Author Topic: Overclocking GeForce 2 MX? GF2 GTS or Ti? (Read 684 times)

Vector · « **on:** January 15, 2002, 10:22:58 AM »

S!
How much you can rise core & memory clocks and still have stability? I played around with GF tweak and adjusted speeds as follows:
Core 175 => 200
Memory 166 => 195
FPS otr eng off 1280x1024 res : 46 => 55!
I'm planning to upgrade my vid card as it's now bottle neck on my system (PIII 933MHz 512MB RAM) which one gives better results (quality/speed); GF 2 GTS / Pro or GF 2 Ti?

Thanks!

Nifty · « **Reply #1 on:** January 15, 2002, 11:36:15 AM »

can you afford to go GF3 Ti 200? If so, that's probably the best bang for the buck on the nvidia side of things (and is very overclockable, supposedly you can get it to near factory GF3 Ti 500 settings).

at tweak3d.com an older article said they got their gf2mx to OC to 210/215 from 175/166 and remained stable. Note: they did choose a leadtek card as it had a decent core HS/fan, and added HS/fan to the memory modules on the card. Dunno if your card has HS's on the memory modules or not. Might wanna look before going any higher on your memory frequency.

http://www.nvidia.com/view.asp?PAGE=geforce2pro this is directly on nvidia's site, and you can compare basic numbers for the GF2 gts/pro and GF2 Ti card. (you'll see the GF2 Ti gives better numbers)

bloom25 · « **Reply #2 on:** January 15, 2002, 04:29:40 PM »

To answer the original question, the Gf 2 Titanium is just like the Gf 2 Ultra. That means it is faster than the Gf 2 GTS or PRO. (PRO is a slightly overclocked GTS.)

While GF 3 Ti 200 cards are cheap, be aware that with your system you would see only a minimal performance increase between the GF 3 Ti 200 and a GF 2 Ti. The GF 3 demands more CPU resources compared to the GF 2, and since your CPU cannot completely fill rate limit the GF 2, the potential extra power of the GF 3 is for the most part not used. In your case it's a tough decision which to choose. The GF 3 IS certainly a better card than the GF 2, but given your current hardware and the fact that nVidia is releasing GeForce 4 in February, it not be the most cost effective route. You can expect GF 3 prices to drop significantly when GF 4 and GF 4 MX are released.

Blue Mako · « **Reply #3 on:** January 15, 2002, 04:59:45 PM »

Quote

Originally posted by Xarios
S!
How much you can rise core & memory clocks and still have stability? I played around with GF tweak and adjusted speeds as follows:
Core 175 => 200
Memory 166 => 195
FPS otr eng off 1280x1024 res : 46 => 55!
I'm planning to upgrade my vid card as it's now bottle neck on my system (PIII 933MHz 512MB RAM) which one gives better results (quality/speed); GF 2 GTS / Pro or GF 2 Ti?

Thanks!

What program did you use to overclock your card? Would it work for my GF2? I have a 32MB AGP GF2 MX 400. Is it safe to overclock without extra fans, HS etc.?

Vector · « **Reply #4 on:** January 16, 2002, 09:55:19 AM »

I used Geforce Tweak Utility, really easy to do changes, huge amount of different settings for you vid card, worth of trying. Dunno about how much you can overclock. Atleast in one finnish overclocking forum they determine the stability by running some 3D bechmark test for three times and if everything's running ok, then it's stable. If you vid card gets too hot, I think your system just hangs, without causing any damage. But there's always a risk when overclocking...

Thanks for your reply bloom25, perhaps it's better to stick with this card and wait for GF3 prices coming down. GF3 should give some great boost to my system tho

Nifty · « **Reply #5 on:** January 16, 2002, 11:18:08 AM »

You should start seeing artifacts (little anomolies) on the screen if you've pushed it too far. I went to 400mhz on the memory on a GF2 GTS 64mb, and it was a bit too much. I dropped it down to 385mhz, and it was stable for awhile, but then started getting some artifacts. So, I just went back to the factory of 365mhz, and resigned that it's set about as good as it's gonna get and be rock solid stable.

bloom is right on the price issues, you should wait until the next gen comes out as it should put prices down, sorry I didn't point that out!

He's also right in that your current system might not take advantage of the better card (honestly, I dunno where the CPU bottleneck point on GF2 vs GF3 would be. I think I saw an article on that recently, I'll look for it.) However, if you're possibly planning to upgrade the CPU/mobo in the relatively near future, you could grow into the better card. Otherwise you'd upgrade to a significantly good processor and your vid card that you just upgraded is your bottleneck again. Yet another thing to worry about when upgrading components. lol.

