using rivatuner, 750 is the most it lets me go to for the core, and when i go above 505 on the memory bus it doesnt pass the test. but the temperature stays at 50 for the gpu.

[Karbon]

That seems like a good OC on your gpu compared to others, and while you're at it you might as well see what your cpu can do.

[djrussell]

Originally Posted by rookie123

Im using rivatuner, 750 is the most it lets me go to for the core, and when i go above 505 on the memory bus it doesnt pass the test. but the temperature stays at 50 for the gpu.

if your card is staying cool but won't clock any higher, it's probably volt limited. there might be a voltmod or bios voltmod for it if you want to go that route. happy googling.