Overclocking my 7900GT

[chris21adan]

I recently purchased a 7900GTX 512mb and was wondering if there was any way that I could raise the gpu/ram voltage by modding the bios with Nibitor 2.8a? Has anyone tried? Also, is there any way to remove the memory limit in coolbits 2??? I had nothing but problems with powerstrip and rivatuner does not support my card just yet. Anyone?

 

[Hauk]

Can't answer about Nibitor, but did read that soft mods don't work due to OVP (overvoltage protection) on card. The mods are hard mods. Search for the "7900GT unlocking the beast within" thread. It details both gpu and mem voltage mods. I did the 1.3v volt mod and pencil shading for memory. Perfect results. Conductive pen found at radio shack. Get a better cooling solution with mem cooling though.

On coolbits2, ever thought of using a driverset where the overclocking tab is built in, no registry hacking or third party programs needed? Get nice with these drivers: XTreme-G 84.22.v2

 

[chris21adan]

What kind of "pencil" would I need and if I do end up doing the hard mods, would I be able to "erase" the traces? I would not want to send my card back to the company hard modded just in case the card goes crazy on me.

 

[AzNPinkTuv]

no.2 pencil lol and wash it with iso propyl alchohal if u need to

 

[Arkane13131]

Originally posted by: AzNPinkTuv
no.2 pencil lol and wash it with iso propyl alchohal if u need to

no2 pencil for the memory and a conductive pen for the core

 

[firewolfsm]

instead of searching the entire thread for your post SteelSix, what did 1.3V get you, most people are doing 1.4 but i was considering the smaller increase.

 

[chris21adan]

This sounds really tempting...... If I do for for the hard mod, I'd probably want to aim for 1.5 volts since I already have a 3rd party cooler installed on my card. I would want to hit 650/1800 for sure!

 

[Hauk]

Hey Fire, I debated 1.4v, but knew I didn't want to take core to 650 or higher. I was hoping for 600 on core. With 1.3v on core and mem mod, repeated detect optimal frequencies gave me 606-615 core 910-940 memory.

I'm happy at the following, played Oblivion for a few hours last night perfectly:

EVGA 7900GT Super @ 605/1750
1.3v GPU mod & memory shade mod
Zalman VF900 w/8v from mobo fan header
Idle = 45, load = 53

 

[Hauk]

Oh and Chris, try the 1.4v along with mem mod. You should get where you want to be. If 1.4 only gets you 640 core, be happy. 10Mhz is bragging rights only...

 

[imported_crypt33]

aaagh, you guys are killing me...I really wanna do these mods bu the idea of messing up my card is horrible to a poor boy like myself also, I have yet to find a website WITH CLEAR PICS that shows EXACTLY what to do for these mods (mods that require no soldering...I wouldn't do that in a million years, hehe)...dont have a multimeter either, which seems to be required...normally it wouldn't be abig deal, but the performance increase seems to be so dramatic...grrr

 

[Hauk]

To anyone concerned about doing this, trust me, it's not hard. The hardest part is drawing a decent line with the pen. Actual area is freakin tiny. Do a couple practice lines on paper. My first two attempts looked like crap. I had alcohol q-tips standing by, wiped it off before it dried and did over.

The following pic, disregard everything but the color line for the voltage you want. The other stuff was from an early mod before the smart guys found the pen mod. Focus only on the color line for what voltage you want:
GPU Volt Mod
(and yes, if you want 1.5v, the lines should touch)

Regarding the memory mod, forget everything on this picture except the circled resistor. Find that thing and just give it a few light pencil strokes:
Mem Shading

Do it! The stuff will wipe off later if you need it to. If you're worried about warranty, it takes more time to reattach stock heatsink. An eraser head, alcohol and q-tips are all you'd need in the future....

 

[imported_crypt33]

thanks very much steelsix...very helpful...but for the memory pencil mod, do you just "color" the whole resistor thing lightly on both those tiny "points/contacts"? or on the whole thing? and the areas where it says "measure" are those the areas you use the multimeter on to test the voltage? (I have an electronics whiz friend whose help I may enlist
also: are these mods recommended for use w/ stock cooling or is it just a given that I need to get a Zalman or other solution?

 

[Hauk]

You shade in the top of the resistor, right smack in the middle of the solder points. Be gentle. Do you need to test voltage? I didn't. All the pencil is doing is decreasing resistance across the top of the resistor, just enough for a little more juice to flow.

