R5: Pro OC V2 - Pro OC Cup introduction

[Massman]

 

Short intro

 

As announced in the main R5 thread, we are planning to update the Pro OC League as it exists today and switch to an F1OC-style of competition featuring a 3 month competition. In short: If users indicate that they are Pro OC, they are allowed to create a Pro Cup team and join the Pro OC Cup. Each competition team will have their own profile page listing the Pro OC achievements and participants.

 

The Cup will consists of 5/6 stages with predefined benchmark and hardware and will mainly focus on the newest generation of hardware. For example: Ivy Bridge, GTX680, Trinity, Piledriver and 4xCF 7970.

 

Alongside of the Pro OC Cup, we'll run the Team cup which will have a similar layout as the pro oc, but with older hardware instead of the latest greatest. Note that the Overclockers League, Enthusiast League and Hardware Masters will not be affected by this change.

 

The plans for this competition was discussed before with complete outsiders of the hardcore OC circle as well as within the staff section. I want to share some of this information to give a broader idea of the plan. The "why" and "how", basically.

 

I'm apoligising for the immense amount of text below - just copied parts of the conversations we had already.

 

Longer explanation

 

 

 

First of all, let's recall what the purpose of the Pro OC League is.

 

1. Separate the normal overclockers from those with good industry contacts.
   
2. Serve as 'front' for the overclocking community: as the most important ranking, it should attract people to overclocking both as spectator and as participant.
   
3. The Pro OC League should be engaging existing overclockers to be motivated to try to compete with the best and 'move up' a league.
   
4. For those who want to compete at the highest level, the Pro OC League should serve as a platform which they can refer to and justify sponsorships.
   
5. Since this is the 'top league' it should be the most difficult one to compete at, both in terms of require resources (high-end = expensive) as well as require skill (nitrogen, multi-pot, etc)
   

 

In general, the Pro OC League is the highest ranking and first thing the mainstream audience should watch. It's designed to run the latest-greatest hardware at the highest possible frequencies and set the highest possible scores.

 

Now, the Pro OC League has been active since Rev4 (-insert date-), but it has not completed all the goals. Actually, aside from the first point, the League has sort of missed its point: no one really competes in it, no one really follows it, no one really bothers talking about it ... or, in other words, no one really cares about it. That's a problem, because we're wasting resources and energy on something that is not getting result.

 

So, why is the Pro OC League so uninteresting? Let's consider the following key points of the pro league: hardware, participants, results.

 

1) "More of the same"

 

When looking at the hardware used in the Pro OC League, we see that it's pretty much always the same hardware that is being used. Even though it's very interesting to watch as a hardcore enthusiast (more mhz = interesting), for most people seeing a 6.65GHz 3770K or a 6.68GHz 3770K is pretty much the same. In its current form, the Pro OC League is very limited in range of hardware.

 

Also, remember that whereas in the past (2005-2008) the term "world record" still had meaning, nowadays that word has very little meaning. This because of two main reasons: saturation and education. Not only is the term "world record" used by every vendor for pretty much every achievement (saturation), the mainstream audience has learned (education) that a world record is a matter of finding the right components and running the benchmark. The time that people were impressed by records is pretty much over (with exception of the cpu-z frequency records).

 

2) "Restricted participants"

 

The people that are participating in the Pro OC League are either very reserved in the way they compete or not very active at all. Pretty much no one will go out on a limb and say "now I will try for #1" or "... top-5". Most of the participants will also say that the league is not important at all, following what both the audience is saying as well as their sponsors probably.

 

In general, no one is putting any value to the Pro OC League. This is probably because, after people started getting sponsorships, overclocking became less and less 'real' competitive and everyone sort of started to promote their results in their own way so everyone feels happy about the exposure (even if completely meaningless).

 

3)"More of the same - part2"

 

In addition to the already boring set up of the league and boring participants in the league, there's also the problem of very few new people trying to compete in the Pro league. Those that don't have the resources say they just can't compete and those who do are usually always in the top. In general, there are never more than 5 people actively competing for a top spot in the competition. So, even for those who are following the competition, nothing really new happens. It's not exciting to follow.

 

So, how to make the Pro OC more interesting for everyone? Make it more dynamic. 3 solutions.

 

1) "Start and end"

 

One of the biggest problems of the league is that it has no start and end date, but is a continuous ranking. For someone with limited resources it's therefore very difficult to find the motivation to continue competing: at no point will he see a reward for his performance. No one remembers who was #8 three months ago, even though that could have been an excellent result for someone with really limited resources.

 

A start and end date basically makes it a "overclocking season". That concept of competition is far more understandable for people who don't really follow the overclocking world closely. Comprehension is vital: if a sponsor (doesn't need to be hardware) doesn't understand why you need support for overclocking, you usually won't get the support you want.

