Tuesday, December 06, 2005

Overclocking the Geforce 6200 NV44

As mentioned in an earlier post the Geforce 6200 appears to be core locked with various Nvidia drivers, notably 81.40 and later. (Un)fortunately the newer driver revisions fix serious bugs like the one I had with HL2.
Disclaimer - I accept no responsibility for any damage you may do by following the instructions below, do so at your own risk!!

Since the newer Nvidia drivers won't allow us to change the core mhz for the 6200, we'll be reflashing your card's existing bios modified with higher mhz ratings. This will make your graphics card think it was designed to do the overclocked speed.
Since many 6200s use passive cooling its best we get recommended overclock values from Nvidia's overclock control panel software before proceeding, rather than enter random values. (Bear in mind that once the card is flashed with new values, if they don't work or are unstable your graphics card may never live again). To get the recommended values you can install the NVidia 81.33 drivers which do allow you to overclock the graphics card core (if you're happy with this instead, and not needing the most recent drivers, stop reading here and go away).
If you want to test values higher than those permitted by the 81.33 overclock test use PowerStrip this is NOT RECOMMENDED for the reason above.

Checklist


Procedure


Note the nvflash commands used in this guide must be typed exactly without extra spaces, failure to do so may result in erasing your card by accident.

Install the 81.33 drivers and coolbits

Open the overclock utility by selecting "Clock frequencies" from the Nvidia control panel, select the "Manual" radio button and then "Detect optimal frequencies".
Note the values down that it gives you for core and memory settings, and cancel the Nvidia control panel dialog.

Reinstall your preferred Nvidia graphics driver.

Create a DOS boot disk, in Windows, and extract the two files, nvflash.exe and cwsdpmi.exe from the NVFlash.zip to it (make sure they are not in a sub directory on the disk). Ensure the disk is left write unprotected.

Restart your computer with this newly created DOS disk and type at the DOS prompt
nvflash -b mybios.rom
After a few seconds a file will have been created on your floppy disk holding a backup of your graphics card bios - reboot your machine back into windows when its finished.
In windows open up the floppy disk you've just been using and copy the file mybios.rom to the desktop or somewhere else on your hard disk.

Extract and run the NiBiTor.exe from the NibiTor zip file. Open the file mybios.rom you've just copied to the hard disk in NiBiTor. Once the bios has loaded into NiBiTor change the settings circled in this diagram to those provided in the first step by the 81.33 drivers.
NOTE THAT THE VALUE YOU ENTER FOR THE MEMORY SPEED IS HALF THE MEMORY VALUE GIVEN BY THE NVIDIA SETTINGS - THE VALUE NEXT TO THE MEMORY COLUMN "(xxxMhz DDR)" WILL DISPLAY THE ACTUAL VALUE YOU WERE GIVEN
Save this bios to the floppy disk using the save file menu, save the file as NEWBIOS.ROM

Reboot your machine with the floppy disk, at the prompt type

nvflash -4 -5 -6 newbios.rom

This will wipe your existing bios and replace it with the copy with the faster core and memory settings.

When your machine next boots up, if you have coolbits installed for your Nvidia driver, you'll notice your default settings for the core and memory are now the faster settings you changed in the bios editor.

If you find any of this useful please drop a comment below - I'm sure I'm not the only person having to put up with shoddy products!!

36 comments:

Benjamin said...

Yes it should do.

Anonymous said...

Thanx for the information. Just overclocked my XFX Geforce 6200A from 351/533 to 405/640 after your procedure and seems like it is working fine... I got a recomended speed from Nvidia of 403/638 the first time, and 359/634 the other time but choose to push it to 405/640... my oblivion runs a little better now! wonder if the card is able to run at even higher clocks...

mcardo99 said...

