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[H] users 7970 Overclock Results thread

My ref voltage is 1.174

What's really strange is the artifacts in TW2 go away if I have the voltage options unlocked in Afterburner at 1125MHz. If I disable voltage options, I get artifacts in that game and have back down to 1070MHz.

Makes no sense o_O
 
Shocked said:
Thanks for the info.

"Reg 00000174 :00003700"

That what we're looking for?

EDIT: Also, I should note, it survived Furmark for 18 minutes @ 1125 at stock volts before I shut it down. Couldn't even get 10-20 seconds into 3DMark before crashing to desktop though, until I lowered it to 1075. Thought it was curious it survived in Furmark so easily considering that.

EDIT2: Afterburner reports voltage fluctuating around 980mv under load. I guess that would explain the drastic increase in temps. But it really started to scare me when it was climbing above 90C.
Click to expand...

What's the stock voltage? The higher the second number, the lower the default voltage is (the lower the leakage). It looks like your stock is lower than 1175 mv, since you can only do 1075 on the core. Since you're 980mv under load, it seems like you have a 1050mv default VID card.

If you make the voltage 1175 mv, you should do 1125 mhz on the core no problem.
 
x3sphere said:
My ref voltage is 1.174

What's really strange is the artifacts in TW2 go away if I have the voltage options unlocked in Afterburner at 1125MHz. If I disable voltage options, I get artifacts in that game and have back down to 1070MHz.

Makes no sense o_O
Click to expand...

The "reg" is the register, not the voltage! ALl the cards will show "174" since that's the register you're polling. The second number is what shows the ASIC leakage value. The higher that number, the lower the VID of your card may be.

When you unlock the voltage options, the voltage for your card is set to 1175 mv instantly.
To find your default voltage, you need to run afterburner without unlocking voltage control, just unlock the voltage monitoring, and look at the MV while running something light 3d (not furmark).

If you get 1140 mv, then your card defaults to 1175 mv. if you get 1010 or 980mv then it's probably a 1050mv card.

Basically, lower VID cards can NOT run at max CCC settings without increasing the voltage first. ALthough it would be nice to know if lower VID cards can overclock higher at the same voltage compared to higher vid cards.
 
Falkentyne said:
What's the stock voltage? The higher the second number, the lower the default voltage is (the lower the leakage). It looks like your stock is lower than 1175 mv, since you can only do 1075 on the core. Since you're 980mv under load, it seems like you have a 1050mv default VID card.

If you make the voltage 1175 mv, you should do 1125 mhz on the core no problem.
Click to expand...
When I enabled voltage tweaking in Afterburner, it defaulted to 1049 mv so that sounds accurate.

The only thing I'm worried about is temps. At stock volts I'm at 82C in Furmark and 74C in Heaven. I guess it should be ok though, assuming it would be the same as a reference card set to run at 1175 to begin with. Just that fan got spinning awfully fast and I've never seen any of my cards really go past 90C in Furmark.

Heh. The last time I played around with voltage overclocking with GPUs was a GeForce3 Ti500.

EDIT: Gets up to 83C in Heaven @ 1175 mv. Haven't tried upping the clocks yet, just wanted to test temps.
 
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Ok now we're getting somewhere.
Set your fan to 60% and then tell me your Heaven max temp after a 20 minute loop at 1175 mv. (just trying to compare apples to apples here, so we have the same fan speed and volts set, though I tested at 1150 core, when you did 1125 core, that should only raise temps about 1C'ish).

Mine is about 76C after 20 minutes, and 1150/1625 default volts (1175 mv). My card defaults to 1175. My ASIC is 00002f50. Apparently the "2" cards seem to be 1175 mv while the "3" cards have lower Vids (1125 or 1050 mv).
 
Running now. Strangely, Afterburner resets my voltage to 1174 mv every time I try to set it to 1175.

Anyway, thanks for the help. I'll edit my post or reply to the thread in 20 minutes and report back!
 
if you have a 1.05V VID card, consider small increments in voltage. i'm still testing but so far i've had the best results under 1.175V. right now my card appears stable at 1175 MHz core at 1.125V.
 
Is your 1.125v the "real" measured voltage, or the target voltage (meaning the real voltage will be lower from vdroop?)
 
Falkentyne said:
The "reg" is the register, not the voltage! ALl the cards will show "174" since that's the register you're polling. The second number is what shows the ASIC leakage value. The higher that number, the lower the VID of your card may be.

When you unlock the voltage options, the voltage for your card is set to 1175 mv instantly.
To find your default voltage, you need to run afterburner without unlocking voltage control, just unlock the voltage monitoring, and look at the MV while running something light 3d (not furmark).

If you get 1140 mv, then your card defaults to 1175 mv. if you get 1010 or 980mv then it's probably a 1050mv card.

Basically, lower VID cards can NOT run at max CCC settings without increasing the voltage first. ALthough it would be nice to know if lower VID cards can overclock higher at the same voltage compared to higher vid cards.
Click to expand...

