Uhhhhh...X1600 in iMac horribly underclocked?

[harveypooka]

Hey, this sounds ace! I have never done anything like this, so just to clarify:

Can this software cause damage to your system?

Will it also speed the card up for MacOSX or is it just when this is running?

Is there anything to worry about or is it just going to cause crashes/resets at the worst?

I just don't want my iMac to be a pool of nice, white goo....

 

[mlrproducts]

It only voids your Applecare if you can't clock it back down! (ie: some idiot with no experience waaaay overclocks it and burns the damn thing up. HINT - if you are getting freezes when playing games, down clock it!)

 

[Lord Blackadder]

Hey, this sounds ace! I have never done anything like this, so just to clarify:

Can this software cause damage to your system?

Yes. Overclocking software merely lets you manually set the speed of the GPU and VRAM. It's entirely up to you to make sure not to set it so high that you damage things.

Will it also speed the card up for MacOSX or is it just when this is running?

Overclocking a card makes everything work better - technically. A small overclock may not be noticable. In fact, sometimes the maximum safe overclock speed produces a negligible increase in performance.

Is there anything to worry about or is it just going to cause crashes/resets at the worst?

I just don't want my iMac to be a pool of nice, white goo....

Worst case scenario - you overheat the card to the point that it fries. Your logic board is ruined, with collateral damage to other internal bits. Cha-Ching $$$$.

The best way to overclock a card is to increase the speed in small increments. If the screen starts producing artifacts or the computer crashes, TURN THE SPEED DOWN. Monitor temperatures carefully. Be aware what a safe temperature range is for your GPU and do not overclock the card to the point that it regularly exceeds that temperature range.

 

[Vlade]

Just to make sure you guys are aware, this voids your AppleCare.

No it doesn't, its ALL software controlled, its just like overclocking the video card with ATICellorator on PPC macs. When I flashed my firmware on my old Geforce2MX on my Powermac that probably voided the applecare!

Does anyone know what the clocks are in Mac OS X?

 

[glorfindeal]

I just ran ATITool 0.25 Beta 14, and it showed that the X1600 in my low-end iMac was running at 313MHz core, 300MHz memory.

So I overclocked it. It's now stable at (no typo) 440MHz core, 576MHz memory. Yes, that is about 50% faster, and FPS readings back that up.

Keep in mind that the Mobility X1600 is supposed to be clocked around 470MHz core, 470MHz memory. The desktop version of the chip is the same, but is clocked about 100MHz+ faster.

It should be able to be pushed even faster when we actually have the fans running properly.

I just ran atitool on my iMac 20". I was able to clock core to 515 and memory to 575. I could have gone higher but I wanted to put in a margin of safety. The tool said I could go as high a 540/594. The default in the 20" iMac is 400/400.

Glor

 

[designed]

I just ran the 3DMark '06 earlier and the fans didn't really engage (altough a slight step up could be heard) so this whole overclocking business is a bit no-go until people start telling their experiences with overclocking and the fans.

Interestingly enough, the 3DMark showed that my X1600 was running at 400MHz processor and 200MHz memory, which seems to be normal when compared to other 3DMark-mac-results. Only my score was quite low compared to them.

Oh yeah, is there a software to pull out any temperature numbers from inside of the mac?

 

[Maxiseller]

It's an interesting point about the AppleCare...

If this is a software solution, it may not void it? And if, heaven forbid, something did go wrong and the logic board died a horrible death it could be extremely difficult for Apple to figure out that it was overclocking that caused the problem in the first place, no?

 

[FarSide]

rethorical

Be carefull boys - a new logicboard won't be covered by apple when you overclocked the GPU on it - start saving money if you don't know what you are doing... $$$

 

[livingfortoday]

Does anyone know of any way to check the speed my Mini's GPU is running at and/or OC it? I'm already playing some games smoothly, if I could tweak it a little bit that'd be nice, though.

 

[MacRumorsReader]

Oh yeah, is there a software to pull out any temperature numbers from inside of the mac?

iStatPro

Find it on Version Tracker... or google

 

[blueflame]

hmm, doesnt work for me

i have a mbp 2.0. in windows XP i installed ATI tools, and then tried to run it, gives me an error saying cannot find bios. which i understand, i just want to know how you all got it to work. thanks very much
andreas

 

[DTG]

Just thought I'd post my findings here after playing with ATITool a little.

