Yet another sneaky Nvidia trick

[ArchAngel777]

Ok, I finished reading the rest. I don't really see a problem with what they are doing, perse, but I think it should be clear that you could overclock 9600GT without messing with the PCE-E bus and get the same result... In fact, I'd argue that is more 'safe'. I personally do not like the idea of the PCI-E bus going beyond specification. I remember the AGP days where a lot of boards did not have the ability to lock it, so an overclocking would result in 75Mhz+ when it was supposed to be running at 66Mhz... This DID in fact kill cards, and it killed one of mine. It did nothing for performance though...

I think what needs to be made clear to potential buys is that comparing the 9600GT to the 8800GT or any other card at this point is not quite fair, as the clock speed of the 9600GT gets a free, behind the scenes overclock.

I'd say, overclock both cards, then test them. Or report the actual speeds of the core, shader and memory from within RivaTuner.

This also explains why some of the people think that the 9600GT has some magical core tweaks behind it. But it looks like a simple behind the scenes overclock has been done... I suppose that could be considered a core tweak, but I wouldn't really call it a wanted feature.

 

[krnmastersgt]

Originally posted by: ArchAngel777
Ok, I finished reading the rest. I don't really see a problem with what they are doing, perse, but I think it should be clear that you could overclock 9600GT without messing with the PCE-E bus and get the same result... In fact, I'd argue that is more 'safe'. I personally do not like the idea of the PCI-E bus going beyond specification. I remember the AGP days where a lot of boards did not have the ability to lock it, so an overclocking would result in 75Mhz+ when it was supposed to be running at 66Mhz... This DID in fact kill cards, and it killed one of mine. It did nothing for performance though...

I think what needs to be made clear to potential buys is that comparing the 9600GT to the 8800GT or any other card at this point is not quite fair, as the clock speed of the 9600GT gets a free, behind the scenes overclock.

I'd say, overclock both cards, then test them. Or report the actual speeds of the core, shader and memory from within RivaTuner.

This also explains why some of the people think that the 9600GT has some magical core tweaks behind it. But it looks like a simple behind the scenes overclock has been done... I suppose that could be considered a core tweak, but I wouldn't really call it a wanted feature.

What I said a few posts back, and like Zap said this just makes the card look better HOWEVER it should only be doing the automatic pci bus increase on nvidia boards with the linkboost technology. Otherwise it shold be operating as any normal card would. As for OCing the card and getting the same results, I think a higher OC can be achieved with a pci bus Oc along with a card OC. Might kill the card but you'd have a nice run with it anyways.

 

[JACKDRUID]

After reading the whole 4 pages, I guess it is a rather good undocumented 'feature' after all... its basically a warrentied automatic overclocking for all users... nice

 

[krnmastersgt]

Originally posted by: JACKDRUID
After reading the whole 4 pages, I guess it is a rather good undocumented 'feature' after all... its basically a warrentied automatic overclocking for all users... nice

All users with Link Boost nvidia boards o.o While it may put some people off that the card gets such nice benches due to ocing the pci bus, most nvidia fans, with nvidia boards, would see that as a huge plus.

 

[vanvock]

" I remember the AGP days where a lot of boards did not have the ability to lock it, so an overclocking would result in 75Mhz+ when it was supposed to be running at 66Mhz... This DID in fact kill cards...."

That's what I was thinking of.

@ krnmastersgt, not that it would oc the componet itself but the bus it operates on which must (it seems to me)have some effect on it

 

[thilanliyan]

nm

 

[vanvock]

Originally posted by: thilan29
Isn't HDD corruption possible with increased PCI-e speed?

What about this concern?

 

[ArchAngel777]

Originally posted by: krnmastersgt
What I said a few posts back, and like Zap said this just makes the card look better HOWEVER it should only be doing the automatic pci bus increase on nvidia boards with the linkboost technology. Otherwise it shold be operating as any normal card would. As for OCing the card and getting the same results, I think a higher OC can be achieved with a pci bus Oc along with a card OC. Might kill the card but you'd have a nice run with it anyways.

