What is artifacting?

[Trail Mixorz]

Is it kinda like when it starts to look blocky everywhere or something? I hear people throw this word around but I never knew what it was

[Volbet]

If we are talking about overclocking or a dying graphics card, they are usually bright green or red dots and lines. it can also be a warping of the image or very extreme tearing.

 

Edit: It also depends on what you have overclocked. The GPU usually give the artifacts that I have mentioned, the VRAM can also show instability by the image being the wrong colours, and maybe make the graphics look very blocky.

[TymmVonD]

@Trail Mixorz

You'll see little dots. Like pixels that are the wrong colors, but that's when it's on the edge of normal and too high of an OC. Major artifacting would be like large triangles shooting down the screen like lightning. I've seen those in Dirt 3 with way too high OC. Mainly, graphical images that are not normal.

[tS_kStin]

Weird looking things on the image that should not be there in short.

[Akolyte]

I also have this question, cheers guys. 

[Jogostar]

[Akolyte]

well..  I saw nothing and then this terrifying picture came up.

 

I almost cried.

[Jogostar]

well..  I saw nothing and then this terrifying picture came up.

 

I almost cried.

a dying GPU is always sad to see.

[Sonefiler]

Sometimes you can see red or white stars pop up on the screen. Usually in the bottom left or top right for me. Just increase the voltage and it will be fine.

[That Norwegian Guy]

CPU to GPU interpretation artifacting: meshes/ models twisting/ exploding outwards - deformed models

GPU artifacting: tearing everywhere, black patches - that is, if it doesn't just outright crash

VRAM artifacting: purple, green or yellow dots and/or squares, frozen picture, snow

SLi/ Crossfire artifacting: Everything is the wrong colour, like a coloured rainbow static overlay, but the picture is the same and it's usually playable