R5: Pro OC V2 - Pro OC Cup introduction

[knopflerbruce]

knopflerbruce

 

I don't think I am talking bad things to overclocking community.

I really worked hard lots of time to growth overclocking in Brazil, and just asking to consider what I am talking.

Please do not only tell that's not good because is not good.

Also I consider you a very important opinion and very active to Hwbot...so...lets think about it...so... if the most think I am talking wrong things... I will understand.

 

Best wishes

 

None of the guys you listed were forced because of skill level. It's not allowing XOC-guys to compete with the pros I'm against, I'm against forcing them. Viss wanted to, so he applied. The top dogs get their sponsorships because of skill, but that doesn't mean we have to force unsponsored guys to join the pro league.

 

If you're talking about team efforts, sharing inside the team is OK. If you're competing for a team (for team points only!) it does not matter who owns what piece of hardware, the team is considered one unit. Selling one chip within a team (team as in a complete team, not Pro team) is fine - but if Andre then starts using the same chip, or you sell it to some other guy a week later after benching it, we'll have to start asking questions. If we find it more likely that the selling process is to make team points rather than a "genuine" sale, where you buy the chip because you plan to keep for a long time, we could end up blocking some scores and banning people for a while - yes. It's very simple. Just don't push the limits, and you're all fine. Nobody buys a golden chip just to keep it for a week... unless there is a clever plan behind it.

 

NOW you can get a high ranking based on strange HW, but not after the change has been implemented (rev 5). You're talking about today's situation, and there is a change coming.

 

20 points pr benchmark means max 300 total, which will not give you a good ranking in ANY league. Also, i do not think you'll get 20 for the REALLY "unpopular" rankings, up to 10 subs you'll get like 10 I think. Those scores are worth 10 points. It's more or less boot'n'run to get 10 points in any other rankings anyway, and as I've already said: getting a top spot is usually not that easy once there are competitiors. Also, a 10 point score means it's not that good - compared with the 100++ you get for certain other top spots.

 

I'll give you a reason to not want to join the pro league: expenses Even if I'd make it to the top of the XOL based on the HW i run these days i would NEVER want to join the pros, as I do not care about binning those expensive chips. I'd rather spend $20 pr chip and buy 15 of older, cheap models than spending 300 on some 3770k. If the pro league fits my view on OCing, then maybe - but it would have to be seriously grinding oriented, then. Putting me in the pro league would not be comparing apples to apples at all, based on the hardware I prefer to bench. Another reason: hardware points don't count in the pro league. I fight for HW points only. Why would I care to join then? The people I fight against are in the HW masters league, not the pro league.

[knopflerbruce]

Totally agree. Wasn't the idea of overclocking earlier in tweaking, modding and so on? I like competitions where is eg. CPU freq limited instead of "fullout" competitions. Why? Because "fullout" competitions are only about money and sponsorship, nothing more. Who has the best chip he wins. In "limited" competitions you can have best CPU in the world but the main idea of these competitions is in skills, not in money/sponsors. Then you can see who really deserves to be "Pro" because he can beat others with skills (tweaking OS, knowing issues in some benchmarks - eg. 3DMark 01 - etc...).

 

That's the real overclocking in my opinion.

 

I don't say that world records made by top dogs like Vince, Andre, HiCookie, etc. should be removed. I know that these guys are high skilled and they really know how to bench but it's also a little unfair towards overclockers who have to buy expensive hardware to do nice scores (and also they need to have good luck in buying) or also towards guys who have some support by some manufacturers but not like "top dogs" (I mean eg. binning 100 chips...) who are often working for GB, EVGA, ASUS, MSI, etc.. I have some support from manufacturers but it's nothing more than one not binned CPU (so I need luck) and older GPU because MSI can't give/borrow me HD 7970 Lightning for extreme overclocking...and because I am poor student I am unable to atack top results

 

So my suggestion is...why not to divide "fullout" top scores from Pro rankings? and Pro rankings can be based on competitions with some limitations...vendors will have their world records and also they will be able to see in Pro rankings what guys are skilled and should be supported to reach top scores

 

In Italy extreme overclocking died...in Czech Republic is slowly dying despite our effort (organizing workshops and other events for enthusiasts to get them into extreme overclocking community)...only about four or five guys in Czech Republic are barely active

 

Norway is ultra-dead:D

[rbuass]

So, why do not separate people that wants to join Pro League... and let the guys do their choose.