You could be right, but I am not so sure. I think the chip will start artifacting at the same core speed anyway. Unless the PCE-E bus overclock gives the card more voltage, thus allowing a higher core clock. I am sure after this post we will start to figure out more... Even more interesting is in another thread, it has been found that the driver gave a boost to the 9600GT as well, with the compression technology. I am starting to think that nVidia is getting worried, worried enough to be doing things like that. I consider both of those shady, as the drivers for the 9600GT can be modded to work with the existing G92 and anyone can overclock their cards. Hey, just my opinion.

 

[krnmastersgt]

Didn't jared mean to say that the driver was doing the pci bus oc therefore explaining the performance boost? In any case I like this little pci bus OC stuff, I hope the GTX can report similar stats.

 

[ArchAngel777]

Originally posted by: krnmastersgt
Didn't jared mean to say that the driver was doing the pci bus oc therefore explaining the performance boost? In any case I like this little pci bus OC stuff, I hope the GTX can report similar stats.

If that is true, I will not see any performance difference as I am running a P35 based motherboard. Time will tell...

 

[krnmastersgt]

Originally posted by: ArchAngel777

Originally posted by: krnmastersgt
Didn't jared mean to say that the driver was doing the pci bus oc therefore explaining the performance boost? In any case I like this little pci bus OC stuff, I hope the GTX can report similar stats.

If that is true, I will not see any performance difference as I am running a P35 based motherboard. Time will tell...

Maybe the drivers now OC the pci bus on any board :Q

 

[Tempered81]

no the 174 drivers give a substantial boost to all g92 cards and to some g84, g86 etc regardless of pci or pci-e frequency. Anything above g80 will see a boost in performance when upgrading from 160xxx series drivers. It's just another interesting point why the g94 is performing so well.

 

[ArchAngel777]

Originally posted by: jaredpace
no the 174 drivers give a substantial boost to all g92 cards and to some g84, g86 etc regardless of pci or pci-e frequency. Anything above g80 will see a boost in performance when upgrading from 160xxx series drivers. It's just another interesting point why the g94 is performing so well.

Does the 8800ULTRA fall under G80, since it is just an overclocked G80, or does it go by another code name?

 

[Tempered81]

i think an ultra is a 90nm G80.

so from this article you can see that the core clock of the 9600gt is not always a real reading. In some performance tests you may get a boost, yet think you are running 675mhz core.. pretty interesting.

someone at XS said this:
"
Think about reviews then.
Without the reviewers and the readers knowing it, they are comparing an
overclocked 9600GT with the other cards, which are still at stock speeds.
It's easy to perform well that way. In the sports world, this would be called
doping."

So its like a card on roids pretending to be a regular card. this is probably the plan on the 9800 series as well.

You might read 700mhz but it might be running at 770 or something.

Whoa.
"
And btw, who said that RivaTuner is the ultimate tool for Nvidia cards? It's just a program made by a russian dude to overclock cards. If no other tool out there confirms this I'm not buying it...

3dmark 2006 Fill Rate Multi-Texturing with different pci-e frquency and same clocks = different score

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...3&postcount=74


Btw:

3dmark 2006 with 675mhz & pci-e auto = 10900 marks

3dmark 2006 with "675mhz" & pci-e 110Mhz = 11600 marks

3dmark 2006 with 743mhz & pci-e auto = 11500 marks

3dmark 2006 with "743mhz" & pci-e 110mhz (817Mhz) = Crash"

 

[lopri]

Very interesting. It does have a point to call what NV's doing is a shady tactic, since I don't remember reading any 9600 GT reviews with this thing pointed out. Also to be noted is that this will only take place on NV chipsets if true. If you guys remember the 780i debut articles, the 780i SPP is not a native PCIe 2.0 part, but rather a massively overclocked PCIe 1.0 part that communicates to native PCIe 2.0 part (GF200). On Intel chipsets PCIe base clock maxes around 115MHz and going above will have a great chance of instability. Benchmarking the 9600 GT on 780i board and P35/X38 and comparing the numbers might let us have a better insight on this.