 

An end date also allows for people to start from scratch at a certain point. When being frustrated about not finding the right hardware to compete at the top, nowadays you just need to spend more money on finding one, but when you can start from scratch, you can forget all the misery from the previous season and start motivated again.

 

2) "Diverse platforms"

 

Diverse platforms allows for us to promote overclocking in a better way to the mainstream audience because we can shape the competition in greater detail than we can now. So, instead of always having the same hardware, we can decide to make it more challenging ("must do 4way") or more related to mainstream ("IGP overclocking"). We can overcome the current "too boring" overclocking competition where if you don't have a good 3770K, it's nearly impossible to get close to the top.

 

Diversity also gives more value to the #1 in the league: this user (or team in R5) does not just own the highest scores for a certain platform, but can reach high overclocking results on a lot of platforms.

Diversity is also good for attracting sponsors for the participants. Because you're focusing on various platforms, there's more possibility to do marketing on various platforms. Eg: if the focus of one competition stage is Trinity, then there is a lot of focus on the overclocking capability of those products. Lots of focus = lots of interest = more companies that are interested in getting a good result/marketing from it => find overclockers to bench it.

 

3) "teams"

 

Nowadays (and historically speaking), most people are still benching alone. But because of the amount of resources needed to compete at the top, more and more people are starting to team up in smaller teams. For example: OCLab, Team.AU, Benchbros and The Overclocking Knights. This evolution is something I predicted some years ago: overclocking went from individual to huge teams first and then huge teams break up into small teams again.

 

This is a good evolution, I think, because it makes resource sharing acceptable by the "hardware sharing"-fearing community. Also, hardware is not the only resource that is a problem; time is a resource too. Having multiple members in a small team allows you to distribute the work that needs to be done to win.

 

Ideally, the Pro OC would because a competition between the top teams representing the larger communities out there. For example, Team XS would be a subset of the Xtremesystems team, Team HOT for greece etc. Teams are usually easier to relate to than individuals.

 

A typical Pro OC Cup

 

In order to understand the idea, let's give an example of how a typical Pro OC Cup would look like.

 

1) Participants:

 

• Team.AU: uncle_fester, dinos22, youngpro
  
• Team EVGA: kingpin, tin
  
• OCLab.ru: slamms, 12, smoke
  
• HKEPC: CherV, mad222
  
• Team Brazil: Rbuass, Cleiton_schenkel, joe90br

 

2) Stages:

 

• "3DMark11": no hardware restrictions
  
• "IGP 3DMark Vantage": igp platforms only
  
• "1155 BCLK validation": 1155 only
  
• "2-core Wprime": dual core cpus only
  
• "sub-$50 SuperPI": only cpus that cost less than $50 are allowed

 

Or, we could make it much more specific in terms of platforms:

 

• Ivy Bridge SuperPI 32M
  
• Trinity 3DMark Vantage
  
• Sandy Bridge-E 3DMark11
  
• Piledriver CPU-Z
  
• Single GPU Heaven DX11

 

3) Timeframe:

 

• start: January 1
  
• end: March 31
  
• Elimination: March 14 (top-10), march 21 (top-5), march 28 (top-3)

 

4) Extra notes:

 

• only hardware that was available on Jan 1 in stores can be used in the competition (approval on individual basis)

 

So, the end goals of changing from League to Cup/Season are:

 

• Make Pro OC more interesting to follow for spectator.
  
• Draw more interest from sponsors, both IT and non-IT, that can pump funds in overclocking (not really hwbot, but in general).
  
• Give more value to be #1, #5 or #10 by having participants to show their skill on multiple platforms and by creating a 'real' competition (look up sociological definition).
  
• Engage more people in trying to compete on a professional level

 

Now, to answer some of the specific questions posted here:

 

You will reduce pro league to Andre, cookie, nick and maybe Vince if there's no amd/ati

 

Guys like myself won't have the resources and will need to drop back

 

What will then happen to people that get support but no where near enough support to compete in a format like that?

 

First of all, since overclocking is a technical activity, whoever has the best resources will have the best shot at the top ranking. If Andre would care enough, he'd be #1 for always. Old-style or new-style (actually: any-style) ... that doesn't change.

 

Ideally, the amount of support would go up in absolute terms, so you'd be more capable of competing. But ask yourself the question: how capable of 'competing' are you right now? Will it be more capable with R5 or less?

 

Does this Pro V2 thingy affect the points rewarded in some way? And if so, how?

 

No, it only affects the Pro OC ranking, not the points itself.