I got top 3 in the Pro League, got Overclocking Emperor achievement in the Pro League, without no sponsorship....

You can be sure I am not rich...I have no good card...neither my own apartment...so I need to rent an apartment to live.

I worked really hard to be there...and each great score and each record was many special moment...and all my friends that followed, feel the same.

So... what I don't think is correct is .... to be in Pro League if the overclocker have no skill enough to be there...because the pro league must be the Pro League...the hardest league...

But if the guy have skill enough...is a great overclocker and be able to be in the Pro League... but he don't want to be in the Pro League..... let the overclocker choose in what league he wants to keep.

After the overclocker have enough knowledge, deserves to be in the pro league, but do not want to be there of their own choice, sure I agree nobody can force the overclocker to go.

What I can not agree, after to be benched 100% to keep me good ranked at Pro League (without VGA, CPU and MB support), simply remove the League.

I did not ask for create Pro League ... but since it was created and I intensely worked there (me and others...I coud see great job from overclockers like Slamms, rsaaninno, Hazzan, Splave, Nacho, etc, etc, etc..)... and now, I believe is completely wrong remove the league and spend out all effort to the Pro Overclockers made before.

Also...there are lots of things I told in my post... (like to be inspiration to next generation, to be important to manufacturers, to be important to show the newest and the max performance...and so on.).

I noticed you guys, looks disappointed with the overclocking in some countries.... but you can be sure that the reason is not because the overclocking league... instead the reason is the global crysis that was affect mainly the Europe.

I don't think Overclocking is death in all countries the same way,,,, in Russia, Brazil, Germany and others, looks for still growing...I hope so..... but I can be wrong.

Edited December 23, 2012 by rbuass

[K404]

Is this discussion spending too much time on one little point of Massmans posts?

 

There will still be a Pro League, just a different way of benching within it.

 

I think it will be easier to work well as a small team instead of an individual.

 

 

We need more voices from the Pro League in this convo.

 

 

 

 

I think the criteria for pro League is too vague. How much support is "too much" for XOL League? If guys are being sent VGAs for 3 + 4 way and the mobo needed to bench them? Any relevant CPU? Binned CPU? RAID controllers for PCM? 2-P boards and CPUs? We all know that companies do not employ us, the "lucky" guys are sent stuff with some conditions.

[rbuass]

There will still be a Pro League,

 

I hope so

 

I was reading about the Rev5...

I don't know, but maybe my english is not enough, and I still confused.

 

Since rev5 only affect Pro League... I believe the best proposal is to have an experience with the new rules, before starting.

Let me (or let us here) know how can we start (create) a competition to Pro League here... and I can work in that.

Since rev5 only affect Pro League... then we can do it together hwbot.. so we can get an experience and evaluate how it works.

I hope we can have good times this way...

 

Edited December 23, 2012 by rbuass

[Massman]

I've read through the thread since post #31, but before forming an opinion I will need to read it again tomorrow. For now, I just want to make a couple of notes about some strong myths in overclocking and some facts about overclocking that people seem to easily forget.

 

1) Overclocking is a technical sport - no matter how great your skill (however you may define that term), in the end it's the MHz that will win the game

2) Companies, secret tools and in-house development products have always been part of the overclocking. The only difference is that nowadays people are aware of this whereas in the old days people weren't.

3) Most of the 'old' top dogs have their own secrets. Afaik, Hipro5 kept most of the modifications for his 2900XTX (or 1900XTX - not sure anymore) for himself when posting the first set of results. Macci had his own tweaks too. The difference is that a couple years back people were more tolerant towards secrecy and were more focussed on trying to figure out why they got beaten rather than demanding every single trick.

4) Limiting the CPU overclock might seem interesting, but it does not solve everything. Already wrote about that some years ago: "The paradox of a fair overclocking competition"

5) People are still interested in extreme overclocking - even in those CPU-Z so-called obscure records. Whether they are able to reproduce those results themselves is irrelevant to the interest, much like people enjoy seeing Red Bull extreme sports or F1 racing.

