# Query on overclocking ATI 9800 Pro 128MB



## Celebryn (Aug 5, 2004)

I have looked and cant find anything to do with overclocking this card. But since this card doesnt come with Overdrive..

I have never really thought about overclocking my Sapphire Radeon, but I am now curious how one would go about doing this.

Is it worth doing?

Is it hard to do?

Is it worth the risk? (after finally stopping the shutdown problems, and being unsure what it was I actually did, I am reluctant to fiddle around with it).

If someone could give me some furter info on their experiences with overclock Radeons, it would be appreciated. ray:


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## Camzl1 (Dec 9, 2004)

*9800's don't OC all that well*

Two things.

Is your 9800 running on an R350 or R360 Core?

Are you using stock cooling?

My Card Built by ATI was terrible at OC ing untill I replaced The heatsink and FAN. for me ThermalTake makes a good but Heavy Cooling solution for your Card (Extreme Giant 3) http://www.thermaltake.com/coolers/chipset/a1919.htm

Now they have a very quiet one no fans at all.

Also you will want an over clocking tool such as (ATI Tool) this tool features an artifact tester to test your settings and if you want to wait, will automatically find your fastest settings with no artifacts for you.
Let it work at night when you are asleep.

http://www.techpowerup.com/atitool/

Hope this gets you started well. Good luck


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## Celebryn (Aug 5, 2004)

I have no idea what core I am running. How do I find out? What difference does the core make out of interest and what does it do?

I havent done anything to change it since I bought it. Though I play with one side leaning against the tower to let air in and heat out, and to stop dog hairs flying in :laugh: , but I dont have problems with heat as I am now.

I am not comfortable changing anything physical, like taking fans off the card and replacing them fans, but I would look into software to change things, as long sa the card didnt overheat.


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## Camzl1 (Dec 9, 2004)

Hey,

The R350 was the first release of the 9800 series and the R360 was the second.

But apparently the R360 doesn't exist on ATI's website but R350 does, it is in magazines.

Anyway, you kinda answered your own question: 

If you don't want to take off your Stock heatsink and change out hardware that's ok. Also if you ever decide on taking off the stock heatsink, there you will find what core you are running on the chip. Going from one core to the other was efficiency improvements. Bringing more air in will be good noise level will be up. Again Software tuning is what you are looking to do, then again may I suggest ATI Tool. It will do the settings for you automatically to overclock and of course allow you to manually change and test for artifacts.
Overclocking can be stable and most vendors give (lee way) in that area. The key word is heat. Take your time and I am sure you will be fine. If you decide to use ATI tool and do things manually, take small increments and start with the GPU (settings) first and test them out. Then go to the memory clock frequency settings. My experience with this card (mine Built by ATI) was a weak OC'er but I think yours being a sapphire will be an even better stock OC'er because they put better heatsinks on anyway.


Hope this helps


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## alottabeef4u (Dec 1, 2004)

Actually Sapphires have one of the lowest overclocking rates of all the radeon manufacturers.


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