AMD Radeon VII Chilling & Undervolting @ [H]

Awesome write-up, and I really wanted to pick one up for a Hackintosh build, as Mojave support is just around the corner. But there is no stock, anywhere. NewEgg.com has even removed all models, except for the MSI, which I wouldn't be surprised if it gets removed today or tomorrow. I wonder if this is either a low volume, kinda one off deal from AMD, or if the partner cards will start to show up now. If that's the case, I can't wait to see what some of the corners they cut will be. I bet we'll see at least one Radeon VII with a blower fan with a plastic shroud :LOL:
 
Yeah, I just noticed all the models gone from Newegg (except 1). Kind of strange, maybe in prep for AIB versions?
 
Love to see some AIB cards as well.

So what sticks higher? The HBM (not good) or the GPU? Could be an engineering design to protect the HBM2 if the GPU is higher which would make a lot of sense, plus using the particular thermal pad.

For the thermal graphic pads with uneven heights for HBM2 and GPU, using separate cut pads could be one solution since these pads do not conform well to height changes. Still not sure if that would even work since they probably don't compress well, meaning the lower component would not have good contact.
For the serious Modder, a custom milled or modified block specific to the Vega VII would seem to be the ticket for the right contact, maybe a little bit more on the GPU than the HBM2 for pressure, than again how much would that buy? Just a good old TIM application with some of the best TIM material may actually be the best overall solution, exceeding the reference design thermal pad heat transfer characteristics.

The key for getting Vega to really OC was cooling and getting the temperature down below normal - I would expect Vega VII to be similar if not the same. Tackle that problem and Vega VII may turn into a beast of a card for the $.
 
noko said:
Love to see some AIB cards as well.

So what sticks higher? The HBM (not good) or the GPU? Could be an engineering design to protect the HBM2 if the GPU is higher which would make a lot of sense, plus using the particular thermal pad.

For the thermal graphic pads with uneven heights for HBM2 and GPU, using separate cut pads could be one solution since these pads do not conform well to height changes. Still not sure if that would even work since they probably don't compress well, meaning the lower component would not have good contact.
For the serious Modder, a custom milled or modified block specific to the Vega VII would seem to be the ticket for the right contact, maybe a little bit more on the GPU than the HBM2 for pressure, than again how much would that buy? Just a good old TIM application with some of the best TIM material may actually be the best overall solution, exceeding the reference design thermal pad heat transfer characteristics.

The key for getting Vega to really OC was cooling and getting the temperature down below normal - I would expect Vega VII to be similar if not the same. Tackle that problem and Vega VII may turn into a beast of a card for the $.
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the gpu is taller than the memory and yes i think it's done that way to protect the HBM modules since they're super fragile and can crack but you'll never know it's cracked til you try to use the card. you can probably get away with using an excessive amount of thermal grease. other than that all the other thermal pads on the market are garbage in comparison to whats on the stock heatsink. as far as using a specifically milled block its hard to say what the tolerances are on the gpu height since they're coated to fill any gaps and to protect the HBM modules.

what would be nice is if Hitachi Chemical started selling it to make life a whole lot easier for people.

for those that don't about the graphite pad http://www.hitachi-chem.co.jp/english/products/cc/026.html it's the TC-HMO3
 
In our testing we found that AMD Radeon Chill and undervolting gave us slower fan speeds. Technically this means lower fan noise, but for us we did not hear the difference. The fans are not that bothersome under default.
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To each its own, but I can tell its bothersome on an open air case, and its noticeable on a closed case.
 
Yessssss these are the sort of left-field articles I like to see. Very interesting thanks guys!
 
Yeah, I just noticed. Afterburner is working great for me.

Just be sure to disable the auto fan in AB as it will overwrite what is set in Wattman (unless that is what you want).
 
Brent_Justice thanks for this follow-up!

Wondering if this gives headroom for any AIBs might do a custom design and some binning to reduce power draw or improve performance even further. Dunno if we'll see much of it before next gen parts launch, but it would be nice to see some attempts at design beyond "and we put a different heatsink on it."
 
deruberhanyok said:
Brent_Justice thanks for this follow-up!

Wondering if this gives headroom for any AIBs might do a custom design and some binning to reduce power draw or improve performance even further. Dunno if we'll see much of it before next gen parts launch, but it would be nice to see some attempts at design beyond "and we put a different heatsink on it."
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My guess here is no. I would suggest that AMD does not have the resources to tightly bin these GPUs. I could be wrong, but this is my gut feeling.
 
So my system is looking stable for the past few days. Got a pretty nice performance boost, and no problems with temps.

Here are the settings I'm using. May not work for you, but should give you an idea of what's possible on a good sample on air.

Core frequency at 1920 MHz 1040 mV max, 919 MHz 724 mV min.

Fans on auto (I found this was needed due to a bug that causes the fans to not ramp down, hopefully AMD will fix).

Power limit 16%.

Memory frequency 1200 MHz, memory timing level 2.

With those settings I'm seeing at least a 10% boost in FPS, maybe closer to 20%. Very satisfied with the performance.
 
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I wonder if I expect too much of AMD to be honest and tell us if we'll ever see these cards again for sale. They are not available anywhere. Like most here, I waited for the [H] review, and twice someone else snagged it right when I pressed the checkout button. It's a really cool GPU for work, I know a few use cases where the extra vram comes in handy. Think about it, Nvidia disabled one HBM2 module on the $3000 Titan V just so it won't compete with their data center class Volta GPUs, and AMD is giving us 16GB of this stuff at $699. God bless AMD, I hope they do make more!
 
Newegg has the listings back up but all are auto notify. I suspect that means a shipment is incoming to Newegg soon.

I was lucky enough to snag an Asrock Rad VII last week off of their web page.

ROCK solid.
 
Dayaks, good news. I also ordered some Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut from Newegg. I'm sure the block comes with paste but the Kryonaut might help a bit more if the surface is uneven.
 
Dayaks said:
Thanks for the heads up. I have one ordered now too. *high five*
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Will be interesting to see what clocks you end up with, I got lucky with my 1080 and it will hit 2100 on air so I decided against water cooling it, but it looks like the VII is the perfect card to water cool.
 
I hope so. Even at stock, per Steve Burke at Gamer's Nexus, the Rad VII runs somewhat faster on water than on air.
 
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