Thinkpads Forum

After I made a fresh install of Vista Ultimate x64 on my new Hitachi 7K200 I was wondering which driver to pick up for my ATI Mobility FireGL 5200. With my previous install (Vista Business 32bit) I had tried 3 different drivers: Lenovo Catalyst driver, modded desktop Radeon driver and modded desktop FireGL driver. The last one turned out to provide the best 3D Mark 06 score, namely constant 1620 Marks. With my new configuration I tried all three again (of course the 64bit versions) and I was surprised by the score drop of about 100 Marks, what is more the Radeon driver achieved only about 800 Marks! So I decided to try again Ati Tray Tools by Ray Adams (it´s a free tool that unlike ATI Tool works under Vista). My past attempts to overclock the grafix adapter were to no avail, launching 3D Mark produced a mess of artifacts. But that was with my previous install.
As for now, I´m using modded desktop FireGL driver as it deliverd the best score again: the utility mobility .net modder from DriverHeaven modifies unpacked ATI drivers in such a way that one can install them on a laptop, quite helpful. Then I installed ATI Tray Tools and successfully overclocked my grafics adapter to 418.50 for GPU (400 by default) and 445.50 for Memory (330 by default) without any artifacts. By now my system is running surprisingly stable and it could achieve 1804 Marks by 3D Mark 06 That´s really not bad. However, if I reboot and load my OC profile the system becomes unstable: 3D mark 06 produces a lot of artefacts etc. The point is that even setting to default clocks doesn´t solve the problem, which is quite weird. I have to disable ATT from startup and reboot. This was actually my past experience with ATT under XP and later under Vista Business 32bit. I´m not sure where the problem is since without rebooting the whole system is running pretty stable.
That said, I think the FireGL has a good overclocking potential and probably it´even further overcloclable provided one has good cooling. I haven´t tried TP Fan utility yet....
Ah yeah, here is a link for those who are interested in a proof : http://img518.imageshack.us/img518/7214 ... ng3no2.jpg

Cheers

Marin

EDIT: removed excessive smileys, I must have been on drugs or something...

I think overclocking laptop components is slightly over the top.
You'll definitely shorten the life span of those items, and battery life must have gone down the tube as well.
But, if you got nothing better to do...

Thanks for your response! Overclocking laptop components is not slightly over the top... it´s actually pretty much over the top..., but I was rather interested in exploring the limits of my ThinkPad, which are in fact 418.50 for the gpu and 463.50 for the memory, and this has brought me 1875 Marks on 3D Mark 06 (here a link http://img71.imageshack.us/img71/6381/atioc2je6.jpg ).
RBS, I hope you don´t really think that I would run any OC profile when on battery. That would be pretty much against the common sence even for me, and, of course, I´m aware of the fact that any overclocking would shorten the life span of my grafix adapter, which is probably not worth 300 3D Marks gain...

Cheers

Marin

EDIT: see above.

and then 2 years later someone buys an old T60p on ebay and becomes intrigued by the untapped potential of his firegl v5200

how many points difference was there between the lenovo driver and the desktop firegl driver? do you still remember?

the windows 7 default driver I'm using is from December 08 and is version 8.561 the modded driver talk and support seemed to die down around ati version 8.12. so I'm wondering if forcing desktop drivers is worth it anymore, I can get a 212 point boost just from overclocking, how much more can I expect to get with a desktop driver?

vand3537 wrote:and then 2 years later someone buys an old T60p on ebay and becomes intrigued by the untapped potential of his firegl v5200

Welcome to the forums! T60p is a very nice machine, so congrats on your deal! Is it 16:10 or 4:3 screen aspect ratio? Oh, well, you have just revived a very old thread here, let´s see how the mods feel about this.

vand3537 wrote:how many points difference was there between the lenovo driver and the desktop firegl driver?

About 70 points difference in 3DMark06 in favor of the modded drivers (of course).

vand3537 wrote:the windows 7 default driver I'm using is from December 08 and is version 8.561 the modded driver talk and support seemed to die down around ati version 8.12. so I'm wondering if forcing desktop drivers is worth it anymore, I can get a 212 point boost just from overclocking, how much more can I expect to get with a desktop driver?

To be honest, I haven´t dealt with modded desktop drivers for quite a while (maybe since the latest betas of Windows 7). There was a point where no matter how you try, the just would not install (I wonder why ), so I gave up on that. I am too using the ATI driver provided via windows update together with a CCC from a modded FirePro package because I need to be able to adjust power management and some other settings, but I can definitely tell you with Vista my 3DMark06 scores were higher with the suitable drivers. I should re-run 3DMark06 some day soon. I think you can´t go more than ~1620 points in 3DMark06 with stock clocks, so unless your current score is significantly lower than that, I wouldn´t bother with forcing desktop drivers, if I were you.

BTW, the fact that one can enhance the 3DMark06 score by OC´ing does not imply that games would run stable with that higher clocks. They may run, but don´t be surprised if they crash or cause artifacts.

Cheers,

Marin

wow!

I hardly expected to receive a response at all, let alone on the same day, yet another tribute to the greatness of the thinkpad

yeah it's a 4:3, I probably overpaid just to get both a 4:3 and a Thinkpad, the 2 most important laptop features IMO.

when I bought it I never imagined it would be capable of such things as playing Bioshock. but it did, and I'm in the process of resetting my jaw lol.
maxing out the graphics card has presented no problems so far, there was maybe a 2-3FPS increase in framerate for Bioshock, and still nothing close to overheating (maxing out at a mere 90c so far) and no artifacting, I only wish I could OC it more...

but I digress, thank you much for the reply, yes 70, points (if that) is hardly worth messing around with modded/unofficial drivers, I'm quite stunned with the performance of this old thing as it is, and was just wondering how much further it might go, time to see how Dead Space plays, it says minimum x1600, we'll just see about that...

