Overclocking MSI R7 260x 2gbddr5 OC

The_Koxy · Nov 9, 2015

Few simple questions such as, does it void warranty? How dangerous it is? Should I even do it since I don't have really good motherboard for it (Gigabyte GA-970A-DS3P). Do I need to know more about overclocking, like stuff about voltages and things, like cpu, or is it just simple? And can my PSU handle it, it's 500W - Chieftec GPS-500A8.

Cheers

<edited by mod for language - please keep in mind that this is a family friendly forum; choose your words accordingly>

The_Koxy · Nov 9, 2015

Oh ye, just to add that the fan is mostly running around 50% and cooling the graph pretty god damn good at stock clocks

cdabc123 · Nov 9, 2015

install msi afterburner and increase clock till its not stable anymore then increase voltage a bit. its pretty easy. i have never killed a gpu overclocking and my overclocked gpus have been going strong for years. i also dont believe it voids the warranty. your psu should handle it and the mobo shouldnt matter.

Unolocogringo · Nov 9, 2015

First please watch the language.
A moderator will probably edit it out and give you a warning if it is your first time.
As far as overclocking it is pretty simple with graphics cards.
Download MSI Afterburner and Kombuster found here.
http://gaming.msi.com/features/afterburner
Start out with slow increments 25mhz at a time and test for 15 minuter with Kombuster.
Raise another 25mhz and test again.
Repeat until the test fails.
Go back to your last good setting and raise it 5 mhz and test.
Repeat until it fails. Now back off 10 mhz and do a 4 hour Kombuster test.
We are looking for errors and temperatures.
If temps get to high, you need to go into Afterburner setting and create a custom fan profile to increase fan speed for better cooling.

Once you get a stable onerclock place a check mark for start overclocking with windows start up.

Voltages are a much trickier opposition and need to be very carefully manipulated. A small increase with a overclocked core will produce a lot more heat than you would think. It is not linear at all. Depending on core speed it can be almost 5 times the amount of heat produced when you are overclocking.
So start with just Core speed overclocking and see how far you can get with complete stability first.
Some chips overclock very good without voltage adjustments and others do not overclock at all. They are already running at their max clocks.

The_Koxy · Nov 9, 2015

Sorry about the language. So you are both saying that it is safe for me, who don't know anything about this, to overclock it? Implying that I don't mess with voltages? So what I didn't know before this, if I understood it well, I can increase clock speeds as long as it's stable, without touching voltages? While for increasing clocks even higher I would have to increase voltages too? So for example in MSI AB I can slide clock from stock 1175 to 1320 and when I do that, I don't change voltages at all? Same for memory clock. Also, how much is it worth that slight clock increase, in terms of FPS, for example in game like cs go. And what does power limit in MSI FB mean, should that stay un touched as well? And last thing would be can I get confirmation that It doesn't void warranty?

Unolocogringo · Nov 9, 2015

Overclocking is fairly safe as long as you do it correctly.
Don't just slide the slider all of the way to the right and apply.
Also do not put a check mark in the start overclocking at windows start up until you a certain your overclock is stable.

The power limit is a electrical/thermal limit in the driver. Increasing the power limit allows the card to draw more power at higher thermal limits. Which in turn allows the card to keep a higher overclock without throttling down
As an example my card will run a 1267 as long as it is below 70 degrees celsius, as son as it reaches 70c it down clocks to 1254. at 80 it down clocks to 1241 etc...
Most video card companies publish their own overclocking software. But they put limits on how far you can overclock.
As long as you stay within their limits it does not void your warranty. If you hack the bios on the card to allow higher clocks and voltages it will void your warranty.
You will be using MSI Afterburner on a MSI card so your warranty will still be good as long as you do not flash a modded bios onto the card.

Unolocogringo · Nov 9, 2015

Depending on the game you will see somewhat linear increase in performance with the overclockto a point.
A 10% overclock will yield between a 8-10% FPS increase in GPU bound games. If the game is CPU bound you will see little to no difference in performance.
Since yours is a lower end card you will see an increase in the games you mentioned as long as you CPU is fast enough.

Unolocogringo · Nov 9, 2015

Increase clocks until it becomes unstable.
Then slightly increase voltage. one notch, do not just slide it to the far right.
Check to see if it is now stable.
If so increase core speed until it becomes unstable again or temperature get too high.
One it becomes unstable again and temps are OK you can increase voltage slightly again and check for stability and temps.

The idea is to keep the voltage as low as possibl while running the core as fast as possible.
If you increase the voltage to the max to begin with you will hit the thermal/power limit at a lot lower clocks and not get as high core speed as you would get at a lower voltage. So only increase voltage when needed to reach the next level.
Once you get to a certain point increasing the voltage will not increase the overclock as you have reached the chips maximum speed or the thermal/power limit and increasing voltage will result in a lower overclock.

The_Koxy · Nov 9, 2015

So where is says max clock is 1320, does that mean it's max clock while having to increase voltages as well, or is it max clock if you don't increase voltage? So what should I do with power limit then? Can it damage my PSU and is it even needed/recommended to increase it? Or is it only needed when you increase voltage as well? Also I got a problem that MSI Kombuster won't start, there's that "working in background" mouse sign, and then nothing happens, any idea?

