OC isn't any better?

[drinfernoo]

I have a Radeon HD7870, running three monitors in Eyefinity, 5760x1080. I've been thinking about OC'ing my card in order to possibly push higher settings at higher framerates. My problem is, I've been upping my clock in AMD Overdrive, and then benchmarking with FurMark, and I'm not seeing _any_ improvement. I OC'ed my card from 1000MHz to 1200MHz (in 10MHz steps), and I saw no change in framerates at all.

My settings in FurMark are as follows:

Fullscreen, 5760x1080, 8x MSAA, Dynamic Background, Burn-in, Xtreme Burn-in, Post-FX, 45000ms

I run the user settings benchmark for 45ms, and I get an average frame rate of 15fps. I saw no change from 1000MHz all the way to 1200MHz, like I said, except my card was running hotter. What's going on? Shouldn't I see some improvement? First time OC'er, by the way :P

EDIT: The current game I'm playing (Borderlands 2 :)), I get 17-25fps with everything turned to max:
VSync, Ambient Occlusion, Depth Of Field, 16x Anisotropic Filtering, High Bullet Decals, Far Foliage Distance, High Texture Quality, High Game Detail, Ultra High View Distance, High PhysX (even though it's an AMD card :P), FXAA, 5760x1080. I get about 57-60fps at 1920x1080, same settings.

[Haldi]

you don't meassure Performance increase from overclocking with FurMark!

You use Unigine Heaven Benchmark, 3D Mark 11 or any Game of choice without VSync.

[drinfernoo]

Aha! I should've known :P

Question: Why?

[crispy]

Aha! I should've known :P

Question: Why?

mind if i jump im here?
its one thing getting better scores with benchmarking software
but the real test is actual games after all thats why u want to overclock in the 1st place isnt it to get better fps playing games
all to often u could get a performance boost in a benchmarking prog because u overlocked but little benifit during playing a game (in my experience)
i personly dont overclock i havnt for about 2yrs
i didnt see much benifit in respect to mhz that i overclocked to fps that i gained
and cpu overclocking in my experience did little in games and only gave me a slightly better benchmark score

i thought that overclocking my gpu by300+mhz and my cpu by well over a 1ghz extra would yield great performance boost in games
but the boost ratio was very dissopinting to be honest

[Jagra67]

Hi.

First OC advise - Cooling the entire system, not just the GPU

Second OC advise - If you´re not getting more FPS, you are just waste resources;

My opnion: Try add more hardware or better ajustment of the in-game options

[Haldi]

mind if i jump im here?

Thats what a Forum is here for :) discussions not private talk!

Well, How much you OC and how much gain you have always depends on the Hardware!
My HD7970 scale pretty well! Even in Crossfire!


But in some degree i have to agree with you! There is no real difference from 55 to 65 FPS ingame!
But on the other hand you might only Drop to 38fps on a heavy graphic point while not overclocked you might drop below 33FPS!

P.S CPU overclocking.... in Games which only have 20-40% CPU load, and with a CPU that auto clocks to 3.8ghz thanks to Turbo Modus... IMHO no real benefit ^^ Stock works fine with most new CPU's!

[crispy]

I see nice results there using that bench mark program,
I like using that myself. Looks awesome on triple monitor!
but again what about real life situations eg games?
Benchmark programs are superficial to me
Games should be the real benchmarking tools

[Haldi]

i wholeheartly agree with you!

I'm kinda sure i had the exact same graph in Crysis (2... ?) but sadly not yet uploaded, and i'm on my laptop right now.

If i ever remember it when i'm back on my PC i'll upload that ;)

[drinfernoo]

I'm not really worried about my other hardware.

XFX Radeon HD 7870 Double-D
AMD FX-4170 Quad-core @ 4.2GHz
Corsair 16GB DDR3 @ 1600MHz
MSI 990FXA-GD80

My problem is, I don't drop below 33 fps, with everything up. I drop below 20 fps :(

I'd like to grab another video card, but at this point, I'm broke, so I'm saving up any way I go, but I'm trying to decide between Crossfiring with another 7870, getting a 7970, or a GTX 680. I do the Eyefinity thing now, and I've never tried Surround, but I've heard that it's good. I'm also not sure that I can run three monitors off of one 680.

[drinfernoo]

However, I don't know how Eyefinity and Surround stack up to each other, standing alone or in Crossfire/SLI.

[crispy]

dont worry you can run 3 monitors off 1 680
it was about time that nvidia finally jumped on the 1gpu card running 3 monitors that amd have been doing for a while now
so go for that if its financially possible

[drinfernoo]

dont worry you can run 3 monitors off 1 680
it was about time that nvidia finally jumped on the 1gpu card running 3 monitors that amd have been doing for a while now
so go for that if its financially possible

But will a 680 be able to handle 5760x1080 maxed? Or should I go for two of whatever card?

[Wijkert]

[quote]dont worry you can run 3 monitors off 1 680
it was about time that nvidia finally jumped on the 1gpu card running 3 monitors that amd have been doing for a while now
so go for that if its financially possible

But will a 680 be able to handle 5760x1080 maxed? Or should I go for two of whatever card?

Maxed what? Battlefield 3 no, MW3 yes. It really depends on the particular game, but definitely not all.

[drinfernoo]

I suppose that's true. Currently I'm playing Borderlands 2, but I do have BF3 Premium too :) I also play lots of Minecraft, but that's more CPU intensive than anything :P I suppose it depends on the game how well Crossfire/SLI scales as well? For example, two cards isn't necessarily going to increase performance in one game, but it might in another, or by different degrees?

[crispy]

I'm playing borderlands @ 5760x1080
And it plays smooth

[drinfernoo]

I'm playing borderlands @ 5760x1080
And it plays smooth

What card with what settings? And how smooth is "smooth"? Because mine runs around 30fps, with most stuff on high, but I have to turn off AF and AA is only 2x.