I wasn´t right about my 3DMark06 score in Windows 7 (with the default ATI driver). I have just finished running 3DMark06 (no OC) and the Mobility FireGL 5200 achieved score of 1619 points

BTW, what utility are you using to OC your card? What clocks were you able to achieve so far? And what do you mean by "I only wish I could OC it more..."?

vand3537 wrote:wow!

I hardly expected to receive a response at all, let alone on the same day, yet another tribute to the greatness of the thinkpad

The greatness of the ThinkPad just enhances the greatness of its possessor (and speaks for his good taste)



Cheers,

Marin

Marin85 wrote:I wasn´t right about my 3DMark06 score in Windows 7 (with the default ATI driver). I have just finished running 3DMark06 (no OC) and the Mobility FireGL 5200 achieved score of 1619 points

BTW, what utility are you using to OC your card? What clocks were you able to achieve so far? And what do you mean by "I only wish I could OC it more..."?

wow I only get a a 1469 without OCing, I got 1681 with 418/463

I use ATI Tray Tools, I just dragged the slider up to the generic specs I saw at notebookcheck: 425/475, but it only goes to 418/463 after I apply it, and I played the video game at these speeds for well over an hour without the chip ever getting over 90c. and since supposedly these chips can go up over 100 just fine, it'd be nice to clock it at 425/475, or maybe even more but no dice, at least with ATI tray Tools and my limited knowledge.

but I can't complain, I thought I was just buying a basic 2.5 or so Windows Experience Index type computer, never expected a 4.4 gaming capable computer

.

edit: lol hey what do you know? I can just drag the slider further
the next "snap back" is at 425.5 for the core, and that has worked fine so far.

how do I install the catalyst control manager with my "windows update" driver, the catalyst install manager doesn't want to do it

and marin, you said that the FirePro_8.583_Vista32_77159 is the only version that worked, did you ever try the FirePro_8.702_Win7x32_96416 ?

edit: ok didn't realize I had to use mobility modder even if I didn't want to change the driver, hooray I can force video games to maintain aspect ratio

vand3537 wrote:how do I install the catalyst control manager with my "windows update" driver, the catalyst install manager doesn't want to do it

and marin, you said that the FirePro_8.583_Vista32_77159 is the only version that worked, did you ever try the FirePro_8.702_Win7x32_96416 ?

edit: ok didn't realize I had to use mobility modder even if I didn't want to change the driver, hooray I can force video games to maintain aspect ratio

Yes, indeed the driver and the accompanying Catalyst Control Center (CCC) are to separate things and need to be obtained from separate sources in this case (at least this was the only thing that really worked for me). As for the FirePro version, I can´t really tell whether I did try that particular version or not, this was long time ago and I don´t recall all the different versions of CCC I tried. If FirePro_8.702_Win7x32_96416 is a new version, then most certainly I haven´t tried it out (yet). I may give it a shot in the upcoming days.

Cheers,

Marin

well, reviving this thread worked once, so let's pull the stake out of its heart and see if it might draw a ragged breath or two again...

I'm about to 'update' my T60p from win2k to XPsp3...just a plain vanilla XP install, as minimal as possible.

I do almost entirely '2d' CAD/CAE work, and I don't play any games; and rarely use any form of 3D...so I'm not concerned with 3d 'performance'.

I'm a bit obsessed with eliminating (especially from registry and always-running processes) anything that isn't truly -required-.

And because I have to burn $$diesel to make each watt of power we use (we're off-grid), I need to minimize power-consumption in every way possible.

Thus, I wish to install ONLY the ATI driver....NOT the CCC, which I never use, and which seems to always be running something in memory even when 'closed'.

I -do- need the ATI chip to be programmed to its most power-saving mode and clock-rates of course (as power-play allegedly does); but I'm thinking that CCC isn't the only way to do that.

My understanding is that such settings are done 'once', at boot.....and thus should not -require- CCC to run constantly. I am not sure yet what utility I might use at boot-time to set the chip's registers properly tho...??

Note that if the 3D portion of the gpu can be shut off completely (which I've gotten the impression from some reading might be possible), that's likely to be entirely usable for 99% of what I do...and might well save a ton of power and heat.

Sooo...to put all this into 'question' form....

Do the modded desktop-drivers allow for the same or better LOW power operation of the GPU?

And do they provide for UNDERclocking?

Also, do they run OK --without-- CCC installed?

PS: Has anyone run the 'normal' IBM driver -without- CCC installed, and does that work well? If so, what procedure did you use to get only the driver to install?

Any other info, observations, and links, regarding minimizing ATI power and installed-software for a 2d-only no-games situation would be greatly appreciated.

Check hard on the web, and install Windows-FLP (Fundamentals for Legacy PCs).
It's a very basic XP-Pro version, with all the bloat removed, right up your street!

better yet, buy a small, cheap solar cell, stick it in the window and draw a few watts of power to offset your thinkpad.

AMATX wrote:better yet, buy a small, cheap solar cell, stick it in the window and draw a few watts of power to offset your thinkpad.

I only wish it were that easy...

In the first place, there is no such thing as a 'cheap' solar cell.

In the 2nd place, a T60p, even at idle, draws 25 watts, not 3 ('few').

Thanks for thinking of me though.

RBS, thanks for the search-term.....I'll check that out. So far, I've been working with nLite and learning how, and what , to remove.

However, since the ATI eats more power than even the CPU does, I'm also interested in any driver, or driver arrangement or setup, that cuts that back some.

thanks again guys.