As far as stock cooling, YES, you gotta put something on those mem modules if you volt mod memory. The stock cooler partially blocks some modules. So it's gotta come off...

 

[samusaraniv]

Originally posted by: SteelSix
You shade in the top of the resistor, right smack in the middle of the solder points. Be gentle. Do you need to test voltage? I didn't. All the pencil is doing is decreasing resistance across the top of the resistor, just enough for a little more juice to flow.

As far as stock cooling, YES, you gotta put something on those mem modules if you volt mod memory. The stock cooler partially blocks some modules. So it's gotta come off...

OK, so you're saying that one should shade in the darker spot (that has the small numbers) BETWEEN the two silver points on the edges of the resistor. Another do0d in another post is saying to shade a U AROUND the bottom edges of the resistor to achieve 2.2V for the memory. What gives??

 

[firewolfsm]

thanks steel, 1.70GHz looks like the average without the volt mod on the mem. Does the mod really bring a performance increase. That is the only one i'm not sure about.

 

[Hauk]

Shade the top of the resistor. It's right there, easiest to get to. Same effect as shading the bottom of the resistor I'm sure.

Fire, I'm sure there's not much real world gain from 1.7 to 1.8ish on memory. I pondered the mem mod too, but did it anyway. For sure, the GPU volt mod is the one that matters...

 

[Kaido]

Originally posted by: SteelSix
To anyone concerned about doing this, trust me, it's not hard. The hardest part is drawing a decent line with the pen. Actual area is freakin tiny. Do a couple practice lines on paper. My first two attempts looked like crap. I had alcohol q-tips standing by, wiped it off before it dried and did over.

The following pic, disregard everything but the color line for the voltage you want. The other stuff was from an early mod before the smart guys found the pen mod. Focus only on the color line for what voltage you want:
GPU Volt Mod
(and yes, if you want 1.5v, the lines should touch)

Regarding the memory mod, forget everything on this picture except the circled resistor. Find that thing and just give it a few light pencil strokes:
Mem Shading

Do it! The stuff will wipe off later if you need it to. If you're worried about warranty, it takes more time to reattach stock heatsink. An eraser head, alcohol and q-tips are all you'd need in the future....

I don't get it; what's the point of the mem mod if the gpu vmod ups the gpu AND mem speed?

 

[morgash]

with my mem runnin at 2.27 volts i hit 1950mhz stable for hours on end. Can run at 2.0ghz but it arts after a while. at 1.4 volts my core maxes at 625mhz. i have the 7900gt vanilla. no CO or KO or special edition, or 2005 platinum edition plus. i have heard the uber editions get better core clocks with less volts. beleive there is a BIG real world difference between 1.7 and 1.95ghz on the mem lol.

Morgash

*EDIT* I'm usin OCZ PureCopper RAMsinks on all my RAM btw. with the zalman vf700Cu pushin full force the GPU stays at about 36C idle and 49C load, the memsinks are cool to the touch when under full load

 

[1Dark1Sharigan1]

Actually I've found that core increases have a much bigger effect on performance than mem increases in contrast to previous cards such as the 7800GT. It seems that the 7900GT still isn't very bandwidth starved even at 650+ MHz. Which is why I don't bother trying to get my RAM higher than it already is (1880).

 

[dman918]

Man, I need to do the pencil mod. Without it, I only get ~790 on the memory...

 

[smut]

Originally posted by: Kaido

Originally posted by: SteelSix
To anyone concerned about doing this, trust me, it's not hard. The hardest part is drawing a decent line with the pen. Actual area is freakin tiny. Do a couple practice lines on paper. My first two attempts looked like crap. I had alcohol q-tips standing by, wiped it off before it dried and did over.

The following pic, disregard everything but the color line for the voltage you want. The other stuff was from an early mod before the smart guys found the pen mod. Focus only on the color line for what voltage you want:
GPU Volt Mod
(and yes, if you want 1.5v, the lines should touch)

Regarding the memory mod, forget everything on this picture except the circled resistor. Find that thing and just give it a few light pencil strokes:
Mem Shading

Do it! The stuff will wipe off later if you need it to. If you're worried about warranty, it takes more time to reattach stock heatsink. An eraser head, alcohol and q-tips are all you'd need in the future....

I don't get it; what's the point of the mem mod if the gpu vmod ups the gpu AND mem speed?

it DOESNT and if it did for some, then they werent at their max mem speed to begin with. The gpu mod ONLY increases volts to the gpu so why would it give more juice to the mem? It doesnt.