Graphic Cards Complete Guide to Softmodding and Overclocking your GPU

A

Anish

Skilled
Well since nothing like this existed here I created this for noobs to OC'ing...

SOFTMODDING
Softmodding for GPUs is basically defined as tweaking the card using a certain softwares to enhance performance. The softmodding I am talking about here is limited to unlocking of masked pipes on your GPU. I recommend the use of Riva Tuner for softmodding as well as overclocking. The latest version is V2.0 which supports the latest nVidia WHQL 77.72 drivers.

How to unlock pipes ?
Well to start with, unlocking means using extra pipes that the GPU supports but have been masked by the manufacturer for either commercial or other reasons. Now the chipset is fully capable of using these pipes. Unlocking of pipes is best for LE editions, NU cards and stepped down or underclocked versions of higher cards.

1. Run RivaTuner and look at the main tab. You'll see your current graphic processors configuration and amount of active pixel / vertex units in device status string, for example: NV40 (A1,12x1,5vp).

2. Click "Customize" button located at the right of device status string to activate device customization toolbar.

3. Click "Graphics subsystem diagnostic report" button in device customization toolbar to activate RivaTuner's diagnostic module.

4. Scroll down "Report categories" list and tick "NVIDIA VGA BIOS information" report category.

5. Click "Capture report" button in the "Report preview" window to refresh report.
6. Scroll down "Report preview" window and find "NVIDIA VGA BIOS information" manually or simply double click "NVIDIA VGA BIOS information" category name in the "Report categories" list to automatically navigate to "NVIDIA VGA BIOS information" in the "Report preview".

7. Look at line displaying "SW units mask". If you see "none" there, it means that VGA BIOS allow activating all non-hardware masked GPU pixel / vertex units, so your configuration is determined by hardware. In this case, I strictly recommend you to forget about softmodding if you are beginner and if you don't understand what do you do exactly. Power users may proceed and try to activate hardware masked units. If you see something different there (for example, pixel 0001b, vertex 000000b) - you have high chances to unlock software locked units.

8. Click "Low-level system settings" button in device customization toolbar to activate "Low-level system tweaks" panel.

9. Select "NVStrap driver" tab.
10. Press "Install" button if you never installed the driver before. If you already have it installed after the previous version of RivaTuner, ensure that you have followed RivaTuner's warning and updated driver when RivaTuner offered you to do it. If you have mistakenly ignored the warning, simply press "Reinstall" button to update the driver manually.

11. If you are a power user, if you have read the previous questions carefully and understand what does the "Allow enabling masked units" option do, and, the most important, if you understand what side effects can it cause - enable this option. Otherwise proceed with enabling software masked units only.

12. Select "Custom" in the "Active pixel/vertex units configuration" list to activate the "Customize" button, then click it to activate "Custom graphics processor configuration" dialog.

13. Tick all disabled pixel and vertex units and click "OK".

14. Reboot system when prompted.

16. Start RivaTuner and look again at your current graphics processor configuration and amount of active pixel / vertex units in device status string. If you see no changes there - the units you tried to unlock are hardware masked and you have not enabled "Allow enabling hardware masked units" option. Otherwise, if you see desired configuration, - proceed with system stability testing to ensure that unlocked units are really fully functional.
Click to expand...
Whew ! That was quite a lot...

OVERCLOCKING

Compared to softmodding, overclocking is somewhat easier !

Note: Overclocking can be more dangerous than softmodding and I don't take any responsibility for problems caused due to overclocking.

Overclocking in 5 simple steps :
1.Open Riva Tuner and under driver settings locate low level system settings.
2. There you will see you your current clock settings. Select Performance 3D from the menu.
3. Then slowly increase your core clock by about 10 Mhz and memory clock by about 15-17 Mhz depending on your card.
4. Click on the test changes button and wait for it to test the stability of your card.
5. Keep doing this till you find your system unstable and thn revert back to the best settings. Use games like Far Cry, Doom 3 and software like 3D Mark to test the stability of your overclock.

Simple isn't it ?

Have fun !

 
Well I think this thread deserves some replies if not more. It took me almost half and hour to type and format it.
 
Chaos said:
Hm... good job. But you should have mentioned for GeForce 6800 only in the title :)
Click to expand...
Thanks Chaos, but this is applicable to all cards, its just the number of pixel and vertex pipes that change !

We can gather some more comments and then reformat then post if felt necessary...

anishcool posted 1.82 minutes later:
Blade_Runner said:
Will rep you if you prove that unclolocking the extra pipes has improved ur performance. I want benchies with and without the mod. ;)
Click to expand...
No problem. I dont have 3D Mark with me now, and its too big to download, what evidence are you looking for, I can post D3 screenshots...
 
Nice.... but it is for total newbies...... Everyone else will more or less have found out through a miracle called "google" :bleh:

But nice effort........ as Blade, said...... run some benchies to show the difference. And only D3 will not be enough..... use Fraps and run the test for many more games like Far Cry, HL2, etc.... and of course 3dmarks.

If we don't know the difference between an unlocked and a locked card, what is the use??
 
hey Blade....

Any place to download Doom3 timedemo ?? I am downbloading all the 3 files you have recommended.... Is Doom3 in the third link ???
 
11. If you are a power user, if you have read the previous questions carefully and understand what does the "Allow enabling masked units" option do, and, the most important, if you understand what side effects can it cause - enable this option. Otherwise proceed with enabling software masked units only.

12. Select "Custom" in the "Active pixel/vertex units configuration" list to activate the "Customize" button, then click it to activate "Custom graphics processor configuration" dialog.
Click to expand...

ALL these items (everything under the "Graphics Processor Configuration" Line) are greyed out and I cannot change them.

I have a Leadtek 5900 non-ultra card. Does this procedure only work for 6-series Nvidia cards, or did I miss a step?
(In addition, I could not find any line called "SW units mask" under the "Report Preview.")
 
kopema said:
ALL these items (everything under the "Graphics Processor Configuration" Line) are greyed out and I cannot change them.

I have a Leadtek 5900 non-ultra card. Does this procedure only work for 6-series Nvidia cards, or did I miss a step?
(In addition, I could not find any line called "SW units mask" under the "Report Preview.")
Click to expand...
Only works for 6200(NV43 core)/6800 cards and nothing else!
 
Back
Top