Thanks Ben! I got my PNY Verto 6200 128mb 64-bit AGP card overclocked to 405MHZ(core) and 270MHZ(memory speed). It scored a 1300 using 3DMARK05. For those of you that are confused about the memory speed, sometimes you will see that the memory speed setting in your nvidia XX.XX driver with the COOLBITS registry mod shows 1.05GHZ. I'm almost sure that value is wrong. In my ONY6200 the single data rate speed is at around 270MHZ (which equals 540MHZ double data rate.) I appretiate people who share their knowledge to help others. I give Benjamin props for sharing this info with the public.

Anonymous said...

I use this metod and work :D thanks!!!

Anonymous said...

Well my XFX 6200 AGP8x 128mb 64 bit did not gain mush of this...only 5 mhz memory...Now it's on 435/515 mhz.Can somebody tell me why my XFX can't go much memory???I'm with Elixir memory chips...Please HELP!!!

Anonymous said...

my msi NX6200AX 256mb 64bit AGP8x from 350/600 overclocked to 400/707 nice :)

Anonymous said...

I just overclocked my NV44 to 435/708. Thanks a ton. Very helpful.
P.S. I did it with a USB Flash Drive.

peter said...

i just tryed the prosess and if you type nvflash - b my bios ,with a space and not nvflash -b mybios you get some kind of test , the if you type YES and pres enter it erases your bios so that you cant flash it and your card is left dead
can anyone help me with this problem to get my ard working again. as the info here is correct and good but just follow it to the letter and you wont end up with a dead card like me

Benjamin said...

Sorry to hear it went wrong.

You may be able to rescue your graphics card by flashing it blind (i.e. you can't see the dos prompt to type). If you need a copy of your original bios have a look at sites like http://www.mvktech.net/ I'll update this guide to stress that the comments must be typed exactly.

Good luck fixing it.

Anonymous said...

VERY IMPORTANT!!!!!

I tried to overclock with Rivatuner, and did it, i didnt tested until reach uninstabel point, but the big deat is anoter thing, I unlocked professional capabilities on Rivatuner, and my 6200 nv44 rev1 just STUCK, after some hours of terror I did a stupid simple thing, added a new hardware, and manualy selected a 6200 from the list windows XP gives you, and them it worked back, so ater this, go to Rivatuner again and uncheck this option!!!!

Anonymous said...

I did it too and it works fine !

thanks

Anonymous said...

AGP 6200A NV44 (5.44.A2.10.00) 256mb
stock speed - 350 gpu / 500 mem
optimal detected average = 427 / 659
tested and flashed 420 / 645 (safe margin)
stock - (169forceware) - 1173 3dmarks
stock - (81.33forceware) - 1065 3dmarks
safe oc via coolbits - 81.33forceware - 1363 3dm
bios modded oc - 81.33fware - 1335 3dmark05
bios modded oc - 169fware - 1424 3dmarks

Can now run 1080p @ 1600x900 "step into liquid" WMV-HD trailer on Barton 3200+! Yeay, thanks! (this is secondary HTPC, you just gave it a reprieve from an upgrade :)

Rene Desouza said...

Sorry , but it didnt work well. Im using a Sparkle 6200 Nv44a but revision A1 ........... didnt overclock well. When it tried to detect optimal freq. I got a sweet Blue Sceen :( . I then manually had to do it till I reached 376 and 681. Nothing more than that.

Thanks anywayz , I wasnt aware that this card could even be overclocked with old drivers. I will just run 3dMark06 and see what happens ............

Anonymous said...

Hi, not sure weather anyone still checks this post but... I tried you method and overclocked to 400/530. My card is a Galaxy GeForce 6200 PCI NV44A. After bios flashing, I could boot into windows but as soon as I start a game, it just hangs. Any ideas?? DJ

Benjamin said...

Sounds like you may dodgy drivers or may be pushing the card too far which works ok when the card isn't being stressed. Installing some reliable drivers (completely removing the old drivers first) or lowering the clock back to the original speeds may fix the problem.

Anonymous said...

Does it mean that I cant overclock my card or is it just my power supply? My pc is a Dell Dimension 2350. Thx DJ

Benjamin said...