6) The price of overclocking has always been high. Only when a company like Intel or AMD makes the mistake of bringing a low-end product to the market that can be fine-tuned to the performance of a high-end SKU, it was reasonably affordable. Those days are gone for what Intel is concerned.

7) Binning has been around for longer than the HWBOT rankings, but it used to be more targeted at the air overclockers (X GHz for Y volt).

8) It's actually not the industry that brought mass-binning to overclocking, it's AndreYang. He himself has more resources for selecting CPUs than any vendor as marketing teams within vendors have limited resources that they need to spend on other things than overclocking.

9) Remember that for a long time the maximum amount of graphics cards you could use was 1. In those days, to get the absolute highest performance results you could get away with one graphics card. Also, in those days you could still get away with non-LN2 cooling (as hw didn't scale that much with temperature)

 

Should this be discussed in a separate thread? The broader subject kind of fits the theme, so I don't have a problem of having it in this thread. I will read over the "hwbot killed overclocking"-posts, though ... that kind of posts lead to nothing anyway

[|ron]

...cut...

I will read over the "hwbot killed overclocking"-posts, though ... that kind of posts lead to nothing anyway

 

If all you understood from my posts is that hwbot killed oc, then I'll need to delete and re-write everything probably

[|ron]

I'll try to sum things up, to be more clear, pointing out pro and cons, and points on which I don't have a solution but on which we can work togheter to find one.

 

New Pro League: leave it as it is now, or do the "seasons" modifications, maybe I'm a bit more oriented on the seasons way, but it's only my opinion.

 

New OC League: here we have basically 2 problems:

1 - binning kills almost every chance of competition for the top spots, unless you can spend 5.000euros/month in hardware. And THAT is exactly what keeps away many guys from entering into the ln2 ring, the fact that it's money-driven (and of course a bit of luck) and not skills driven

2 - people saying that someone should go in the Pro league because of really strong scores or little sponsorization, creating flames and bla bla...

 

So, what I propose for the OC League:

1 - just set a frequency limit for cpu and vga

2 - people could post scores on OC league or PRO league, they decide at the moment of submission. Of course, if someone mainly in the PRO league wants to post in the OC league, the frequency limits will be active even for him

 

Ok, but, how to set limits? This is the part on which we must work togheter. Here is what I got till now:

 

- set fixed limits, for the entire life of that cpu or that vga.

Pro: there's no need to recalculate from time to time, the frequency limits, according to new and better steppings coming out etc.

Con: just look at Sandy Bridge... the first CPUs where topping at 4,9ghz, then appeared in the bioses the pll overvolting and the frequencies went up 'till 5,6 average and 6GHz for the best samples.

 

- set variable frequency limits, to be modified automatically let's say every day, or every month.

Pro: HWBot DB already calculates the average OC for a cpu with a specific cooling method. For 3770K is around 6300MHz as of today. It should be sufficient to apply this limit to the submissions, plus a 5% more frequency to not limit too much the competition but at the same time, to not let the super binned cpus take control of all. So 6300/0.95=6631MHz Max

Con: Same as fixed limits solution

 

Possible solution to variable limits:

- when a new hardware is introduced, it always needs some weeks to be available everywhere on the market. So, let's use this disadvantage that some countries have in respect to others like for example USA, to solve that problem.

We could open the submissions for that cpu, without points for the first month (except if you would want to post in the PRO league, as I already said it would be everybody's choice, without a big separation as it is today). After a month, the DB will be a bit populated and we can calculate the average freq to set as limit.

Periodically, let's say after another month, we could check wether or not the average frequency is changed a lot. In case yes, new recalculation, and probably last recalculation for the rest of the life of that hw. In case not, then it's ok, no changes needed.

 

A few marginal things I thought, as consequences to those modifications:

- a lucky guy who has a great cpu, could post in the OC league within the limits, and also in the Pro league without limits, getting points for both of them.

But, here is the interesting thing! You are a bin-addicted guy full of money without skills?! You'll probably get 0 points in the OC League since the other guys know how to better optimize and tweak etc... Same as per the PRO league, since if you don't have a really good hw and good tweaking skills, you'll get a not-so-good score to match up with the others.

[knopflerbruce]

No matter how you look at it you can still import hardware. I think 95% of my gear arrived from either USA or Germany.