My 20" iMac has default core and memory of 400/400.

When I pushed the memory to 410 my screen went black.

When I clicked "Find Max Core" my screen went black and I got the VPURecover Error shortly after.

I don't really want to crap out my system but I am very curious about the capabilities of this card. Should you raise both the core and the memory together to some extent, or would you recommend taking one up and then the other? Or does it not really matter?

DTG

 

[milo]

Just to make sure you guys are aware, this voids your AppleCare.

If it's done via software, would Apple be able to tell if you did this?

 

[Lord Blackadder]

If it's done via software, would Apple be able to tell if you did this?

Yes. The speed settings are saved in the ROM. If you fry the card and take it in for repair a technician could read the ROM, find your overclock setting in there and tell you to get lost.

Of course, you could always change it back to stock numbers before taking it in for repair, assuming the computer is still usable. But OC'ing to failure DOES void your Applecare, and Apple MAY be able to tell, or at least be suspicious enough to give you a hard time.

 

[clykins90]

i have a mbp 2.0. in windows XP i installed ATI tools, and then tried to run it, gives me an error saying cannot find bios. which i understand, i just want to know how you all got it to work. thanks very much
andreas

Make sure you have the new beta version, theres a link to it in this thread.

Odd. I only could get my iMac 17" to 434/517. If i raise the clock any higher my display goes ballistic. I'll try and push the memory a little bit more and post my impressions of AOE3 before and after.

 

[BakedBeans]

is this windows only?

 

[DougTheImpaler]

I wouldn't be surprised. Apple's AIO graphcis solutions have always been underclocked...the same is true of the Radeon 9200 in the Mini and 2004 eMac, as well as the Radeon 9600-based iMac G5's.

 

[harveypooka]

I had a quick hunt on Google to find the standard core speed for this card (could only find the X1600 XT and Pro, not the one in my iMac 20") but they run at 500mhz or so. If the card runs at around that or 450mhz and the card in the iMac is clocked to run at 300mhz, surely we can safely clock it to 450mhz if it's the same. I want to, but am scared....

 

[Diatribe]

I had a quick hunt on Google to find the standard core speed for this card (could only find the X1600 XT and Pro, not the one in my iMac 20") but they run at 500mhz or so. If the card runs at around that or 450mhz and the card in the iMac is clocked to run at 300mhz, surely we can safely clock it to 450mhz if it's the same. I want to, but am scared....

The question is does it make that big of a difference? On paper yes but I mean in reality.

 

[harveypooka]

The guy that started this thread claimed that it does...a 17fps increase from 30 to 47fps. Quite impressive. Just over 50%.

 

[Lord Blackadder]

I had a quick hunt on Google to find the standard core speed for this card (could only find the X1600 XT and Pro, not the one in my iMac 20") but they run at 500mhz or so. If the card runs at around that or 450mhz and the card in the iMac is clocked to run at 300mhz, surely we can safely clock it to 450mhz if it's the same. I want to, but am scared....

The X1600 in the iMac is a Mobility core, so I don't think that it should be clocked as high as the desktop X1600s. If the desktop chips run at 500MHz, expect the Mobility version to be downclocked significantly, and also don't expect it to be as overclockable as the desktop chips.

 

[glorfindeal]

Yes. The speed settings are saved in the ROM. If you fry the card and take it in for repair a technician could read the ROM, find your overclock setting in there and tell you to get lost.

Of course, you could always change it back to stock numbers before taking it in for repair, assuming the computer is still usable. But OC'ing to failure DOES void your Applecare, and Apple MAY be able to tell, or at least be suspicious enough to give you a hard time.

The speed settings are not save in rom. The ATItool must be relaunched if you shut down windows to reestablish the clock speeds.

Glor

 

[eva01]

thanks to this thread i clocked my 9650 up 30%

 

[glorfindeal]

is this windows only?

The ATITool is windows only. There is ATIccelerate but the authour hasn't been able to get it to work on the intel macs yet.

Glor

 

[MRU]

I clocked mine at 500/540 imac 20" X1600 256mb

HalfLife 2 Lost Coast Stress Test

54 Average FPS at 1680x1080 Everything on High, with HDR on Bloom Only. No AA

Without it being clocked same settings..

34 Average FPS..............

That's a considerable difference...