 

- What happens to the users who currently attend the Pro-OC but don't want to be part of these competitions? Will their profile just show up in the OC-League? Didn't realy understand that point. Would be strange if you just completely remove that league and the submissions because this would also affect the rankings for the rest or?

 

So' date=' users are still allowed to indicate whether they are pro oc or xoc. If a user selects 'pro oc', it gives him the right to start a competition team and competite in the Pro OC Cup. If he doesn't want to compete, he will just not be in a ranking, but of course his submissions will still show up in the database. Just not part of a league. For someone who is now in Pro OC, but wants to go back to the XOC, that's also possible.[/quote']

 

I mainly look at the Pro OC League as sort of the "billboard" for overclocking: the best, most-skilled overclockers competing on the latest(/greatest) and attracting attention to the passion that we all share - overclocking. When we are talking about how to get more people into OC - growing the community - I'm convinced the Pro OC is the place for people to get familiar with the most extreme and the other leagues are for getting involved and doing it yourself.

 

Now, with that idea in mind, I don't think the Pro OC League is that interesting at this point (for reasons mentioned in the previous post). It's not interesting for overclockers (how many people are actively competing?), not interesting for spectators/followers (how many are discussing the league?) and not interesting for the industry (how many are promoting the league?). No matter how the inner circle of overclocking appreciates the amount of effort it takes to become top five, top three or even number one, outside of the (small) inner circle seem to just not care at all. And that's a problem not only for the people that like to see overclocking grow - it's also a problem for the people that are actually competing in the league. Nothing is more frustrating that putting long hours and huge effort in something that is very much underappreciated by the large majority out there. Mind you, I'm not saying that getting top ranks shouldn't be appreciated, I'm just trying to point out that the lack of people caring is a sad/bad thing for everyone that likes overclocking.

 

So, how to improve? If the song's not catching on, do you change song or instrument?

 

The "song" in this case would be the typical record-hunting that you're talking about - trying the get the highest score 'ever' in a benchmark. I honestly believe that this song is over in the majority of the cases for reasons I also mentioned in my previous post: education and saturation. No matter how much we smile when seeing 600K Aquamark, the smiling only happens within the inner circle. Maybe a press release, but a highly ineffective one as people who write the PR don't really know what's going on and people who read the PR say it's an ancient benchmark. Record-hunting is, nowadays, only relevant for the latest 3DMark (read: most popular) benchmark and frequency records. Anything that is single-threaded or non-latest DirectX is considered unimportant. And, again, this is not my personal opinion but a harsh reality.

 

When you write "There is a great change it will destroy the popularity of HWBOT", I honestly, honestly believe sticking to the "record-hunting"-style of overclocking would lead us to a demise faster than a new format for 'Pro OC'. The format is not new, by the way, it's been tested in the HWBOT OC Challenges, Country Cups and F1OC - competition are fun and easier to get people's attention with.

 

The power of Pro OC 'Cups' is that the community can say what they want to see the top overclockers compete with. Community, in that last sentence, is again not just the inner circle of overclocking but also those who enjoying seeing extreme overclocking but don't actively take part in it - like news portals, like IT managers and perhaps even friends and family. There's a possibility to make it more relevant and, very important, more understandible by putting the focus from benchmarks to hardware and competition. To explain myself - overclocking nowadays has the focus on benchmarks because, practically, you need to run one/two systems through a set of various benchmarks to score points in a endless competition. With a Cup, you use a (wider) variety of setups and have to put them through specific benchmarks within a limited timeframe.

 

Fyi - the idea is not at all to only run mainstream hardware. Also, the mainstream hardware is not a goal in itself, but a mean to get people's attention to what the Pro can do. You can always spin it in a way that it still is a bit about 'record-hunting', by the way. Trinity IGP benching can easily be about "the fastest IGP ever". Benching SuperPI 32M with an i3 3225 is about "highest BCLK" and "strongest memory". But these are just examples of things you can do, not what defines the competition.

 

Eventually, if properly configured, I see the Cup get more teams involved than there are currently people involved in the Pro OC League. It should be more easy to give 'sponsors' (in any form) a justification on why they need to help the competition team to take part in the competition.

 

//edit: maybe I should put all my thoughts in an editorial - the Cup (also Team Cup) is pretty much the practical outcome of some underlying ideas.

 

Getting people "into" overclocking is not per definition having them to actually overclock competitively or join HWBOT. What overclocking needs is a group of people that follow overclocking on a regular basis without actively participating in it; spectators if you will. No matter how much people you can get to actively overclock, that alone will never be enough to be more significant than we are nowadays.