Sorry I don't know about your DELL but I know some micro tower PCs have some tiny PSUs (I had a 150W job in an IBM Pentium 2 years ago).

I don't use my 6200 anymore since I got a 7600 in my new machine - do the latest drivers + coolbits/rivatuner etc etc not allow you to over/underclock the 6200 without resorting to the hardware bios changes suggested in this guide?

This guide was written about the time of the NV44a chip release because of buggy/locked drivers and this was the only way to push the performance of this particular model, so it may not be applicable anymore.

As I mentioned in my last post check you have the latest non beta stable drivers, and if you do overclock, try small amounts at first. Given your results so far I'd be VERY careful in case you fry it - it might be close to tolerance already.

Anonymous said...

Hi seems like there aren't any
new post but i would like to now if someone can help mi car is
a Nvidia Geforce 6200
Settings from rivatuner are
A1, NV44a, 4pp, 3vp or so
and i need to now if this method works on this one(be dangerouos or not).

Thanks

Benjamin said...

Hi Anonymous,

Please read my above post first about newer Windows drivers. Failing that....

Yes it should do - NV44a is what this guide is written for, however there is always risk when you flash the card bios since you are updating the "built-in" low level graphics card bios software, things can go wrong and each card brand may have minor differences. As long as you are just modifying values on your existing bios (not using a new bios you found somewhere on the web, possibly from another brand) it will generally be okay.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the comment man i apreciated and i will make the risk to see how far my card goes, I'll let you know the results when I'm done
being GOOD or bad.


So Long!

Anonymous said...

I just see something interesting, do you know if this kind of card can have the pipelines up to 8 i saw it
somewhere else but they say it only works for the NV43 but they also said
that the nv44 can't be overcloced
so...

And for the record I'm altimus
so you know who is the one wasting your time.

Thanks!

Benjamin said...

The NV44 revision physically only has 4 pipelines. The NV43 physically had 8 but the extra pipelines were disabled usually (supposedly) because of reliability problems (e.g. the GPU's extra pipelines did not meet QA standards).

Anonymous said...

Altimus:

Thanks for the info, saved from a fatal mistake, and let me tell you that I'am about to do the flashing to
450/658, proved with 3Dmark03 and
3Dmark06 and went fine, and it even improved quite some, I'll let you know the results soon.

Later...

Anonymous said...

Matt:

PNY 6200 (TC i think)
GPU processor: GeForce 6200
Driver version: 178.13
Core clock: 351 MHz
Memory clock: 266 MHz (532 MHz data rate)
Memory interface: 64-bit
Total available graphics memory: 383 MB
Dedicated video memory: 256 MB
System video memory: 0 MB
Shared system memory: 127 MB
Video BIOS version: 5.44.A2.10.52
IRQ: 16
Bus: AGP

do u think that will that work with my card?, cheers, good thread!!

Benjamin said...

Matt:

Probably. The bios revision looks close to the one I had on the screenshot linked in this post - the specs look similar to the Xfx card I had too. As far as I'm aware however, AGP does not have turbo cache ("TC") since this is a PCI-E feature, so make sure it is an AGP card/you have the right specs :)

Anonymous said...

Matt:

Cheers for the quick reply,

i'll give the old drivers a try in the morning to see if it over clocks ok, i know it wont overclock at all with the newer drivers (the 1's which can without ntune),i'll post how i get on.

cheers again!

Anonymous said...

Matt:

Sorted works great, its now running @ 400/630, i can realy notice the diffrence!, pes 2009 works great now! it was a bit choppy before,i mite try making go more after i get extra cooling! niceone for all the info, cheers again

BlackBird said...

Hi what drivers are you guys using, i can't get my overclock working in game... The game crashes every time. While when not in game my 420/680 clocks run very smooth :s

Anonymous said...