Unolocogringo · Nov 9, 2015

Every chip and card is different as the silicone they are made out of is purer near the center of the wafer than it is near the edges.
You may reach max clocks without any voltage adjustment.
You may reach max clocks with a slight voltage adjustment. or you may reach max clocks with the max voltage adjustment.
Then you may not reach max clocks no matter what you do to the card.
Some will just not run that fast
It is what we call the silicone lottery. You never know what kind of silicone your chip has until you start overclocking.
Nothing is guaranteed, except that it will run at default clocks.
.

Unolocogringo · Nov 9, 2015

Never had that problem with Kombuster. You might try uninstalling and reinstalling it.
If you have more problems with it you can download Furmark and use it to test with.
http://www.geeks3d.com/20150828/furmark-1-17-0-gpu-stress-test-opengl-benchmark/

These test push your card to the limit. They make it easy to see if you are stable or are going to overheat while gaming pretty fast.

The_Koxy · Nov 9, 2015

Ok so I had to install the 32bit version instead of 64, talking about Kombustor. Am I looking at specific settings when testing or? there are quite few but using common sense any that gets it to work on 100% load should do? Even tho it's some openGL 4 and not even direct X. Also if I am not getting too annoying now, I would need help with that power limit, and with question can it do harm to PSU.

The_Koxy · Nov 9, 2015

Oh yeah, there are also two stress tests, 3D and Kmark(PsyhX) with various settings. Also you said I am looking for errors and temperatures, and since there is no actual errors count or something, how do I recognize them

cdabc123 · Nov 9, 2015

look for artifacts shadows and just imperfections in the image

Unolocogringo · Nov 9, 2015

No you have a fair power supply. Not great,but not complete crap either
But at the same time you video card will not push it any where near its limit.
Your video card will pull 150 watts max when fully loaded, so you have plenty of power to spare.
Your total system draw will be 300 to 375 watts depending on your other components.
300 to 325 is probably close, but you could have some high end power hungry components or lots of lighting etc.... that would push it higher.

The_Koxy · Nov 9, 2015

I've fx6300, It shouldn't use too much power. Anyway, so what increase am I looking at since it's percents? I don't want to over do it. Also it's just some rocky ball, not sure if it's gonna be easy to spot imperfections, or is it? I mean doeas image go crazy or? And I just did stress test again and it drops from 100% load, so I guess I need to fix that as well?

cdabc123 · Nov 9, 2015

from my experiance when you push a card too far it will either just lose display and you might have to reboot and lower it or it will start flashing shadows and flipping out

The_Koxy · Nov 10, 2015

Ok guys, so I did overclocking and tests for some time now, and it went smoothly all the way to max clock offered, 1320. So when I did stress tests with kombustor everything was working perfectly, but when I started playing the game drivers started crashing with message display drivers has stop responding... I had that happen to me before if I had too many big processes started, but this time I made sure there is no any. Also then I just tried downclocking it which caused total black screen and had to restart. Is there any help with the drivers? I am using the latest one

Unolocogringo · Nov 10, 2015

Some games and programs are not overclocking friendly.
Different drivers are varying amounts overclocking friendly.
I do not own any AMD video cards so I can not help with which version to use for best overclocking results.
Add OCCT to your overclocking tools, it runs stress tests and checks for errors.
http://www.ocbase.com/index.php/download

Overclocking is something that can take minutes (minor overclocking of a few percent) or days( major 10% or more) to get right.
A 4 hour stress test is the minimum suggested, but I stress for at least 24 hours to insure complete stability when overclocked.
I run Folding@ Home so everything has to have server grade stability to complete work units without errors.
It can be accomplished but you have to be willing to take the time and effort for 100% complete successful overclock.
It is not slide a couple sliders and run a 5 minute stress test and call it good proposition.

The_Koxy · Nov 10, 2015

Ok then, I will be going to be overclocking and testing in next couple of days and see how it goes. Thanks a lot for help!!

The_Koxy · Nov 10, 2015

I'll have to ask one last question. It's about that OCCT program. When I run for error checks it just shows me some picture which uses very little of GPU power, so it doesn't stress it at all. So should I combine it somehow with Kombustor? like checking for errors while I stress it with kombustor or something. Or does it also work to leave it in background while gaming?

Unolocogringo · Nov 10, 2015

The pictures are not pretty or actively moving much,but it is stressing your video card between 97-100% load.
You can check this by looking at the afterburner graph or the temperature graph in OCCT.
Make sure you are running it in full screen mode.
Also make sure you set the resolution to your monitors native resolution

Unolocogringo · Nov 10, 2015

The_Koxy :

I was a noobie like yourself ,way back in 1996, I found this site and learned a lot over the years, so now I try to help others, like I was helped in my beginnings.
So you are quite welcome for the help and anything else you do not understand or need a little help getting at grasping or understanding ,just post back and I will do my best to try to help.

The_Koxy · Nov 10, 2015

Alright then, that's it. Thanks again!

Overclocking MSI R7 260x 2gbddr5 OC

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