Factory Underclocked CARDS Question

[Drivenby]

So i recently bought a Jetway X1950-PRO PCI-E and i'm in a BIG dilemma. MY card comes with the core clock at 575 MGHZ (standard for this card) and 590 Memory Clock (100 MGHZ lower than the standard , 690).... Why would they do this? , to add a cheaper FAN or sink?..

well anyways i wanted to overclock it to factory standards to give it a try but 100MGHZ is A LOT.. specially considering that MY card doesn't support ATI OVERDRIVE and there's no way i can get TEMPERATURE READ OUTS .. Not even with Riva Tuner or ATI TOOL.. someone recommended using SPEED FAN but i have no idea how to use it and i only get TEMP's for my HDD's , CPU , AMBIENT and REMOTE (what is this? , is this my GPU?)... so the only way i have left is using ATI TOOL artifact CHECK to see if it overheats (i assume that if i don't get ARTIFACTS , then it means it's not overheating) ..

so what would you people do ? (please don't recommend me buying another card , i have had this for less than a month)

Also is the 100 MGZ difference very BIG ? (FPS-wise)

 

[Didou]

Maybe the card's memory was lowered because it didn't pass the stability tests at a higher speed. Feel free to overclock as you would any other component meaning you raise the speed by 5MHz steps & after every clock change you test the stability of the card with benchmarks & games, etc.

If the card remains stable & if you don't have any visual artefacts you are good to go. Just keep in mind that changing the clock speed voids your warranty so if your card fails after a few weeks/months you won't be able to replace it.

As for the performance increase you won't know what it brings until you try it. Good luck.

 

[Gavin_Capacitor]

Overclocking technically voids your warranty, but I have returned parts that I have OC'ed (they didn't die because of the OC, of course). And I have an 8400GS that I have OC from 459/400 (core/memory) to 575/500. Totally stable after hours of team fortress 2, and could go a bit higher. (Im just too lazy to test for artifacts again and again for an extra 9mhz lol) If I were you I would go for it - ive never seen a card underclocked before.