W1zzard-Mobility 9800 = Serious Issue

[shoman24v]

I think ATITool is incompatible with the Mobility 9800. From my expirence with my X800, leaving fraps open while ATITool scans for artifacts should come up with nothing but errors. It only catches the error once it starts but not after that. Here are some screens...

http://friends.filecloud.com/15258/FrapsRunning.jpg

http://friends.filecloud.com/15259/FrapsRunning1.jpg

Sorta makes me afraid to overclock now knowing it doesn't find errors.

 

[W1zzard]

the 2 images show no permission errors

you are right .. there should be tons of errors when fraps is open .. i still suggest you try it on your mobility .. maybe find an overclock which shows artifacts in games and try scanning at that speed in atitool

looking forward to see your findings

 

[kypen]

I'm having a similar issue. When I first used ATI tool, it found my max speed at about 470/400, so I've been running at 445/400 for some time. This was about a month ago. So, I cleaned out some fans a couple days ago, and re-ran it. After about 17 minutes (with the memory at stock) it took the core up to 570 mhz! I got scared and backed off. I ran it again yesterday, about 20-25 minutes it was at 630 mhz! AHH!! Again, I cancelled. Today, I started at 470mhz and have been benchmarking with 3Dmark2005 every 10 mhz (leaving memory at 400 mhz). I hit 515mhz on core, then I stopped benching. Always stable, never any visual artifacts.

Here is what is odd. My score never increased more than a margin of error (50 or so pts between consecutive benches). The HL2 stress test is also stable.

Also, I ran shoman's test with fraps open. It increased the clock a little bit then stopped. I also got an error/bug that it told me to report.

This is telling me that my video card may be throddling itself? I don't know how this is possible, but if my score stays the same, but clock speed increases, how is that possible without it throddling itself?

 

[shoman24v]

630Mhz wtf....

There is a serious problem somewhere.

I don't know if I want to start overclocking even more...This is a laptop that my work bought and I would hate to tell my boss that the video card is dead because I overclocked to 900Mhz

Plus for someone to overclock to 630Mhz that makes me rethink if ATI Tool is actually speeding up the chip...

 

[kypen]

Well, that is an interesting point.

That was my initial thought, so I thought i would use another utility to OC. I use radlinker. I got it up to benching 515/400 stable, but as I mentioned, my score didn't change much at all. 2 utilities OCing major, but my score doesn't change? That is what is making me think it is throddling itself or something along those lines.

 

[shoman24v]

Ok, this is very interesting.. I just rebooted the laptop and decided to run a CSS bench. Here are my PC specs

Dell iXPS
3.4GHz Extreme Edition
1gb of ram
60gb 7,200 rpm
Mobility 9800 Omega 4.12

Ok, ran the tests at stock clocks 350/300, I didn't open any overclocking utility for this bench.

Tested at:

Models-High
Textures-High
AA is set to none
AF is set to 2X
Shader detail-Low
Shadow Detail-Low
Water-Simple Reflections

Average FPS of 86.8

Now I did the same test but used ATI Tool to Change the clocks to 450/400

Average FPS of 80.57

You would think the scores would go way up, but instead they went down.

EDIT: Just rebooted and used Radlinker instead of ATI Tool to over clock. I set the clocks to 452/398 and ran the CSS bench again

Average FPS of 102.65 on the same in game settings as above...



Ran the bench again using ATI Tool, first time I got 96fps, the second run (right after first) was 86fps.



-I'm going to reboot and run the tests again using the stock clocks.
-Ok, all these average FPS scores were done one after another without quitting the program
-88FPS
-83FPS
-72FPS
-75FPS



-Ran the test again using Radlinker. I set the clocks to 450/400. Tests were ran right after each other
-95.97
-78.60
-74.40

Seems to be that the card isn't overclocking.

-Ran the test using ATI Tool now. I again set the clocks to 450/400. Tests were ran right after each other
-91.95
-72.87
-74.60

Again a massive framerate drop on the second run.

Tell us what you think about this W1zzard...... oh and yes the lappy is plugged in

 

[kypen]

What resolution was that run at?
Did you restart in between OCs?

I do find that massive frame drop quite odd.
I also find it odd that the Radlinker OC gave you 103 FPS but ATI tool/Rivatuner gave you 96/92 respectively. We are talking about 10 frames per second here. That is a 10% difference, nothing minor.

Why?

 

[shoman24v]

All my tests were done at 1280x800

Just ran the test again and scored 94fps on stock clocks.

Edit>>>>not rivatuner I ment radlinker

Even though I got 102fps I still don't think the card was being overclocked.

 

[kypen]

Well, oddly enough, when I OCed with either Radlinker or ATITool, and used the 3DMark2005 system analysis, it would show the OC (it scans the clocks on the card).

 

[W1zzard]

just to clarify .. the same happens with both atitool and radlinker:
clocks get set, 3dmark analysis can detect it, but the first run is fast and the following ones get slower?

are the clocks still there after running for the first time?

have you tried any other benchmarks? did you close css between runs?

 

[shoman24v]

3DMark03 scores

These tests were at stock clocks (350/300), each done one after another, no reboots.

Run 1: 5890

Run 2: 6015

Run 3: 6033

I guess those seem right but I had 3 previous benches from about 2 weeks ago at stock clocks that were 6505, 6523, and 6863 but those could have been at higher then stock clocks, I cannot remember....

Now for the benches using the ATI Tool, I restarted after the first benches and overclocked to 450/400.

Run 1: 7483

Run 2: 7359

I'll do a bench using radlinker now.

Ok, I rebooted set the clocks on radlinker to 452/398

I only did one test and scored 7474.

It seems that both overclocking utilities are doing their job! But, what boggles my mind is why the Counter Strike Source benches are oh so low . And maybe the fraps error should be looked into....

 

[kypen]

Okay, so we know that the utilities are doing their job. However, this doesn't detract from the fact that ATITool was OCing my card to crazy frequencies.

BTW: I tried the most recent beta build and it crashes my PC. I run it and it finds an artifact at low frequencies (435/395, I have been running 445/405 for months and it has been stable as hell and artifact free). When I run it again, it makes CRAZY CRAZY artifacts at about 445 core and completely locks up the PC (can't even move the mouse).

 

[shoman24v]

Okay, so we know that the utilities are doing their job. However, this doesn't detract from the fact that ATITool was OCing my card to crazy frequencies.

BTW: I tried the most recent beta build and it crashes my PC. I run it and it finds an artifact at low frequencies (435/395, I have been running 445/405 for months and it has been stable as hell and artifact free). When I run it again, it makes CRAZY CRAZY artifacts at about 445 core and completely locks up the PC (can't even move the mouse).

Wow thats interesting....

Eh I dunno, with all the problems I am having in CSS with framerates it makes me not want to play. I can lower the resolution but what is the point in that, everthing will look blurry. But nOooO Dell had to make this laptop with some crazy resolution (1920x1200)

Maybe i'm just too used to my X800..