[|ron]

mhh, yes, but I don't understand what's your point bruce.

I made a big post, plenty of suggestions etc... how does this thing that you can import hw, match with my post? I'm not sarcastic, I'm really "confused"

 

edit:

aaaaaaaahhhh ok, now I see!

"So, let's use this disadvantage that some countries have in respect to others like for example USA, to solve that problem. "

Ok, but that was only the "incipit", it is not the main reason why we should do that. Anyway, your example is correct, in fact if people will import hw, we'll have an average frequency available in less time

Edited December 23, 2012 by |ron

[rbuass]

To limited CPU clock is completely useless.

Same problem...

People need to find a monter CPU (highest binned CPU clock)....

So...if hwbot limited the frequency...

People need to find a monster CPU (highest binned BCLK)...

Lets think about it... if the 2 ways need binned CPUs, at least is more fantastic to keep highest score is possible... to any platforms.

[|ron]

I really don't understand ronaldo...

If Hwbot will limit the frequency, who cares about bclk or cpu clock? You can do 106x61=6466 or 109.6x59=6466, it's your business to find the better setting, given that you also have to deal with the ram clock and timings etc...

 

You want to obtain fantastic scores by binning 100 cpus and finding one that can bench at 7GHz? Ok, go and submit the score in the Pro league. You want also points from the OC league? Do the same benchmarks with the same CPU but at limited frequencies, let's say 6,6GHz, and show how much you're good at tweaking.

 

If I've not answered your concerns, please try to re-write, since I don't well understand. sorry.

[Mikecdm]

Limiting clocks is a terrible idea. There is no way to prove that someone did in fact run the bench at those speeds. Eventually, everyone will be "masters of efficiency."

[|ron]

Well, right, but it already is like that, now. Same thing goes for the hardware sharing chapter with cpus sold/borrowed from a clocker to another, especially in the same team.

But, for the sharing thing, I still see no solution... instead, for the "efficiency" problem, there are 2 solutions:

- ALWAYS, bench session video recording (already proposed time ago by... I don't remember who was saying that)

- if someone has really really high efficiency, we, the clockers, could ask that guy to do a video recording, only for that specific score

 

Problem solved, as far as I can tell. Do you agree, or do you think that something still needs to be improved?

Oh, and thanks for having pointed that out, I didn't think about that in my previous post.

[I.M.O.G.]

Requiring recordings is a bad idea. I can't keep video records straight for every session. Let alone doing subzero, where often times results aren't repeatable - most any score I submit is the product of dozens of runs which I wasn't happy with submitting, then only sending in the result I was happy with. Often times my best score comes from somewhere in the middle - working my way to tighten down all settings to maximize the score, then spending a while pushing harder and failing to get any better. I'm not sorting through a 3-9 hour benching session to extract the 25 minutes worth of recorded results where I wasn't failing. For instance, I spent about 3 hours on LN2 getting these results which weren't that hard but just took a lot of trial and error to find what the chip's limits were:

http://hwbot.org/submission/2336586_

http://hwbot.org/submission/2336584_

 

HWBot isn't successful because its the perfect system. It's successful because its the best system - its convenient, focused on community driven teams, reasonably well moderated in most categories, and caters to a diverse enough audience.

 

Perfect is the enemy of completed. In some things, good enough is ideal, and judging from the way hwbot operates I think they often times get that balance right.

[Lucky_n00b]

@ Ron :

 

I understand your concern about limiting clock frequencies, all valid points, but then again,when overclocking being 'overly competitive', there will be problems at some point (i.e : people using real-time BCLK /multiplier adjustment and tone it down before benchmark ends).

 

And I guess many user out there have pointed out that enforcing this 'clock-limit' rules is hard. We're talking about a specific wrapper with secure clock reading which cannot be tampered by whatsoever, not to mention this 'wrapper' have to use very little CPU resources and memory footprint so they don't intefere with the benchmark score.

 

It can be done, but only in live competition I think. Speaking of which, I've seen some Live OC Competition in Indonesia that used the 'clock-limit' rule, and it CAN be enforced since all of the judges were closely watching all the contestant - hard to do this in online competition.

