What programs can I used for Overclocking?

There are many programs available to download which enable you to overclock your graphics card. RivaTuner, Coolbits, ATI Tray tools and Powerstrip are among the most commonly used programs.  I have tried pretty much all of them and i personally find RivaTuner to be the best. It's ease of use and simple menus make it ideal for a beginner just starting out, while the useful features will keep the enthusiasts happy.  I will be using RivaTuner throughout this guide and i suggest you do the same.  You can download the latest version of RivaTuner from here, courtesy of Guru3D.com.

The Basics

Before you start to overclock you need to understand the basics of your graphics card. When overclocking there are three main components you will be tweaking.

Core Clock:

This is esentially your graphics cards processor. This will generally not overclock a great deal, but this will yield the biggest performance increase. Also, altering this clock will increase temperatures more drastically than the memory clock.

Memory Clock:

This is basically your graphics card memory, you will generally be able to increase this higher than the core clock.  Also remember this clock is double pumped, so an 800MHz clock displaying in RivaTuner is actually running at 1600MHz.

Shader Clock:

This is also another variable to consider when overclocking your graphics card.  Note that not all graphics cards will display this option. This is because graphics cards used to be manufactured using Pixel Pipelines. Even my 7900GTX uses this method. However, new technology has implemented Stream Processors. You can expect these from the newer 8800 based cards. The shader clock is simply the clock of the stream processors, however i will not cover this in this guide.

When you first download and install RivaTuner you will be prompted with a few messages. Firstly, you will see this box appear. Don't be alarmed, it's simply scanning your registry and gaining system information. Just wait a few moments for it to finish and you can proceed.

If you are using BETA drivers which are not WHQL certified, you will be prompted with this box too, simply click ok and tick the box if you don't wish this message to display again.  It's just informing you the drivers you are using are not tested with RivaTuner yet, but continue anyway and you shouldn't have any problems.