I expect some backlash to NV from reviewers if this is true in that NV essentially rendered reviewers clueless dummies.

 

[Cheex]

Originally posted by: taltamir
i don't see the problem here...

neither do i

 

[BFG10K]

This is yet another possible reason why the 9600 GT is closer to the 8800 GT than people expect. I wonder if the shader clock is being affected too?

And btw, who said that RivaTuner is the ultimate tool for Nvidia cards? It's just a program made by a russian dude to overclock cards. If no other tool out there confirms this I'm not buying it...

It's likely no other tool will confirm it because no other tool is good enough.

 

[Tempered81]

does anyone have a 9600gt 512 with an intel p35 chipset. could they check the pci-e freq. in bios?

 

[vanvock]

From the linked article: My dear friend Unwinder had this to say regarding an update in RivaTuner:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There won't be such an update. I'll always use 25MHz just like the NV driver.

Does this mean the pending .07 wont show it?

 

[SniperDaws]

Originally posted by: jaredpace
So you've heard about the 174 forceware boosting the 9600gt, well check this out...


http://www.techpowerup.com/rev...A/Shady_9600_GT/1.html

At least we know now why the 9600GT keeps up with the 8800GT.

 

[SniperDaws]

Originally posted by: jaredpace
does anyone have a 9600gt 512 with an intel p35 chipset. could they check the pci-e freq. in bios?

what do you want me to check old fruit ?


mine is currently set to 101 instead of auto.

ill do some experiments now, if im to put my pcie at 110 should i back off my overclock of 740/1850/975

 

[Ylurien]

Isn't anyone else worried that overclocking their PCI-E bus is going to cause system instability? It seems like everyone is overjoyed by this news...?

If the PCI-E bus has to be overclocked for a 9600GT to achieve the same (actually slightly worse) results than an 8800 at stock PCI-E speeds, doesn't that mean the product (9600GT)is inferior? I realize that the number of shaders and ROPS and everything is quite different, but for the price, why would anyone still be considering the 9600GT?

I don't want to have to overclock my PCI-E bus just to get close to what I could get if I were to spend a few more dollars on an 8800GT. This new information certainly explains why the 9600GT runs even hotter than the 8800GT.

It seems to me like Nvidia is doing these kinds of things so that they can skip an entire generation of video card technology - and avoid the costs that would have gone into the research and development for that generation - and still maintain a lead over ATi.

 

[Tempered81]

yes overclocking pci-e bus can cause hard disk problems/errors.

yes to sniper - set your clocks to stock if you plan to test 100mhz pcie vs. 110mhz pcie.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: krnmastersgt
Maybe we can finally play Crysis at 19x12 with max settings at over 60 fps.

Am I the only one that doesn't care a whit about Crysis?

Originally posted by: vanvock

Originally posted by: thilan29
Isn't HDD corruption possible with increased PCI-e speed?

What about this concern?

What concern? Aren't most SATA ports either tied to the chipset speed or locked? I think the only worry would be using PCI-E cards, and onboard external chipsets (though those may mostly be PCI not PCI-E).

Originally posted by: BFG10K

And btw, who said that RivaTuner is the ultimate tool for Nvidia cards? It's just a program made by a russian dude to overclock cards. If no other tool out there confirms this I'm not buying it...

It's likely no other tool will confirm it because no other tool is good enough.

Can't this be put to rest by testing it on Intel chipsets to see if the observed (as in benchmarked) performance changes versus an 8800GT on the same board under same conditions?

 

[Demoth]

First of all, this is not a dirty trick nor anything close. Bottom line is you now have a $169 card, which very well could drop below $100 pretty soon, that can beat the $300 midrange from just a few months ago. Also a card that in SLI can compete with top end right now. Don't care how they did it, the power draw is still low relative to it's power.

I'm suspecting Nvidia is looking at ATIs gameplan of a few high performing but efficient GPUs that scale well in a multi-config. We could well see a greater concentration on 2 years down the line for architecture while a heavier emphasis is putting what is already developed into a much better designed SLI platform.

Good riddance to 8400GTs and other garbage cards like it.