Edited December 24, 2012 by Lucky_n00b

[Massman]

If all you understood from my posts is that hwbot killed oc, then I'll need to delete and re-write everything probably

 

I was refering to Mafio's post, not yours

[|ron]

cut

 

Well, so, for the sake of improving the fair competition on hwbot, it would be too difficult to press a button and record a video?

Lol, if that's all the efforts we are going to put in it, I've nothing to say.

And I never said that every flucking session will be recorded, I said that only in case of someone complaining about a result maybe the mods could ask a video.

And, since there will be frequency limits, you'll not be to the max max max max limit but you'll be in a rather stable situation, so no probs to re-do a run.

 

cut

 

Hi Lucky, I know what you said, but instead of throwing at me already well-known problems, try to find a solution WITH me.

I really think that hwbot, as it is right now, simply can't grow... how much people can afford to change 200cpus to get a decent one? And the same goes for the videocards.

Mantaining everything like it is now, it's all about money and time you can spend binning cpus like a monkey. Then you put it on the rig, power up, 7ghz, 100 global points, the end. Where is the skill?

You say there will be problems about invalid scores... ok, and we, the users, should report them to the mods, as it always has been. We are the best JUDGES out there, because we all do the same and we know if a score is suspicious. asking for proofs will be necessary in a few cases, just like it is now.

And also, remember, the majority of us is honest, I really think that it would be stupid to stop this proposal only basing on some faggot that will always exist and will always get banned sooner or later.

 

I was refering to Mafio's post, not yours

 

Ah sorry I misunderstood since me and mafio we were saying almost the same things.

Edited December 24, 2012 by |ron

[K404]

Filming a run is easy. Just make sure there's space on the memory card!

 

Keep the camera on a stand and have it filming the monitor.

[|ron]

Another side-effect of this change in hwbot, would be that we'll not spend 80% of our time to search for the proper cpu or vga.

We'll have plenty of time to improve our scores and, since hw releases are on a more tight schedule in the last years, by doing that modification, we'll have a "slowdown" to better squeeze the power out of every single mhz.

Then, if you want to still bin large amounts of cpus, you can post even in pro league with unlimited frequencies!

 

Another thing on the people who will cheat anyway, whichever method you'll choose: even in the gaming scenario, sometimes, someone is caught using cheats. It's not easy to spot him, but sooner or later it will be brought down by the mods.

Even in F1, 2 years ago, RedBull was caught using aerodynamics not fully permitted. The other teams spotted it, because they had a much more performing car and that was impossible since the limitations were the same for everybody. FIA decided to toggle that specific limit, for RedBull and for the other teams also.

I could go on and find other examples from other sports, but the rule is always the same:

- there will always be some faggot that won't follow the rules (even for good reasons, but it's always unfair), in EVERY kind of sport. So, improving/changing something can't be stopped by that issue, since in the new method I didn't propose "No screenshot required, post what you want, as you want"... It remains based on trust between users, like it is now.

 

@K404: yeah, correct. And plus, if someone would ask me to replicate my score, I would be glad to show that I have nothing to hide! blunny, it's for my integrity that I would have all the reasons to show that I did it honestly!

 

edit: "blunny"? This is a rock solid moderation

Edited December 24, 2012 by |ron

[rbuass]

C'mon overclockers...

Is hard to binning 7 Ghz 3770K... sure

But also very hard to binning highest BCLK 3770K...

So... change binning by binning do not be the better way...

If you tell me...Limited the clock and bclk... looks better....so...people will binning better IMC CPU...

Overclocker are all overclocker... always looking for the best weapons... and sure... will need always to do their best to find their weapons and also their best tweaks.

I have been thinking about this thread...and sometimes will be good to have multiple kind of competitions... limited, no limited, high end, mainstream, and so on....

I really prefer to bench the highest score as possible (regardless will be nice to bench hardmodded GTX 260...GTX 275...and so on)... but to look for a 18XXX 3DMark11 in a single card, to me, (please... i told "to me")... will be always what I am looking for.

 

best wishes, christmas and new year for all

[hokiealumnus]

I do see the problem if the idea is that Kingpin and the other hardcore pros will compete in the XOL again, as well as the NEW Pro League. Is that confirmed? That sounds odd to me.

 

I don't think so, at least not if they ever use ES chips or are sponsored or are an employee that gets relatively unlimited hardware.

