Back in January 2012, PizzaMan from Overclock.net managed to get some quality time with HiVizMan from the UK. The result is a pretty interesting interview that spans several interesting overclocking-related topics. One such topic is the issue of hardware sharing between a married couple who both enjoy overclocking. HiVizMan also talks about his approach to overclocking and the research he has undertaken to fully understand how benchmarks work and the best way to optimize hardware and OS to get the best scores. He also paints a picture of what competitive overclocking looked like in the UK about six years ago. Here’s a sample of the interview:

PizzaMan: You've only been benching for only a year now and have climbed to the top quickly. What have you learned in this short year that you would like to share with your new team about making it to the top of your game?

HiVizMan: Yes I have been lucky in that under Rev3 on HWBOT I was UK Number 1 from about end of February till the Rev4 was introduced. Think I am still number two but the competition is pretty strong as there are some really class benchers out there in Great Britain. What gave me a distinct advantage was 1Day. And not in the way you would imagine.

She was adamant that there was no way on this earth she was going to make my journey easy or spoon feed me. So once she gave me my starter pack of kit it was up to me. I was freaked out the first time I did a benchmark and compared my results to the others who were running at there, or there about the same frequencies. Man, my scores were bad. I sucked big time. And I could not work out what the problem was, until it dawned on me that benching is part hardware, part OS optimization, part benchmark tweaking and part understanding the relationship between them all and the specific hardware being used. But I am getting ahead of myself.

Once I saw how rubbish I was, I decided to find out all that I could about each and every benchmark that I was going to compete in. Now most folks don’t read the instruction manuals for their DVD players...right? Well I read everything first. I spent large portion of my life in academia and as a book worm it was only natural for me to return to what I knew, read up and research about what it is I am doing. So I read all the white papers I could find about the Futuremark benchmarks. They are provided with the application as a rule you know. Just read them. And of course Google is your friend too.

You can find the full and fascinating interview with HiVizMan here on Overclock.net