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All reference 6950s still soft-moddable?

Zinn

Zinn

2[H]4U
Joined
Jan 31, 2010
Messages
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I just ordered a couple of reference XFX 6950s from Amazon. I was wondering, has anyone heard of AMD hard-locking the shaders on these GPUs, or should it be safe to try flashing the BIOS? If it's a bad idea to mess with this, I'd be glad to keep them stock. But I wouldn't mind a free performance boost... So what's the deal?
 
Has anyone had problems unlocking? Like bad shaders, etc. Or is it pretty safe?
 
It's safe if you use the shader unlock method, and I recommend this. Don't straight up flash to a 6970 bios if you are scared to brick the card. I actually bricked one of my cards by flashing straight to a 6970 bios.
 
rUmX said:
It's safe if you use the shader unlock method, and I recommend this. Don't straight up flash to a 6970 bios if you are scared to brick the card. I actually bricked one of my cards by flashing straight to a 6970 bios.
Click to expand...

though the recover BIOS switch averts that... :D
 
Umm, not sure but I read somewhere that a new revised 6950 was on its way to stores, and supposedly it isnt unlockable.

Not sure how much truth is in that, but I read soemthing along those lines as I was gunna jump on the 6950 wagon, but I decided not to as knowing my luck I would get the locked ones.

http://blog.networqscience.com/?p=11506
 
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EVIL-SCOTSMAN said:
Umm, not sure but I read somewhere that a new revised 6950 was on its way to stores, and supposedly it isnt unlockable.

Not sure how much truth is in that, but I read soemthing along those lines as I was gunna jump on the 6950 wagon, but I decided not to as knowing my luck I would get the locked ones.

http://blog.networqscience.com/?p=11506
Click to expand...

It sounded like it was the 1gb version of the card that this was supposed to be "fixed" with, however I haven't seen anyone posting about unlocking the 1gb cards yet. I need to get another 6950 that is unlockable, but definitely don't have the funds for quite a while, so I'm holding out, hoping that they don't end up "fixing"/disabling the unlocking ability.
 
I flashed my 6950 using the directions above and started getting major artifacting and freezing after a couple of days. I lowered the speeds to the default 6950 speeds to try just the higher shader count but no-go.

Had to flip the BIOS switch back to "2".

ugh...
 
Karma said:
I flashed my 6950 using the directions above and started getting major artifacting and freezing after a couple of days. I lowered the speeds to the default 6950 speeds to try just the higher shader count but no-go.

Had to flip the BIOS switch back to "2".

ugh...
Click to expand...

FWIW, I believe that the fact that you were at all able to unlock/flash the card is evidence that the cards are still flashable. Now, what you do after flashing can make all the difference, i.e. o/cing etc. I've left my card stock after unlocking.

When I flashed my card, I couldn't even use winflash. I had to do the command-line flash, and once it was done had to reboot my computer and hope for the best. GPU-Z confirmed it worked, but it was an uncomfortable experience. So far about a month or so and no artifacts or other issues, but I'm at stock clocks (I'm pretty sure my setup is CPU limited, even with increasing o/c on my proc)
 
There is a shader unlock only bios out there. it may be better for you as if you flashed with a 6970 bios the reason you could be artifacting could be because your ram can't run at 1375 or with the aggressive timings the 6970 bios sets on the vram.
 
I have had some brands' BIOS's cause major problems with my card and others work 100% fine.
It's worth a shot.
 
Just get Techpowerup's batch tools to dump your bios, unlock its shaders and reflash it. It's a free performance boost with almost no risk.
 
Done.

Unlocked on both cards with no issues at all.

3dMark Vantage sometimes artifacts on the Extreme preset, but it was doing that @ stock, so I'm not gonna worry about it.

This is a ridiculously nice free performance boost.
 
rUmX said:
It's safe if you use the shader unlock method, and I recommend this. Don't straight up flash to a 6970 bios if you are scared to brick the card. I actually bricked one of my cards by flashing straight to a 6970 bios.
Click to expand...

What is the difference? Is the shader unlock method just "activating" the 2 disabled SIMDS and keeping the clock speed the same? So is it safe to say increasing clock speeds at all if you do this is much riskier than it would normally be?
 
What was your brand? I know it shouldn't make a difference, but I got a Sapphire 6950 & used a Sapphire 6970 BIOS, but it still didn't work right even at 6950 speeds.
 
Karma said:
What was your brand? I know it shouldn't make a difference, but I got a Sapphire 6950 & used a Sapphire 6970 BIOS, but it still didn't work right even at 6950 speeds.
Click to expand...

Don't use the 6970 bios. Use the 6950 bios that has shaders unlocked, and ups the voltage to 1.175. I have an XFX.
 
I know this is going to sound stupid, but everywhere I look I see 6970 BIOS and no unlocked 6950 BIOS. Couldn't find one on Techpowerup, Xtremesystems, etc.
 
Karma said:
I know this is going to sound stupid, but everywhere I look I see 6970 BIOS and no unlocked 6950 BIOS. Couldn't find one on Techpowerup, Xtremesystems, etc.
Click to expand...

