Problems after overclocking a GTX 550Ti

[rds1220]

A couple days ago a posted a couple questions about overclocking a GTX 550Ti. Now though I am having another problem. I raised the core clock to 1000 MHz and the voltages to 1.112. Using Furmark to stress test the overclock everything was fine. I got no artifacts and no thermal throttling or any other problem with a 20 minute test. However when I played a game it stayed at 1000 coreclock/2000 shader clock for a few minutes but the core clock drops to 405 and the shader clock drops to 800. Also the memory frequency which is set at stock also drops into the low hundreds. So what is wrong and what is going on? Is the overclock unstablen or do you think it's just the game?

 

[azathoth]

What temperature is your card running at?

 

[smorizio]

nvidia and amd have power settings in there control panel. you need to turn it off or set the card to performace to keep the card max out.

 

[rds1220]

What temperature is your card running at?

Under load with Furmark the max temp was 76 degree's but that is an extreme no gsame will max the card out like that. In gaming the max temp is 46 degree celcius.

nvidia and amd have power settings in there control panel. you need to turn it off or set the card to performace to keep the card max out.

Where is that, is it in the Nvidia control panel? If so do you know exactly what it is called. I've always used AMD cards up tp this point and I'm still playig around with Nvidia control panel. I don't really know what I'm looking for. The only thing I changed was in Afterburner I clicked the "Force constant voltage" which seemed to help a little. It seems more steady and doesn't drop as often but it still does it.

EDIT: I just checked Nvidia's control panel and saw nothing about adjusting power settings.

 

[smorizio]

it under manage settings in the control pannel manage 3d it called power management mode.

 

[rds1220]

Ok I found exactly what you are talking about BUT I'm not seeing anything called power management mode. This is what I did so far

Nvidia control panel>3D settings>(name of game)>

Within that I see no mention of power managment. Coud it have to do with XP? If so can it be fixed?

 

[DJDeCiBeL]

Here's what he's talking about because I have it too:

The clocks shouldn't be dropping in-game like that, though, regardless.

It could be a driver issue.

 

[rds1220]

Yes I found that same picture on a different forum through a google search. But when I click the name of the game sand scroll through the options to adjust in the control panel there is no option for power management. Do you think it has to do with using XP? If so do you think this problem can be fixed. Ad for the second part of what you said it could be a driver problem but I am using the latest drivers from Nvidia.

 

[DJDeCiBeL]

It might very well be that XP is the problem, yeah (or at least the XP version of the drivers).

Try an older driver. I'm using 295.73 myself.

 

[rds1220]

I'll try that and see. The weird thing is even when I go back to stock settings it still does it, it drops to 405 core/810 shader. The FPS are staying constant even when the clock's drop.

 

[DJDeCiBeL]

That last part seem to suggest that the clocks are dropping because there just isn't enough load to keep the full power 3D clocks active, but that would be very odd for almost any newer game with a 550 Ti. Most games should push a 550 Ti quite hard.

 

[rds1220]

These are older games like older Battlefield titles and older COD titles.

 

[DJDeCiBeL]

Yeah, it might be worth trying a newer, more graphically intensive game to see what happens.

 

[BobCharlie]

I know this is an old thread but the "drop" in clocks is from the 2D clocks like those shown in CPU-Z. Under the graphics tab in CPU-Z, you'll see you can select 2D Desktop, or 3D Applications to view. What you were/are seeing is the 2D settings as 405 Core and 810 Shader are what my GTX550Ti are showing under the 2D tab. Basically, when viewing 2D images (like your desktop or possibly SNES emulated games for example), the card will drop speeds as 900 core (970 or more if OC) isn't needed for 2D stuff.

Also, with my set up I've found that 970/1940 is a rock solid OC without touching anything else and that's 70Mhz over stock. Anything higher than 990/1980 can/will be spotty without touching the voltage. If you decide to touch the voltage, do it in minimal increments ONLY! And even then I wouldn't go more than a couple bumps (best to not touch voltage until you have a full understanding of what you are doing as well as the consequences). GPU's can't take voltage bumps like most CPU's can. I read another post where the kid upped GPU volts to MAX right off the bat and that's a sure-fire way to cook any card. I only use the 970/1940 OC while playing a game, and even then I always make sure the GPU fan is set to max (77 is max with this card using MSI Afterburner).

More often then not you'll see the biggest improvement with games by downloading the most current video driver. Nvidia's most current drivers are usually their "BETA" drivers, which you have to go to their site and manually look for. As of a couple days ago, 3.10.70 is the most current and is giving 26% boost in performance to BO2 for example over the "normal" driver which is by FAR going to give better FPS boost than any GPU OC.