Found the article at Toms Hardware that had CPU scaling in it.
The article (also posted in another thread)

Click on CPU scaling to jump right to that section. Test setup will give you info on the 3 systems they used. If you look at the 800mhz system in Quake and then in Max Payne, you can see that it depends on the application as to whether you're going to get an increase from the GF2 Ti vs the GF3 Ti 200.

Also, this is just one article and one site's review. Your mileage may vary.

Vector · « **Reply #6 on:** January 16, 2002, 11:38:29 AM »

Thx nifty! Yes these dang computers swallows more and more money. After each upgrade some component is immediatly outdated and bottleneck

OTOH waiting will save money, but we can't wait forever, hehe. You really think that if I upgrade to say GF 3 in near future (I'm not planning to upgrade cpu), I don't see any major improvement on FPS? I've thought that current GF 2 MX is horrible bottleneck of my pc

Am I totally lost here?

Nifty · « **Reply #7 on:** January 17, 2002, 11:08:39 AM »

Quote

Originally posted by Vector
Thx nifty! Yes these dang computers swallows more and more money. After each upgrade some component is immediatly outdated and bottleneck OTOH waiting will save money, but we can't wait forever, hehe. You really think that if I upgrade to say GF 3 in near future (I'm not planning to upgrade cpu), I don't see any major improvement on FPS? I've thought that current GF 2 MX is horrible bottleneck of my pc Am I totally lost here?

You'll see improvement over the GF2 MX with a GF3 Ti200 on your machine. What Bloom is saying is that you may not see a difference in the GF3 Ti200 and a GF2 Ti (which also is an improvement over your GF2 MX) and we're talking a difference of around $70 between those two cards (minimum pricewatch.com difference, mind you.) You might want to do some research before you commit to one or the other. The CPU scaling at tom's hardware was done on a PIII-800 with 2 128mb sticks of RAM. The framerate difference was not very much in Quake, but in Max Payne, the difference was very significant. I'm not sure what the difference on your system would be with respect to AH.

Don · « **Reply #8 on:** January 17, 2002, 01:10:41 PM »

Vector:
I am a novice about this topic but, I did purchase a GeForce Ti-2 card and overclocked it 10%. I did this only because I don't know enough about this to dare go any higher. The GeForce Ti-2 card gives better performance than the gts and pro but, the Ultra card is faster and has better performance. I bought my Ti card at a good price so I went for it. If I had to do it all over again, I'd go for the GeForce 3 Ti-200. for about $70.00 more you will get much better performance than the 2 series and you can (according to many sites eg. Tom's hardware etc.) overclock it up to GeForce 3-Ti-500 performance levels. Still, if you can afford a Ti-2 card, it is a good card, and will give solid performance. At a smoking airfield I get 45 to 50 fps, not bad, and I limit my frame rates in AH to 60 fps.

Don · « **Reply #9 on:** January 17, 2002, 01:12:59 PM »

Blue mako:
FWIW, I use a program called cool bits. Very easy to use and efficient. But, I am a novice and what it allows is what I am capable of doing and understanding

If there is another program out there that is better; I'd like to hear about it

Don · « **Reply #10 on:** January 17, 2002, 01:29:19 PM »

Vector:
I have a dell 933 Mhz P-III 381 MB Ram (PC-133) system.
I have recently installed a memory manager to better handle the memory resources of my PC. I don't understand your bottleneck you spoke of. I do know that if I have too many things running in the background when I fly AH, I am going to get weird performance in the game. I usually start AH with 94% of system resources available on my PC, that works well for me.
Often times people have programs running in the background without their knowing it. have you looked into that?

Vector · « **Reply #11 on:** January 18, 2002, 10:25:38 AM »

Don, thanks for your reply. I can see we have similar systems except vid card and you're getting way more fps than me. So my vid card has to be a bottle neck.
I never use any background programs while flying in AH. Well, except those looooong climbs in lancaster or even more worser climber; P-47, then I'm surfing in the net.
I hope we can have paddle blade prop in D-11 or P-47N in some day (forced, shameless "improve jugs dammit" add) so I don't have to surf while flying any more.

ps. btw Don, what OS you have?

Don · « **Reply #12 on:** January 22, 2002, 03:01:25 PM »

Vector:

My OS is Windoze ME. I hate it but, it came with my PC

I have learned to use it and have no complaints other than it sux rocks