Page 16 of the TPU thread should have all the info that you need.
 
okay, just kidding. I've tried several different unlock ROMs and all of them seem to cause artifacts when the cards have been powered up for awhile. including the one that leaves memory voltages / timings alone. after going in and out of a few games, the performance would start to really drag down in certain games (Crysis, Metro 2033) or other games would have serious artifacting (Mass Effect 2). the cards seemed to be getting pretty hot, too ~90C

every time i switched back to the stock 6950 bios, the issue disappeared. i'm super happy with the performance either way, so unless someone has any suggestions, i think i'll leave it alone.
 
Zinn said:
okay, just kidding. I've tried several different unlock ROMs and all of them seem to cause artifacts when the cards have been powered up for awhile. including the one that leaves memory voltages / timings alone. after going in and out of a few games, the performance would start to really drag down in certain games (Crysis, Metro 2033) or other games would have serious artifacting (Mass Effect 2). the cards seemed to be getting pretty hot, too ~90C

every time i switched back to the stock 6950 bios, the issue disappeared. i'm super happy with the performance either way, so unless someone has any suggestions, i think i'll leave it alone.
Click to expand...

you have like a 3% chance out of a hundred to get a card that doesn't unlock. Sorry to hear that. I got 2 that unlock stable, even with the 6970 bios. Every time you buy one of these cards that is a risk your taking though.
 
Well, I'm going to try to the 6950 shader only version & see what happens there.
 
Lord_Exodia said:
you have like a 3% chance out of a hundred to get a card that doesn't unlock. Sorry to hear that. I got 2 that unlock stable, even with the 6970 bios. Every time you buy one of these cards that is a risk your taking though.
Click to expand...

Could it be PSU related? I know I'm pushing the 750TX pretty heavily with all the drives, the CPU and two video cards unlocked at +20% power. My gut tells me it still should work, but don't know for sure.

I wish I had one of those tools to monitor power draw from the wall.
 
Zinn said:
Could it be PSU related? I know I'm pushing the 750TX pretty heavily with all the drives, the CPU and two video cards unlocked at +20% power. My gut tells me it still should work, but don't know for sure.

I wish I had one of those tools to monitor power draw from the wall.
Click to expand...

your cards are gettng too hot for simple unlocked cores. something else must be going on. try wizard's unlocking tool and mod your cards stock bios. what are your temps on the stock bios?
 
Zinn said:
Could it be PSU related? I know I'm pushing the 750TX pretty heavily with all the drives, the CPU and two video cards unlocked at +20% power. My gut tells me it still should work, but don't know for sure.

I wish I had one of those tools to monitor power draw from the wall.
Click to expand...

Try running without the +20 power and see if your cards run cooler or more stable. I think the 750 watts could be an issue but something tells me your just in the safe zone with it.. barely though. One of the signs your components is underpowered is excess temperature.
 
Hmm, the cards are getting up to 92C - 93C under Furmark with stock everything (BIOS, power, clocks, etc...)

Should I be concerned about this? It seems like a simple explanation for why performance degrades after awhile is that the cards are overheating... probably the stock BIOS is less susceptible to this

Not sure what to do tho since my case has reasonably good airflow.

[edit]Damn, when I keep the stock BIOS but bump the OC to the overdrive maximum of 840 / 1325 / +20% the thing gets up to 95C in furmark and the fans go crazy. Is this a problem?
 
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1: Do you enjoy playing Furmark? How hot does it get in a demanding game or with GPUTool?

2: What type of case are you using?

3: You could and probably should set up a modified fan profile with Afterburner.
 
Zinn said:
Hmm, the cards are getting up to 92C - 93C under Furmark with stock everything (BIOS, power, clocks, etc...)

Should I be concerned about this? It seems like a simple explanation for why performance degrades after awhile is that the cards are overheating... probably the stock BIOS is less susceptible to this

Not sure what to do tho since my case has reasonably good airflow.

[edit]Damn, when I keep the stock BIOS but bump the OC to the overdrive maximum of 840 / 1325 / +20% the thing gets up to 95C in furmark and the fans go crazy. Is this a problem?
Click to expand...

95C in furmark is fine. I would only anticipate problems beyond 99C. The reason the fan goes nuts is that in excess of 90C is considered an 'emergency' fan speed point for AMD, where every extra degree triggers a considerable rise in fan speed. This doesn't mean the card is in danger, that's what the increased fan speed is there to prevent.
 
Maybe my PSU is holding me back? I got a P2 X6 @ 3.25 w/ 2 HDD & 1 Optical, 4 Gig RAM and the 6950 running off of a Corsair HX 620.
 
Karma said:
Maybe my PSU is holding me back? I got a P2 X6 @ 3.25 w/ 2 HDD & 1 Optical, 4 Gig RAM and the 6950 running off of a Corsair HX 620.
Click to expand...

No that Psu is more than enough for your rig. I doubt that you draw more than 350w under full load.
 
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