Ah, I see. Well, my ASIC is 00002db0. Voltage monitor reports around 1.158-1.160 wiith the voltage control disabled. So I have a 1175 mv card then.

I booted up The Witcher 2 again and it's not artifacting anymore with voltage control disabled at 1125MHz. Quite strange... the first day I got the card I was not able to get it stable at this speed. I have kept temps around 60C under load, so I doubt it was due to heat.
 
I hit 78C. Looks like it was pretty constant throughout the entire 20 minutes. And admittedly the ambient temperature is warmer than I'd like (dang office gets hot much quicker than the rest of my home).
 
Shocked said:
I hit 78C. Looks like it was pretty constant throughout the entire 20 minutes. And admittedly the ambient temperature is warmer than I'd like (dang office gets hot much quicker than the rest of my home).
Click to expand...

Sounds like our cards reach about the same temps at the same voltages.
I just wonder which one will overclock higher, though.
Do you know how far you can get with stock volts, and with a small bump?

The highest I can do stable in BF3 with stock is 1150 mhz.
I can do 1200 mhz stable at 1.225v.

@porter:
Sounds like you have a very nice card. I'm just trying to find out if most of the lower VID Cards will overclock higher than the higher VID cards when both are run at the same voltages...

How high can your card go (stable) at 1.175v?
How hard have you pushed it max?

And what are your temps like at 1.175v in BF3?
 
Just got back home, so you'll have to give me a bit.

Gonna start with 1150 and see how it goes from there. :)

EDIT: Any guidelines you want me to consider for what's "stable"? I used to just let Furmark run for a while.
 
Play BF3 and fly in chase cam mode in a jet. That always points out core problems if you start seeing lines coming from your jet :) Or play Witcher 2 or run 3dmark 2011.. Furmark is horrible for these kind of tests. Tends to crash under heat related problems instead of core calculation problems which would pass furmark.
 
Well, everything seems fine so far at 1175 (EDIT: @ 1175 mv). I don't have any games installed at the moment because this is an entirely new build, but I ran Heaven for a while then benched 3DMark11.

Just ran Heaven for several minutes at 1200 without a problem. Going to run 3DMark11 again, just paused real quick to downclock my 2500K to 4.6 from 4.7. Was hitting 74C in Prime95, though I don't know why I decided that bothered me now as opposed to a few hours ago lol.
 
Sounds like you have a winner.
Looks like the lower vid cards can overclock higher.

Can you do me a favor though?
Can you set your voltage to 1225 mv (1.225v) and tell me if you're stable? Please use 925 core (default).

Some people have posted that they can't use 1.3v at all, even on default volts....I wonder if it's because they have a lower VID card...
 
I'll try it on default clocks in a sec.

I did try 1225 on the core, first at 1175 mv - Heaven ran for a while but 3DMark11 crashed. Upped the volts to 1225 mv, and I think I was getting some light artifacting (which I think was present when I tried it at 1175 mv, but I was only half paying attention and it wasn't blatantly obvious all the time).

EDIT: 1225 mv seems fine at stock clocks
 
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Having some great results here. You have been a lot of help Falkentyne by using some of your suggestions with some of my own I'm now stable at:

Sapphire HD 7970

Core: 1175
Memory: 1600
Voltage: 1.175

Overclocking tool:
Afterburner

Testing tools:
3DMark 11 (P8763)
Furmark (78c max temp after 15min 1080p burn in with fan set 1:1)

Thanks again (even though you are kind of hateful):D
 
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Falkentyne said:
@porter:
Sounds like you have a very nice card. I'm just trying to find out if most of the lower VID Cards will overclock higher than the higher VID cards when both are run at the same voltages...

How high can your card go (stable) at 1.175v?
How hard have you pushed it max?

And what are your temps like at 1.175v in BF3?
Click to expand...

i am stable at 1200 MHz at 1.175V but i get artifacts at those clocks. it seems regardless of voltage my chip tops out at 1150 MHz. not a bad overclock really :)
 
Porter_ said:
Results:
1175 core
1575 memory
1.17 volts

Type of card:
XFX Black Edition DD

Overclock tool:
Sapphire Trixx

Stability test:
BF3 and Metro 2033 at the moment.
Click to expand...

Update:
1150 core
1625 memory
1.1V (VID = 1.05V)

Type of card:
XFX Black Edition DD

Overclock tool:
Afterburner

Stability test:
BF3, Metro 2033, Crysis 2, STALKER CoP, ATItool
 
Guess I'll update mine as well. Finally got around to pushing the memory some as well. Will get around to testing some actual games as I get them installed.