 

Think about the events you have done: Assembly and Campus Party. The potential group of spectators - the people that come and check out the booth and stick around for a couple of minutes - is far larger than the potential group of new overclockers. When the spectators ask why you do it, you now have to give answers like "to break records" or "for fun", which is something people usually don't relate to. But if you can tell them that you're doing it for a competition, people can relate. Even F1OC, before it got ruined, was pretty good at getting more spectators in the beginning.

 

I had a similar experience with the Tones shop. Before the Country Cup, it was difficult to get them to understand overclocking, but when I showed how we did in the Country Cup they got interested and excited about overclocking. They started asking "how can we get a Belgium team higher on the rankings" - indicating they were interested in the competition. None of the guys over there overclock or actually comprehend what goes on exactly, but because of the understanding of the concept of competition, they could relate and got interested.

 

Putting more focus on XOC won't help much - that is just changing the instrument. It's the same type of league with the same inherent problems that the Pro OC League has, but only with more people involved. From a "billboard" point of view, the league is actually even more uninteresting as a large part of the competition revolves around overclocking old hardware.

 

I think this should be the flow for competitive overclocking:

 

- Spectators: "get interested" -> "follow on regular basis" -> "become fanboy and spam on facebook/forums"

- Participants: "get interested" -> "join enthusiast league" -> "join forum/team to learn more" -> "get involved in competitions ~ TeamCup/HOC" -> "join xoc league" -> "join more hardcore competitions ~ gbt/msi comps" -> "move up to higher regions xoc" -> "start pro oc competition team"

 

That's the point I'm not realy happy about. Back in the days you invented the Pro-OC to keep the Vendor-Benchers like Vince and Hicookie away from the normal overclockers. Now it looks to me that we go back where we were But I can kinda understand it as I don't see any other good solution.

 

Actually the end goal would to improve the situation, not worsen it. Getting more people into Pro OC would be the result of an increase of sponsors getting into overclocking. For example: local corporations backing up local guys to compete in the Pro OC. The idea is to create an environment that benefits more people

[Massman]

Simply put: best three members of your forum form a Pro OC Cup team, gather the resources, compete in time-limited multi-platform benchmark competition. Tell sponsors you're competing and increase resources

[k|ngp|n]

This:

 

- Spectators: "get interested" -> "follow on regular basis" -> "become fanboy and spam on facebook/forums"

- Participants: "get interested" -> "join enthusiast league" -> "join forum/team to learn more" -> "get involved in competitions ~ TeamCup/HOC" -> "join xoc league" -> "join more hardcore competitions ~ gbt/msi comps" -> "move up to higher regions xoc" -> "start pro oc competition team"

 

Nice ideas here..let get talkin.

[K404]

Definitely like the idea of an OC season, having a start-point and an end point and a "permanent memory" of guys getting great scores/ rankings will make a massive difference.

 

250 great benchers could 100% quit right now and once their scores slip down the rankings, no-one will remember them.

 

 

It'll be cool to see a variety of different platforms pushed mega hard, it is a bit dull seeing the same global hardware combo all the damned time.

[k|ngp|n]

OC needs more spectators like typical sports. Spectators who get the bug for it will eventually participate. Lets face it, its not really growing like it should or I expected it too long ago. IMO extreme OC can help save or at least slow the dwindling desktop pc market for high end, but shi** has got to change. Its the same core global group of benchers with many dropping off, with not as much new blood as there should be for it to grow. It used to be exciting to follow for the whole enthusiast community (not just oc), it's not really the case anymore. Even tho a proposed scenario with different rounds/diff hw could hurt my chances of competing if I stay here at EVGA being pretty much inte/NV only, I still think its a great move. Right now the way things are its just a copy and paste of the same setup for huge points in most benchmarks..only diff being raw mhz.

[Lucky_n00b]

Simply put: best three members of your forum form a Pro OC Cup team, gather the resources, compete in time-limited multi-platform benchmark competition. Tell sponsors you're competing and increase resources

 

Interesting indeed. When are you planning to start this Pro OC Cup If I may ask?

[Trouffman]

Thanks for summing all that up Massman, I actually do agree a lot on the change that have to be made in order to promote / attract people to overcloking, not in the usual way as before where you 'expect' people seing it to join and overclock, but more in a way to have spectators about it.

 

The sub-team system is a need, as it is used already byt some (benchbros etc.) and it make sense nowdays regarding price of hardware and difficulty to get large sponsoring per person or regarding time needed.

