Driver is not responding after flashing 8800GTS 640MB BIOS under Win7

[Petkevicius]

Hello,

This forum's community helped me to OC my CPU recently, so I hope I will receive response to this post as well. I have to mention that I searched all posts in tomshardware.com>Forums>Overclocking>Graphic Cards and found useful information about my card's (ASUS 8800GTS 640MB) OC, but not the exact case which I faced few days ago.

I am running Windows 7 64-bit OS and I like to keep my drivers up to date. So, the driver for my GPU is 196.21 downloaded from NVIDIA site. Firstly, I started to play with software. However, none of them (ATI Tool, GPU Tool, NVIDIA System Tool, Riva Tuner) gave results. And the reason is simple - all of this software did not let me to do anything. I was not able even to install Riva Tuner normally, although I followed the instructions about Driver Signing disabling. NVIDIA System Tool and ATI Tool do not let me to change the speeds - the text boxes where I input the speeds are painted grey (yes, I use an administrator account). Well, GPU Tool seems to run, but still I am not able to change anything - once I change the setting value and press Apply, the current clocks do not change (stock speeds are 513 792 1188). No luck with software.

So, I read some articles about flashing GPU BIOS and I liked the idea. I found some kind of mini database (where people share they OC'ed GPU's speeds) and counted the average values for core clock and memory settings. I decided to flash settings to 630 930 1200. I used GPU-Z 0.3.9 to save my current BIOS. I opened it with NiBiTor and changed values to 630 930 1200 and saved it to a new file. However, there are some problems with making bootable USB stick under Windows 7, so I used WinImage to create an .ima file and then burned it with Nero. My .ima file included MS-DOS 6.0 (I injected boot600.exe), two executables from NVFlash 5.91.01 and those .rom BIOS (both old and new) files. So I burned a disk and booted from a CD-ROM. Once loaded, I typed in "nvflash -4 -5 -6 1.rom" (1.rom is my new BIOS file) and it all went OK.

However, once my computer rebooted, OS started in low screen resolution. I saw that new hardware device is found and the drivers are being installed. I checked the Device Manager and found out that it's my GPU. After drivers have been installed, I rebooted the PC and then screen began to flash, I saw 'Display driver is not responding' (or something simillar) icon and then 'blue screen' appeared. Then I started OS in Safe Mode. No problems there, low resolution. I installed 196.21 driver and rebooted. Once I saw my desktop, the same thing happened - flashing screen, information about not responding driver and a blue screen after 10 seconds or so. Luckily, I backed up my default BIOS at the very begining. I flashed it back and it all went OK. Computer is running normally.

Does anybody would like to share ideas? Would you suggest me to try to flash BIOS with lower settings?

P.S. I apologize for being so concrete and for poor English as well. Thanks in advance!

 

[saaiello]

First off flashing your GPU bios is not recommended too much chance that you will kill the GPU. Your best bet is to use is EVGA precision its the easiest overclock tool there is for nvidia i use it for my 9800GT myself.

http://www.evga.com/precision/

You will have to register with EVGA but it is free then downlaod latest version. I think the problem you are having is you were using an older copy of riva tuner back at the end of January when they released 196.21 driver it disabled overclocking in riva tuner and EVGA precision but updated versions were released and it all works now so try evga precision.

 

[treefrog07]

Re-flash the GPU BIOS to the original version (that you saved before you updated). Flashing can be done, but you have to have the exact match for the BIOS chip.

 

[saaiello]

Re-flash the GPU BIOS to the original version (that you saved before you updated). Flashing can be done, but you have to have the exact match for the BIOS chip.

You apperntly didnt read his whole post he said he flashed back to original bios already and he wants to know what to do now. There is no reasonable justification for flashing a 8800GTS bios everything can be done via software only thing you cant change via software on that is the voltage and increasing that dosent gain enough performance to make it worth it.

 

[Petkevicius]

You apperntly didnt read his whole post he said he flashed back to original bios already and he wants to know what to do now. There is no reasonable justification for flashing a 8800GTS bios everything can be done via software only thing you cant change via software on that is the voltage and increasing that dosent gain enough performance to make it worth it.

Thank you for being accurate.

I downloaded and used EVGA Presicion as you recommended and I used it succesfully. I am able to change clock rates now with no problem. Now, other questions appear. How do I know I ocerclocked GPU enough or did I made it the right way? I guess I have to lift up the rates step by step, but what is the time interval from each step to another? I will try to express myself another way: let's say I turn on EVGA Precision application, my GPU default settings are 513 792 1188. I lift up core speed to 520, current speed does not change. 525, no change again; 530 - it changes to 540. OK, now I am on 540. How long I have to run GPU at this setting and when I can lift it up again?

Another question. The 'Test' button on EVGA application seems to be inactive all the time - I am not able to run stress test. Is that normal?

 

[Petkevicius]

Well, it seems my questions were pretty dumb and I find simple answers to them by myself.

After all, I used EVGA Precision, GPU Tool and 3DMark06 applications for overclocking my card. The funny thing is that GPU Tool began to work as it should after I installed a new NVIDIA display driver (197.13, it's WHQL and is available at nvidia.com already). However, I choosed EVGA Presicion because of it's ability to control the fan easily. I used GPU Tool to run stress test (ATI Tool 0.26 and 0.27B2 both does not work for me). Firstly, I set the fan speed to 95%, I can manage that hum. I brought the core speed to 612 step by step and I wouldn't like to go beyond just because I want the working card for 4 more years at least. I have to notice that I disabled 'Link' function in Precision because I found a chart where people share they OC'ed cards' speed values and none of them are running shader above 1020 or smth (http://www.overclockingwiki.org/joomla/news/site_news/geforce_8800_gts_overclocking.html). If the 'Link' is enabled, the shader is at 1417 while core is at 612. However, my default shader is 1188, so I lifted it by a minimum and it got into 1242. Finally I set memory at 918. I ran GPU Tool stability test after every step I made and I ran it for about 3 minutes each time. The temperature never comes close to 86. Why 86 you ask? Before all of this I ran GPU Tool stability test with stock speeds and the temperature came to 84-85 and never went beyond that for 15 minutes. So, now I have a profile 612/1242/918/95. I ran four 3DMark06 tests: both SM2.0 and both HDR. Obviously the system did not crash during the tests. I tried to play some games, no crash as well. If I would look at the 3DMark06 results, I see about 15% gain. I hope I will notice it while gaming, but I am too tired for that now

I have two profiles in Presicion for now. One is stock and another with new speeds. Am I free to change from one to another in one step? I mean is there a posibility to cause damage to the card if I change core speed from 513 to 612 in one step? Memory from 792 to 918 in one step?

Thank you for responses.