 

I asked privately since I have submitted results with three ES processors over that many years (and not very good ones, because ES these days aren't any better than retail chips; in my case nowhere near as good). If you submit with ES processors, you're pro, period. Going back to XOL isn't an option. Thus, after the Rev.5 pro league comes into being, my profile will languish in purgatory, unranked. That is the price for submitting ES results to help my team with a few points.

 

Lest someone come up with the solution of submitting ES results without points, I cannot afford to replace ES CPUs with retail in every circumstance, so those points are needed. I'd rather my profile disappear into the nether personally and still be able to help my team then lose those points.

[Splave]

Best Samples will always win. Take a look at previous MOA/GOOC winners and see where they are among the rankings, not at the top. Thats the way it is, thats the way it will be. Companies will just have to add extra steps now and test bclk and imc more as well as igpu(yuck).

 

People say manufacturers are killing OC is crazy. They are making it alot easier for you and I software control, in house overclocking staff on the payroll, guides etc. Might make you feel less manly but guess what? people want simple and its helping to get people to give OC a shot. Before it was like okay maybe by doing a cap mod I can get a little bit more out of it, or if I tune in that OCP mod a little tighter I can get a bit more but now its the best caps, auto OCP bios etc and pretty much if you have a middle school education you can get the most out of a card (there are some tricks but for the most part you get the idea) that is why people feel they have to bin now.

 

Pro-leauge will not get you fully sponsored. If you think by busting your ass for years and staying in the top 10 of the pro league will open up a sea of hardware and samples it wont. And why would it? Every company already has its bencher and apart from reviewers they dont need you! sorry to dissapoint you but its true.

 

I can get on board with the challenge based quarterly events. I think it would save me alot of money in GPU's but guess what? You have to bin, its just the way it is now and thats a fact. Benching is not an investment and its costs money to play. Will I get stomped every quarter by the big guns? Yes probably but if Im doing something I enjoy then who cares right? End of the day its still a hobby.

 

Low clock is not an option. Short of having some sort of OS locked cpu speed control or competition spec'd motherboards that have locked limits this will never work.

 

In order for us to grow, and this website to grow we need simplicity...not loop holes that you learn over time...not a 100 page rules book...something your mom and dad would understand, and Im still wondering if this revision is helping or hurting, change it not always good and it seems each revision more and more people are turned off...I guess we will find out soon.

Edited December 27, 2012 by Splave

[saint19]

After read all the big guys write their opinions, here is mine, the opinion of a nOOb that is losing interest in the OC world.

 

All we know that overclocking world isn't fair and more if you are in the XOC league, but that's the "cost" of use extreme cooling methods. Now, the sad part is that while the top guys have too much hardware and constant access to LN2, now I want to be in the top and win points for rise up in the rank, for that reason I bought from my own money a i7-3770k and GTX 680 Lightning....but after bought that I'm in the same way, why? Because a single CPU with a single GPU can't do anything against a lot of hardware and better hardware above mine, that's it.

 

Now, overclock isn't only dead in Italy, is also coming to the end in my country Columbia...that has never been in the "top" or almost near to be. The Rbuass suggestions are very nice, but I also know that is almost impossible change the current system to that new proposal.

 

For now, I still have some hardware that I want test (FX-8350) since I want a 8GHz validation but after that I don't know if I will continue overclocking...as many of the guys here, I have kids and bills to pay.

 

Cheers.

[Gav777]

Since people are offering their opinions on everything overclocking related, as a relative newbie I thought I'd offer mine.

 

As it relates to growing the interest and participation in overclocking; it seems to me that the hwbot system has a fundamental problem. The scores in each "league" are not ranked comparatively to scores in the same league, they are compared to all scores.

 

The enthusiast league is where most, if not all, your future pro or Xtreme people will come from... surely this is where the community needs to grow its support base. Results in that league have extremely minimal return on investment of time and money, unless you're benching obscure stuff or in a category with few subs.

 

The same is true of pro vs xtreme overclockers leagues in the past. Sure the users are ranked separately, but the results are still compared. If you want people to aspire to a higher level of competition, having them be blown away by people with superior equipment is not the best way imho.

 

To use the popular F1 analogy, cars in the same league race against each other. You don't put a Ferrari in the formula 3000 race.