 

With the large amount of release of new hardware that are tied up to some specific platform, we avoid by this (time + focus on something / a platform) getting tied up by the manufacturer and/or the only "bump" in the scores / ranking fight jsut everytime a new hardware come out or a new binning of CPUs as been made

[Splave]

interesting, guess we will see how it turns out when it drops

 

+100 to what vince is saying

[BeepBeep2]

oc Needs More Spectators Like Typical Sports. Spectators Who Get The Bug For It Will Eventually Participate. Lets Face It, Its Not Really Growing Like It Should Or I Expected It Too Long Ago. Imo Extreme Oc Can Help Save Or At Least Slow The Dwindling Desktop Pc Market For High End, But Shi** Has Got To Change. Its The Same Core Global Group Of Benchers With Many Dropping Off, With Not As Much New Blood As There Should Be For It To Grow. It Used To Be Exciting To Follow For The Whole Enthusiast Community (not Just Oc), It's Not Really The Case Anymore. Even Tho A Proposed Scenario With Different Rounds/diff Hw Could Hurt My Chances Of Competing If I Stay Here At Evga Being Pretty Much Inte/nv Only, I Still Think Its A Great Move. Right Now The Way Things Are Its Just A Copy And Paste Of The Same Setup For Huge Points In Most Benchmarks..only Diff Being Raw Mhz.

+9001

 

I think many do not get into it because they can't take the plunge, and like how Sandy/Ivy or BD/PD is, all of the top 100 scores are high bin CPUs. Most normal people can't start dishing out $2K to get into Xtreme OC with dewars being $300-1000, CPUs being $300 each, motherboards $200-400 each, good RAM $100+ etc.

 

All to get some points with no spectators than competitors and not really any return for accomplishments.

Edited December 19, 2012 by BeepBeep2

[I.M.O.G.]

I like the proposed changes for Pro OC. Makes more sense to me, and more interesting.

 

If this is the way it goes, I think K404's suggestion to keep a history of the leaderboards should be incorporated as well. I think with this setup, everyone would be more interested in seeing the current results. But also it should be more manageable to keep a history so everyone can look back to see who dominated the rankings last year, or through the past several years, or past several "seasons/cups".

 

No one is really keeping a history now. Even the big live events, to find who did well in times gone by you'd have to find an article summarizing it... The events themselves don't keep any history, or standings over time. Those in the know recognize Kingpin's name because its been around enough, as well as others, but they couldn't really say what records he's held in the past, when he held them, or for how long he's held them. A score that's currently 14th globally, could have been 3rd globally 4 months ago - but there is no way for anyone to know unless they've been following closely all along.

 

This creates a lack of perspective for the potential audience/fans.

 

For a lot of categories, first place right now is less meaningful because we know it won't be first place next week and then will be forgotten shortly after. The person who achieved it will remember they had first for a few days, but no one else does. Keeping track of the past, makes the present more meaningful to everyone.

[Rasparthe]

I like what you are saying with this Pro-OC Cup, I think you have identified a lot of the problems facing the community but one thing that you hasn't really been stated is the basic characteristic of any hobby or sport. The popularity isn't usually directly related to how great the 'elite' or the most hardcore of participants. What I mean is, catering competitions and increasing the visibility of the Pro-OC is one step but not the most important. Its more important to foster those that have only minimal interest or new to the sport/hobby. Giving them something they can participate in, get there hands dirty with and get involved. 90%, 95%, 98% of the members of HWBOT will never even try to make it to the Pro-OC level, or even desire to except on some passing level.

 

Personally, you can have a Cup style event but I think you will see more participation by having month long competitions that have the points carry over month to month until someone wins the entire season. Being able to point to member XXXXX as the winner of 2012 season provides alot of the same dynamic solutions by giving a Start/End and diverse platforms.

 

So I ask, why limit this to just Pro OC? Why not provide month long competitions for each of the three leagues. You can only compete in the league you are in and the monthlies don't have to be complex, two or three stages and a end year winner. You then provide a winner in the league that the average/minimal interest overclocker can relate to, not someone with equipment provided by sponsors and hardware reps but a guy looking in electronic recycling centres and eBay and Kijiji looking for cheap parts just like they do. In my opinion, those mid-level competitions will do more promote HWBOT and grow the community than any adjustment or promotion of the virtually unattainable Pro-OC league (for most overclockers that is). I think you can look to the Country Cup and Team Cup for how much interest on the various forums they generate and most of those stages have nothing to do with newer, relevant hardware.

[slamms]

From my side is very sad, that we cant choice benchmarks for OC, because HWBot stuff will provide benchmark schedule for us.

 

How many competitions will be in year, 4?

[Massman]

Regarding the historical timeline remarks - I absolutely agree. We will need some time to figure out the best way to visually represent this history though. But, yeah, the main idea for the Pro OC Cup (as well as the Country Cup and Team Cup) is to set up pages with historical overviews.

 

Interesting indeed. When are you planning to start this Pro OC Cup If I may ask?

