# ATITool crashes on x850xt



## drake (Nov 20, 2005)

I've tried two different x850xt cards, and both crash when using ATITool .24.  The first card would only crash when trying to abort, and only made it to a core speed of 537.  Took it back (had other issues as well) and this one went up to 572 core without artifacts then locked up (distored screen, computer lockup)after ten minutes. The temp at lockup was 74c degrees.  ATI's own Overclock utility said it could do 594/614.  Is it the card or could something be conflicting with the program?


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## Solaris17 (Nov 20, 2005)

^ try the newest beta.


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## drake (Nov 20, 2005)

Just tried the beta, it crashed too.  This time I got to 15m of run time, but with artifacts starting at 581 with a core temp of 72c (after 9m of running).  Keeps dropping to 578, reaches 74c then crashes then after a minute gives me a rainbow across my screen and locks solid.  When people do these tests, are they using stock cooling and running the fan at standard speed (14 percent)?  Seems like mine gets nasty when it approaches 75c.

Now, like I said, this is the second card I've had, I dont' want to take another back.  Could something in my system be conflicting with this test?


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## drake (Nov 21, 2005)

No ideas?


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## zOaib (Nov 21, 2005)

do u ahve an ati made card or some other manufacturer ??/ and is pci express


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## drake (Nov 21, 2005)

Its a genuine ATI x850xt AGP.


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## zOaib (Nov 21, 2005)

gotcha , i was starting to get worried cause i had an asus x850 xt on the way , but mine is pci-express ................. hopefully i dont get this same prob !


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## drake (Nov 22, 2005)

I want to thank everyone for jumping in to give me a hand on this one.  That's what makes using such boards the wonderful experience it is. [sarcasm mode off]


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## BCK (Nov 22, 2005)

I have a VisionTek 850XT and I am running ATITool 0.24 without issue. Running on an NF4 MB w/ XP Pro SP2.

I also run ATITray tools.  In fact, I run the tray tools to normally under clock my card and go into OC mode as a function of starting a 3D game.  I also use the tray tools to control my fan speed relative to temps and monitor temps.  I rarely get over 52degC.  I am running an Artic Cooler; keeps it cooler, get a slightly higher OC (additional 1%) and its so much quiter than the stock cooler.  The Ati Tray tool has an auto Fmax mode like ATITool but I have found that the tray tool is overly optimistic and does not stress the card as much as the ATITOOL.  The ATITOOL results in lower GPU & MEM Fmax but if I use those frequencies, I wont see artifacts during benchmarks or gaming.

I am also running Catalyst 5.9 drivers from ATI.  5.11 are available but I haven't tried em yet.  I'm not sure if this could affect ATIOTOOL or not.

So then, back to your problem.  It could be that your GPU is just getting too hot.  Have you removed the heatsink and checked its contact patch?  Perhaps some artic silver would help?  I also highly recommend the Artic cooler products, if for nothing else the lower sound levels.

Good Luck - BCK


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## arnoldo (Nov 22, 2005)

For the temp, I suggest you to replace the stock cooling. I've seen some of my friends use Artic Cooling and I think it does a good job in cooling the card. 
As for the clocks...It could be caused by power issue. Make sure that your PSU wattage is powerful enough for the active peripheral on your PC. I got this power issue before and it's fixed by replacing PSU.


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## drake (Nov 22, 2005)

Would removing my stock cooler void the warranty?


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## Poisonsnak (Nov 24, 2005)

I think officially maybe but if you keep it around and replace it when you try to get warranty how will they be able to tell?  I know for DFI motherboards so long as you put the stock parts back before you send it in they don't care.

I also have this problem on my X850XT-PE, ATITool acts like normal for memory testing (finds artifacts, backs off, etc.) but for core overclock it just jacks it up to huge values (670MHz) and the system hangs with display corruption or reboots itself, but ATITool does not report artifacts (just the "hey your comp rebooted when I got to xxx core and yyy mem").

I just assumed it was because the card was not stable at that speed.  It seems like mine is limited to 564 / 594 even with the ATI Silencer 5 Rev.2, it does hit about 65C at that speed though.


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## Rooke (Jan 1, 2006)

Hi! I'm new to this forum. It's cool. 

Anyway, imo, I'm starting to think the problem isn't with the card, but with ATITool itself.  I've got an X800XT that does the exact same thing with ATITool as Drake's. Here's why I think this:

Prior to yesterday (I'll get to what happened then, later) I was using the stock cooler and had the fan monitor set to go straight to 100% for any temp over 57C.  

Everytime I attempted the Find Max Core, ATITool 0.24 hung, I assume, at the the first artifact found - always at 524.25MHz.  That's only a 4.7% increase.  I would think the X800XT should be able to do better than that. The temp never went over 68C.  

When finding Max Mem, tool never failed, always reported the artifact(s), and correctly went thru it's routine to give me a max mem 542.25MHz.  That's only a 7.8% increase. Once again, the X800XT should be able to do better than that for a mem oc. 

Although I kept reading over and over in different forums how the X8xxXT's should be able to reach well above 70C without problems, I thought, maybe it's the temps causing the artifacts, and ATITool's crashing, and the poor oc'ing results. 

So now we come to yesterday.  I replaced the stock cooler with a Zalman VF700-Cu, which imho, is awsome: idle temp now 31-32C, max load temp now 53C, and it's oh so quiet.   

Well, I figured I should get a much better oc with those temps. But no!   Max GPU is only 533.25 and MEM is only 549.00.    I gotta be doing something wrong!  

And, ATITool 0.24 still hangs on the first artifact of a Find Max Core.  

I would try one of the betas but from reading the threads, it doesn't sound like they're a whole lot better.  Am I wrong?


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## testemo (Jan 2, 2006)

Uhm, ati's autodetect doesn't push the card as hard as ATITool.  Mine detects my X850XT-PE's memory as being able to go up to 616, but, ATITool shows that if you push it at it's hardest, this is not true.  ATITool has not once crashed on me, though it froze up when I set it to find max core and it went up to 576.  Everything below 576 is 100% stable, which means the video card froze beyond software abilities to VPU recover, not ATITool.  Simple solution, I just set the max core setting in the clock safety range to 575 and it never hits 576.

In other words, maybe trust ATITool's long careful deliberation over ATI's little quick guess utility.  Not all video cards are alike and a rare few actually don't run at stock correctly even.  Very rare, but, it has been proven to happen.  What's more, overclockability is never guaranteed and you WILL find that some overclock less than others.  Don't blame ATITool if it doesn't, and, really, you aren't supposed to send it back just because it doesn't OC as well as you assumed it would.  Oh, and yes, stock cooling is utter crap.  I personally recommend the ATI Silencer, which, unlike the otherwise equally good (or maybe even slightly better) zalman, will exaust heat out the back of the chasis, which means chasis temperatures don't go up (which, in turn, means it doesn't keep drawing in warmer and warmer air if your case isn't super-cooled.)

BTW, so far I'm using version 0.25 Beta 8.  Beta 10 and 11 have a problem with artifacts showing up.  I don't know about 9.  I do know that 8 works 100% for my system, though for some reason once it lost the fan speed settings and somehow set itself to run the fan at 14% until around 80 something C (I found out because my game crashed around 74C, long before the fan could speed up.  And in my system it should never see the 70C range.)


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