Advice summoned for Overclocking my 5770....

[WaltC]

I've decided to run the crap out of this card while I am waiting on my 7970 to get here--actually, I'm still debating which AMD card to buy--just not interested in nVidia, thanks but no thinks, JHH. (Let the 3dfx guys out of the dungeon, stop the beatings and release them from their wall restraints, quit feeding them scorpions and flies, and I *might* reconsider--maybe.)

Anyway...My card is an XFX HD 5770 1 gig GDDR5--first time in a decade I haven't owned a top-tier ATi card, but there it is...Had a surprisingly lot of fun with this card, actually.

Now I 'm using Afterburner 2.2.0, and I've noticed that I can unlock the voltage regulator for the gpu--have actually done so but chickened out from making a change--because frankly I don't know how far I can safely push it at all. Here's where I currently am:

Stock voltage--I'm running the gpu at 960MHz with no problems as of yet, but I still have yet to vigorously test it in games at that speed. Ram is clocked to 1375MHz, and don't know how much more I can push that--if I can keep even that much up on a consistent basis.

Key seems to be the fan profile, so I'm using the one standard in AB 2.2.0 that ramps up fan speed nicely when gpu temps begin to rise. I note that in earlier versions of the Catalysts (I'm running 12.4WHQL) I couldn't get beyond 900MHz cpu and 1200MHz ram before artifacts and lockups would occur--regardless of the fan-speed setting.

Here's the thing--with no change to standard gpu voltage, I am already clocking the gpu at its max of 960MHz--so I don't see any need to actually try and increase the gpu voltage through AB. Do you?

Neither AB or anything else will let me push the clock past 960MHz, so that must be some kind of bios limit.

What say ye? Any suggestions? Salutations? Last rites?

[Dr. Zhivago]

940/1300 is the highest I can get reliably in games with my Sapphire Vapor-X 5770. It will pass 960/1375 in Overdrive tests, but that's about it.

Hope this provides some perspective.

[WaltC]

Originally Posted by Dr. Zhivago

940/1300 is the highest I can get reliably in games with my Sapphire Vapor-X 5770. It will pass 960/1375 in Overdrive tests, but that's about it.

Hope this provides some perspective.

Yes, thanks for the reply! That's about where I am, too. Well, it's been fun anyway... Do you use AfterBurner, and have you tried experimenting with the gpu voltage? I'm a bit leery of that, but I thought I'd ask if you'd had any luck with it.

Thanks again!

[Dr. Zhivago]

No, I have not tried Afterburner, just the AMD Overdrive.

[adinamark728]

Interesting...

[WaltC]

Originally Posted by Dr. Zhivago

No, I have not tried Afterburner, just the AMD Overdrive.

Well, I've been working with the Catalyst overdrive, too, and I've actually been able to reach 950/1400 for extended periods simply by setting the fan control to manual and leaving it @~70% or so. Noisy but effective. I've had few overclocking problems that could not be addressed by a reduction in temperature--which I was a bit surprised about.

Afterburner 2.2.0 actually would allow me to adjust the gpu voltage as the program allows me to unlock it, but even Afterburner doesn't allow a gpu overclock > 960MHz, which I can darn near reach with stock voltage--so I've had no need to adjust the voltage. I dropped back to 900/1300, though, for the time being. This little XFX 5770 1gig has turned out to be quite a nice little card, actually.

I generally don't overclock--but every now and then the bug hits and I'll see what I can do--safely. Right now I'm enjoying a 700MHz overclock on my cpu with no adjustment in stock gpu voltage (from 2.9GHz to 3.6GHz) that is stable in everything I've run--including Witcher 2, Skyrim, and lots of other stuff. Not too shabby considering this cpu has two 1-meg L2's.

[caveman-jim]

did you unlock unofficial overclocking in the msi ab ini file?

[oozz77]

Hey WaltC,

I'm in a similar position to you where I am looking at upgrading my card (but whole system soon too) so I finally decided to see how far my 5770 would go.

I had a thread in the General Radeon under "safe temps for 5770"

This is one post of mine.

I kept pushing this last night and got the core to 1090 and left mem at 1300 and temps hit only 82c and fan got to 82 so I am quite surprised by the overclock!!

Played a couple of games only for a short time with no problems!

Seems to have been a great card for it's time and price!!!

As you can see, I was amazed to see my core go to 1090c without crashing and fan and temps stayed at 82c!!

Maybe you can lower the ram speed and up the core- but I don't know which is more beneficial as I haven't done exhaustive benchmarking!! Just not worth it as I did get a fair boost in FPS in the games I still play!!!