 

Ideally we wanted to kick this off on January 1, but that will not be feasible as the Pro OC Cup requires us to also develop a couple of additional features. So, February 1 2013 is now the target.

 

From my side is very sad, that we cant choice benchmarks for OC, because HWBot stuff will provide benchmark schedule for us.

 

How many competitions will be in year, 4?

 

I understand your concern regarding HWBOT deciding what hardware to bench and which benchmarks to use. It's one of the drawbacks of a competition concept as planned. The advantage of making a tighter selection is that it allows for more interesting hardware/benchmark combinations (like K404 said).

 

One competition would be 3 months and a new one starts when the last one finishes - so about 4 a year, yes.

 

I like what you are saying with this Pro-OC Cup, I think you have identified a lot of the problems facing the community but one thing that you hasn't really been stated is the basic characteristic of any hobby or sport. The popularity isn't usually directly related to how great the 'elite' or the most hardcore of participants. What I mean is, catering competitions and increasing the visibility of the Pro-OC is one step but not the most important. Its more important to foster those that have only minimal interest or new to the sport/hobby. Giving them something they can participate in, get there hands dirty with and get involved. 90%, 95%, 98% of the members of HWBOT will never even try to make it to the Pro-OC level, or even desire to except on some passing level.

 

Personally, you can have a Cup style event but I think you will see more participation by having month long competitions that have the points carry over month to month until someone wins the entire season. Being able to point to member XXXXX as the winner of 2012 season provides alot of the same dynamic solutions by giving a Start/End and diverse platforms.

 

So I ask, why limit this to just Pro OC? Why not provide month long competitions for each of the three leagues. You can only compete in the league you are in and the monthlies don't have to be complex, two or three stages and a end year winner. You then provide a winner in the league that the average/minimal interest overclocker can relate to, not someone with equipment provided by sponsors and hardware reps but a guy looking in electronic recycling centres and eBay and Kijiji looking for cheap parts just like they do. In my opinion, those mid-level competitions will do more promote HWBOT and grow the community than any adjustment or promotion of the virtually unattainable Pro-OC league (for most overclockers that is). I think you can look to the Country Cup and Team Cup for how much interest on the various forums they generate and most of those stages have nothing to do with newer, relevant hardware.

 

I agree with pretty much everything you wrote.

 

The continuity of the XOC and Enthusiast leagues do have certain major advantages. For one, they don't require anyone to be active all the time in order to be ranked somehow. You can easily bench just once a month and maintain a top-50 position. This is quite good for the overclockers that don't really have that much time to bench/overclock, but still like to do it once in a while. Secondly, it's very easy to get started: all you need to do is run benchmarks with your system and you will usually generate a couple of points and see your profile go up in the rankings.

 

That's one reason why we want to try this for the Pro OC only at first. A second reason is that the biggest complaint about HWBOT is about the ever-changing HWBoint algoritm and league rules. So, we will test the concept with Pro OC first and then if all works well slowly try to implement it for the regular rankings. We will still have the Team Cup, Country Cup and Challenges which will be designed for the non-Pro overclockers. Meaning: none of the expensive hardware, but more targeted at older systems and older cards.

[slamms]

Ranking will depend from last competition result? Ranking will change every 3 months?

[Massman]

Every time a Cup ends, there's a ranking. The next Cup starts from 0 again.

 

There is no more Pro OC League/Ranking.

[rbuass]

I do not know if this change will be good or will be bad.

One of the things that I think is bad is the fact of having to always be well ranked, and is really hard to be in the top.

No matter if one day I struggled the most and I was #5 or number #3 in Pro League, but if a new platform is launched, dropped down in the rankings and have to climb all over again (this was the law... ).

I think a correct way, would reward the work that made by ​​overclockers.

To give an example, ... what about the great results with the GTX 480, GTX 580, HD 5870 and so on?

I believe I have done a lot for overclocking in my country and even the world, and I know HWBOT is on track to achieve further improve our league, but still do not know how this can be done.

Pro League, we can see that few ever really participate. of 77 members, believe that only the first page has done something today.

For quite some time, I have only benched hardware that can give me results for the top ranking.

This means that I and professional overclockers, using the video cards GTX 680 but not GTX 660ti ... or we used the GTX 580, but not the GTX 560ti or HD 5770 and below (main cheapest cards).

Always seek the needed hardware to compete more top, and 99% of the time, I had to fetch the results in single VGA, because despite being the league Pro, I have my own money to buy video cards, processors and motherboards.

Some time ago I tried to ask Hwbot to consider only one per benchmark result (example: 3DMark11, only the best results, go with 1, 2, 3 or 4 plates, but only the best must be ranked).

I know it's impossible to please everyone, but I believe these things should be changed.

Valuing the work of overclockers, appreciate the results.