Hi... accidentally, i found this page...
And accidentally, i have 6200 TC too :D

My card
GPU: 6200 TC
Vendor: undefined (I cant find it with GPUZ and in the GPU itself!)
Chip: nv44 rev B2
Driver version: 181.22
Default clock: core/mem: 350/333MHz (666Mhz data rate)
Memory Interface: 64bit
Bios ver: 5.44.02.32.00
Bus type: PCIEx 16x @16x
Memory: 256Mb
PP / VP: 2 / 2
IRQ: 16

My PC:
Pentium 4 531 HT 3 Ghz (OC 3.6 Ghz)
ECS P965T-A
Visipro 2X 1GB DDR2 800Mhz

The thing i want to know is, is there someone ever heard chip nv44 rev B2?
All I know, nv44 rev B2 is used in 7100GS TC. But, that isnt my card. Then, without any guide i try to OCing it.
And now, OMG, it can run core/mem : 450/435Mhz (870Mhz data rate), even more with rivatuner 2.22 in 36-58 Celcius (with 12 cm additional fan).
So, I can play Oblivion, Fallout 3 and NFS Undercover smoothly although its in low setting (>30fps)
How do u think? Its strange, isnt it?

thx. Jesse
sorry for bad english XD

Emilator said...

Hi!! I`m from Chile!!

First sorry for may bad English...

I have a EVGA 6200 NV44 256 MB and your guide is the only one that works!!! I get speeds of 420 GPU and 679 Ram... AND IT WORKS GREAT!!! of course i bought a big fan!! :P THANK YOU A LOT!!!!!!!

Anonymous said...

well can i flash the bios with USB and how?
pls help

Unknown said...

Hi every one im just new to this kind of things i tried searching and find this page.
I already haved an evga 6200 agp version NV44 rev A1
tried the steps above and obviusly all warks fine, but i haved the a old problem now when the clocks are twecked in games just freezes and in internet the refresh rate also has some kind of frezz thing, is there any problem with this card or is just that the driver installed dont function correctly and blocks the card perfomance or just as i haved spoted this card cannot be oced.
My clocks were 350/532(266) now are 395/313(628) and have the nvidia Extreme G 177.92 driver benjamin can you help please.

Thanx

sirish said...

Hi Benjamin,
This is a great guide... and the only one which worked for me :)

My bios version is 05.44.A1.11.00 and I tested with 400mhz/650mhz on 81.33 drivers .. and it was totally fine..

But then I reverted back to factory settings and re-did the whole thing by installing latest drivers from nvidia 195.62 along with ntune 5.05.54.00 ... I set the core to 425 in bios and when booted to windows ..ntune was showing a junk core frequency of 3267Mhz!!!!!!!!!

Just wondering, which stable drivers did u finally settle at when u wrote this guide? this info would greatly help :)

and once again, thanks a lot..

Benjamin said...

Hi Sinish,

This was a very long time ago to me - I swapped to a 512MB Geforce 7600 GT (which I got at the same price as my 6200, and overclocks a huge amount!). If I remember it was the 162.50, although this may not be correct as I currently use the 163.75 drivers with my Geforce 7600 mainly because of the support with the 162.50 3D glasses driver (I use anaglyph glasses now because of my TFT - my shutter glasses don't work with a TFT). I don't play many new games so an older driver is fine (I've not had any problems with MassEffect for example). 162.50 and 163.75 have both been stable for me.

Benjamin

Unknown said...

Thanks for this guide!

I couldn't find "detect optimal settings" in the 81.33 drivers.

I had to just try with the clock speeds of the commenters.

I have a newer NV44 A1 with a newer bios that yours.

Also, NiBiTor didn't list any clock speeds initially. I had to change the number of performance levels to one, then change the clock speeds.

Just a question. If I'm getting a small amount of white dots (artifacts), is it because the core speed is too high or the memory speed is too high?

I have no problems with the stock cooling, apparently.

Thanks!

aaron

Benjamin said...

If I remember correctly it's the memory - I haven't got this overclocked card any longer.