Good afternoon everybody,I just retired my 9 months old computer and bought a new one. Can anyone advise me if it it necessary to overclock my video card.GIGABYTE Nforce4 SLI-ready; AMD64 4600+2 Dual-core; 3GB DDR400 RAM; ATI X1900 XTX 512MB; 19"LCD; 160GB Maxtor HDD; Saitek X52.I am hearing a lot of negative feedback about the ATI driver & CCC. Mind to give me any suggestion.Regards,Isagani

If you don't know how to overclock a video card.. (I really don;t know how either)... I'd say... forgetabout it. With your system... it should be a good system for flight sim.Don't know about ATI drivers.. Many people here swear by ATI cards... Some prefer NVidea and other prefer ATIs.So just install FS9...and check it out yourself. Forget everything you hear... and experience it yourself. JMO.Manny

Hi,In FS04 you will not notice a difference. You purchased a fast system so you don't need to overclock! So leave things at stock speeds and if you are in the oc mood, try bumping up the CPU.Hope this helps,Jimhttp://www.hifisim.com/Active Sky V6 Development Team Active Sky V6 Proud SupporterHiFi Beta TeamRadar Contact Supporter: http://www.jdtllc.com/AirSource Member: http://www.air-source.us/FSEconomy Member:http://www.fseconomy.com/

Isagani,I strongly recommend reading the following ATI Tweak Guide at the following address: http://www.tweakguides.com/ATICAT_1.html. There's a section on overclocking. You might also be interested in his Game Graphics and Display Setting Guide: http://www.tweakguides.com/Graphics_1.html.Hope you enjoy your new system!Best regards,JimYoung

Well, I know one thing: FS9 benefits more from overclocking the cpu than the vid card. O/c'ing the vid card won't do as much in FS9--will still do a little, but not as much as the cpu (FS9 is a cpu-bound app). That may change with FSX but I don't know.Rhett

Hello..The X1900XTX is the King of the Hill in the ATI line-up...There is no need for you to overclock that card...That is a wicked videocard!! Unless your an uber geek with the quest to push things to the absolute max...Then go for it..but the ATI X1900XTX is more than capable as is...The nVidia 7950GX2 videocard is about the only thing that will give a X1900XTX a run for it's money...I own one of each...Both are awesome...It boils down to personal preferance...Some folks swear by ATI..Some swear by nVidia...They each have their slight good/bad points...I also dislike CCC...However that is because it's based on net framework which is a recource hog...Well...I just need to get use to it...Windows Vista will apparently heavily employ .net framework...As I understand it..nVidia drivers will also be based on .net framework before it's all overwith...It's just going to be a part of our future...If you will follow the tweek guide posted above you will minimize the .net framework recource impact...The ATI drivers past 5.11(I Think) will use CCC exclusivly..The Old Style control panel was abandoned at that time...For those running ATI CrossFire the CCC is a must...There is nothing wrong with CCC...It is more a case of folks(like me) resisting change...We'll all just have to learn to live with it...Like I say nVidia guys too someday...Just how it is..You have a nice rig!! I understand you will read allot about "CCC is crap"...I've written it myself a time or two...But if you'll follow that tweek guide and learn the CCC...Quit paying attention to the guys raggin' on CCC...You'll be fine...Hope you enjoy you new system!!

I just wanted to Copy and paste what I consider one ot the most important portions of that Tweek Guide above...I encourage you to read the Whole Thing...It is an outstanding source of information...This is one of my main pet peeves with .net framework...and how to reduce the percieved overhead associated with .net framework..Note: Once Again..Please Read The Guide Throughly...Here is the .net framework info:Of course there are downsides to this for us users - such as an incredibly bloated startup process and background memory usage. If you have installed the .NET Framework primarily to use the new ATI Control Center, you can disable two .NET aspects to reduce your startup time, reduce resource usage and still have no impact on the functionality of your system or the ATI Control Center:1. Go to Start>Run and type "Services.msc" (without quotes). In the Services dialog box, if you find the '.NET Runtime Optimization Service' then set it to Disabled.2. Go to Control Panel>User Accounts and select the aspnet_wp ASP.NET Machine Account, then choose to Delete it. This account is only necessary if you do development work using the .NET Framework. Alternatively you can delete this account by going to Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Computer Management>Local Users & Groups>Users and disabling the ASPNET account. Should you ever need to recreate this account, go to your .NET folder (usually WINDOWSMicrosoft.NETFramework[versionnumber]) and run the aspnet_regiis.exe file.See the ATI Control Center section for more details on how to disable the many other startup items and service entries the Control Center creates which blow out the startup memory usage.I personally consider that guide *THE* ATI Info Source...Please refer to it for additional info...

Gentlemen,Many thanks for your ideas and suggestions. I really appreciated all those. My Dad used to tell me that "TWO HEADS ARE ALWAYS BETTER THAN ONE " until now I am following that rules.Regards & happy Flying to all....Isagani