As it stands today, the same achievements are given for the 3 categories (whatever be the category number 10 Enthusiast or Pro, the same achievements ... if you got top 20 in the Enthusiast, got same achievement to top 20 Pro Overclocker).

As it stands today, you can gain many points competing alone competing in certain categories (eg, the super expensive Xeons that do not even need to overclock... and got 60 global points).

I really don't know how to do it better, but I think hwbot must award the overclockers for ever... so... it will encourage them to keep pushing.

I don't know what about all effort I made during all my overclocking life (at Hwbot)... but I am only one overclocker.

Since we will no more have the Pro Overclocker League, I will let Hwbot decide next steps.

 

 

I'm available for the HWBOT decide, and what you need me, just ask.

Edited December 20, 2012 by rbuass

[Blue Storm]

I agree with the most of posts here.

 

What I would like to add...I think many hardware enthusiasts see extreme OC as something what they can't afford. I see it on Czech HW magazines. When we write news about new OC record eg. in 3DMark Vantage (4-way CFX/SLI and hand picked 3970X/3960X/3930K) many ppl says that it's nice but not for ordinary people. Why not to promote more results with old or low/mid-end hardware? That's what can bring more people into OC scene. Eg. NickShih's result with Trinity (also hand picked I guess, but it's much cheaper than Sandy Bridge-E platform) attracted much more ppl than global 3DMarks records.

 

I can say that I like benching older or cheaper hardware more than benching high-end. Don't know why but it's more fun and it's more interesting for ordinary enthusiasts than 4-way setup.

 

But also I understand that vendors would like to have many global records instead of many "Trinity records" or "GTX 660 records". So why don't promote both? Vendors will be happy, overclockers will be happy that they did something good for OC community and enthusiasts will see that extreme overclocking isn't only about very expensive hardware, hand picking from "hundreds" of CPUs and GPUs and perhaps they will decide that it's worth it to try it.

[Rasparthe]

 

I agree with pretty much everything you wrote.

 

The continuity of the XOC and Enthusiast leagues do have certain major advantages. For one, they don't require anyone to be active all the time in order to be ranked somehow. You can easily bench just once a month and maintain a top-50 position. This is quite good for the overclockers that don't really have that much time to bench/overclock, but still like to do it once in a while. Secondly, it's very easy to get started: all you need to do is run benchmarks with your system and you will usually generate a couple of points and see your profile go up in the rankings.

 

That's one reason why we want to try this for the Pro OC only at first. A second reason is that the biggest complaint about HWBOT is about the ever-changing HWBoint algoritm and league rules. So, we will test the concept with Pro OC first and then if all works well slowly try to implement it for the regular rankings. We will still have the Team Cup, Country Cup and Challenges which will be designed for the non-Pro overclockers. Meaning: none of the expensive hardware, but more targeted at older systems and older cards.

 

I don't see any reason that you should get rid of the XOC and Enthusiast Leagues, it makes more sense to run the monthly type competitions and season winners in addition to the leagues as they are now. It would even make those in the Enthusiast leagues happy since they don't have to compete against those in the XOC league. There are plenty of people that don't want/have the time/or any interest in whatever the monthly comp is. You are exactly right about what you have said on the value of the league, so run a yearly season in addition to the league. There are already monthly competitions, it shouldn't be too hard to make sure points carry over month to month and restrict them to the league you currently are ranked in.

[saint19]

I don't see any reason that you should get rid of the XOC and Enthusiast Leagues, it makes more sense to run the monthly type competitions and season winners in addition to the leagues as they are now. It would even make those in the Enthusiast leagues happy since they don't have to compete against those in the XOC league. There are plenty of people that don't want/have the time/or any interest in whatever the monthly comp is. You are exactly right about what you have said on the value of the league, so run a yearly season in addition to the league. There are already monthly competitions, it shouldn't be too hard to make sure points carry over month to month and restrict them to the league you currently are ranked in.

 

Totally agree on this.

 

I'm not in the Pro OC League, and even, I'm not in the top of the OC league but I agree with Rasparthe and Rbuass.

 

Why not do something for the middle end and low end hardware? I know, we should do the effort for get high end hardware but even that, I only can get one or maybe two lightning GPUs per year...that's not enough for give a fight to the top guys with a lot of hardware in the desk.

[TaPaKaH]

The new format of Pro League is not going to make things more affordable.

 

Let's be honest, to fight for top spots in any contest, binning is a must since you're only as good as your samples are. These days the Pro league is mostly about binning stuff like 3770K and GTX680/HD7970, which are quite popular outside of the benching community and hence are not too difficult to resell. If you switch the focus to multiple 'obscure' platforms, people will still have to bin but will now lose more money as getting rid of the rejects will be a lot harder.

