Overclocking

We also took a look at Diamond's Overclocking tool downloaded free from their website here.

“Diamond Tools” is a new video overclocking utility designed by Diamond that can be used with any Diamond Video Cards, except the S60 series. Unlike any video utility available, this tool allows for overclocking of the video card through the use of a 3D renderer that scans for artifacts and monitors the effects of environmental and GPU temperatures. It then automatically modifies the GPU, video RAM and fan speeds to provide optimum video performance without degradation to video quality it produces.

As luck would have it I can use the overclocking tool but it will have limitations in regards to "monitors the effects of environmental and GPU temperatures" without a temperature chip. The tool however has an up hill battle with some other free overclocking tools already well known and battle tested. But like most of the OEM card manufactures they're all starting to realize the benefits of catering to the enthusiast who wants to tweak their card beyond stock specs.


Designed somewhat like another tool I'm familiar with, the spaceship spins during the heat up phase and then scans for artifacts. Selecting Show 3D View starts the fuzzy spaceship and gives you options to find maximum clocks for GPU and memory. The tool limits your OC somewhat. The max obtainable overclock for the GPU was 465 MHz and 290 MHz for the memory with the Diamond Tool. I would expect them to draw the line in the sand at some point. Using a different tool I was able to reach a stable overclock of 550 MHz on the GPU and 100 MHz higher than the spec'd 700 MHz of 800 MHz on the memory.


Now the tool is a lite version, however it does offer system information, which I should add does not recognize the sub vendor, that can be saved to a .txt file. Also under tools it has Tweaks in which you can enable Speed Optimizations and Textures & Techniques tweaks. It can save and load profiles as well. The tool I would have to say is intended for higher end graphic cards and my testing with the X550 may not be a fair test, either way it's good to see Diamond recognizes the need for such a tool.


Overall the Diamond Stealth X550 overclocked fairly easily, both the GPU and memory overclocked well over a 100 MHz. The temperature of the GPU even stayed in a good range using the thermocouple Type- K probe, idle temps at 26°C with the max temp of 39°C using the Diamond tool to find max GPU overclock and using ATITool the max temp of 44°C after one hour for each tool.