Of course, you might say that noone forces the participants to bin and one can compete with 'random samples', but same can be done in the current format as well. For example, if you have an 'average' 6.5GHz Ivy, you can easily get in the Top 20 provided you have the time to cover all the global CPU-heavy benchmarks.

[knopflerbruce]

I don't think there will be competitions based on REALLY obscure hardware. Midrange GPUs/CPUs from current/last generation should be quite easy to resell, too - especially in countries with generally low income.

 

Even here it's easier for me to sell a 2600k/P67 combo than 3930k/X79, for example.

[K404]

I don't mind seasons as long as the ranking is determined through "continuous assessment" instead of one "final exam"

 

In any sporting league, the #1 is determined by having the best scores throughout the entire season, not by winning the final game of the season alone

[rbuass]

there are lots of things involved,

No one that knows deep overclocking, can tell that is just binning CPUs and VGAs and you will go fly to the top.

To know how to bench, how to improve efficiency, and win and fix all issues.

I lose the count how many times I spent time, ln2, killed hardware to find parameters, temperatures, voltages, tweaks and so on.

During the last years, I was forced to compete with the high end hardware to keep on the ranking (nobody was forced to be in the rankings, but since here is worldwide overclocking league... I am talking about the ranking)...

So.. I push all my efforts to keep me in a good place in the ranking...and now, look for all this work will be losed.

What about the achievements people won???

I am not talking about ridiculous achievements (like used MSI mainboard, used GB mainboards, submit XX scores blablabla).

I though the achievements people won must be for ever, to be earned.

If Andre is there, is because he fought to learn, and to be a great overclocker... same to Nick, Cookie, and other top dogs.

I am in the Pro League, because i was forced to be there... I have no support to MB, CPU and VGA...and still need to pay lots of money and time to keep me in a good ranking, but I do it because I like and because I want, but I am there, and now, look for Pro League will be end.

What I don't like, is to hear about to cut the Pro League, and kill all efforts from the Pro Overclockers.

I don't know in other countries, but here in Brazil, people look for the best overclockers to be inspired to be best.

I don't think is a good idea simply to cut Pro League.

I agreed about the competitions, and I agreed about to give more efforts to bring more enthusiasts and even Extreme Overclockers, but to kill the Pro League don't look for the best way.

Also, how can somebody compare the max performance of the new CPUs and VGAs to old stuff?

SURE I think people earn to get points, moral, records, competitions and so on.

How can compare the performance of old things with the hardware more powerful and modern.

There is no sense for the top overclockers don't use the most powerful video cards and CPUs because it is an interest to overclockers and also the manufacturers.

How many people will be part of the competition, if will be selected hardware???...and this people will be from where (enthusiasts in the most)

So the question is... what about the overclockers that belong to Pro League?

Edited December 21, 2012 by rbuass

[Massman]

I don't see any reason that you should get rid of the XOC and Enthusiast Leagues, it makes more sense to run the monthly type competitions and season winners in addition to the leagues as they are now. It would even make those in the Enthusiast leagues happy since they don't have to compete against those in the XOC league. There are plenty of people that don't want/have the time/or any interest in whatever the monthly comp is. You are exactly right about what you have said on the value of the league, so run a yearly season in addition to the league. There are already monthly competitions, it shouldn't be too hard to make sure points carry over month to month and restrict them to the league you currently are ranked in.

 

Okay, I think I get what you mean. Essentially a ranking based on competition points?

 

//edit: but that's sort of what the Team Cup is for, no?

[Rasparthe]

Yes, a season long ranking based on competition points that are determined by points earned in monthly competitions. The Team Cup is exactly that, team based. Individual member season long competition, with a start/end so that you can build some history for each of the leagues. Personally I think the more things you can overclockers to concentrate on the better. Not everyone is interested in the same thing. Some people love only the newest, greatest, faster modern hardware and only chase globals and long for hardware sponsorship and they concentrate on that. Others might only participate in whatever hardware/vendor driven competition is going on, buying hardware to compete and win other hardware. Others only concentrate on their TPP, others their Enthusiast or XOC ranking. This gives something else for even those with almost no points can compete in and provides a ranking year to year for people to measure themselves against the rest of the world.

 

Keeping the current league rankings is important for an overall ranking system, and those that as you say, only might put scores once a month or when they get something new they want to overclock. But for those that are looking for an individual ranking that resets every set period (year?) to measure against the rest of those active overclockers it could provide an way to get those new/minimal interest members even more involved. Just my opinion of course, but I think that HWBOT is missing some individual recognition for active overclockers that concentrate on legacy/non-3770k/non-7970/non-680 hardware.