Results:
1200 core
1600 memory
1.175v (target)

Type of card:
XFX reference

Overclock tool:
MSI Afterburner

Stability test:
Heaven, 3DMark11
 
JonnySS said:
Having some great results here. You have been a lot of help Falkentyne by using some of your suggestions with some of my own I'm now stable at:

Sapphire HD 7970

Core: 1175
Memory: 1600
Voltage: 1.175

Overclocking tool:
Afterburner

Testing tools:
3DMark 11 (P8763)
Furmark (78c max temp after 15min 1080p burn in with fan set 1:1)

Thanks again (even though you are kind of hateful):D
Click to expand...

Sorry I wasn't trying to be rude. I was just unhappy that you were trying to write a guide (when the premises was incorrect) instead of asking for help (which I would have been glad to help with).

Can you run MSI Afterburner in the command prompt and use the /rr174 switch and report the second number in the popup? Seems like you also have a low default vid GPU, which is why you can't max the CCC sliders without raising the vGPU. But once you raise the vGPU, your card should overclock like a champ.

A person on xtremesystems.org said his 1.050v default Vid card runs 1225 (!) mhz stable.
 
MSI Afterburner 2.2.0 Beta 11
Changes list includes:

- Added memory voltage control for reference design AMD RADEON 7970 graphics cards with CHL8228 voltage regulators
- Now MSI Afterburner displays target VID instead of real voltage sensor reading on "GPU voltage" graph on graphics cards equipped with CHL8228 voltage regulators. These changes are implemented to avoid confusing the beginners and prevent the hysteria about voltage drop on AMD RADEON 7970 series graphic cards spreading across different discussion forums. Experienced users, understanding the difference between target and real voltages, may still unlock the previous real voltage monitoring mode via editing the hardware profiles
- Core and memory clock limits have been extended to 180% on AMD RADEON 7970 graphics cards in unofficial overclocking mode
- Now MSI Afterburner's startup daemon routine precaches VRM I2C registers state at the first Windows startup. Precached VRM state is being used to detect default voltage instead of hardcoding default voltages into the database. Please take a note that you may forcibly perform precaching later with command line switch or disable the precaching at all via configuration file if necessary and force MSI Afterburner to use the previous hardcoded database based default voltage detection
- MSI On-Screen Display server has been upgraded to version 4.3.1. New version gives you the following improvements:
o Added workaround for AMD OpenGL driver context switching issues causing abnormally low framerate in ID Software Rage when OSD is enabled
o Added workaround for AMD OpenGL driver PBO issues causing the driver to crash or perform abnormally slow during videocapture
Click to expand...
 
After spending a few hours tweaking the voltages on both of them, here's where I landed:

GPU1 : 1125/1575
Target Vgpu 1.200 V, idle 0.845 V (power saver mode), load 1.136 - 1.148, usually closest to 1.142
Load Temp 82-84

GPU2 1125/1575
Target Vcore 1.200 V, idles at 1.189, under load = 1.148-1.166 usually closest to 1.156v
Load temp 80-82

GPU2 is in slot 1, GPU1 is in slot 3. Auto fan controls for both, which are 20% at idle and just about 50% on the nose for load.

I spent hours adjusting the Vgpu's based on the actual measured under load, finding the sweet spots and getting as low as possible. It's just a coincidence they both wound up targeted at 1.2v, that's just what delivered the sweet voltages under load after some massive Vdroop.

Battlefield 3 is pretty amazing. I used to play without HBOA, and there's little difference in screenshots, but playing with it on makes a much bigger difference than the screenshots indicate. Much more cinema like.

I'm sure I could go higher, but I don't want to hear any more fan.
 
Figured I'd chime in with my results since I've been rock solid for over a week now.

I have a Gigabyte 7970 reference card.

CCC sliders all the way to the right.

core 1125
mem 1575

I don't even need to set powertune to + 20% but I did after a couple days just because I was bored.

My VID according to Afterburner is 1.175

and my highest load temp (that I have noticed) was 78c

I don't continously monitor temps because I haven't had to and the cooler never gets too loud, just a whooooooosh to let me know she's doing her job.

I'm thoroughly impressed with the card. Wicked easy to get a sizable overclock and has provided me with increased gaming performance over my previous GTX580. Much appreciated when using a 30incher and 120hz panels alike.

All this and my stocks have shot up!!!!
 
Hey Fal

Thanks for being more understanding with my noob factor. So I didn't run the command line however when I only enable voltage monitoring as you suggested it does show .983 so I assume my card is a lower vid. Any particular tests you think I should run?
 
I also still don't understand why sometimes I run Furmark and fps stays at 45 and I can finish a run to check load temps. While other times it jumps to 65 fps and death when that happens.
 
Dumb question:

I ordered my 7970 and it should be on its way here shortly and I am hearing things about 1.05VID card vs a 1.175VID card and the 1.05 is a much better overclocker. How do I find out off the bat what my card's VID is? If I unerstand VID is the default voltage my 7970 is set to? Meaning if I get a 1.175VID card, does that mean I am getting an inferior chip? Or can I just start overclocking by bumping the volts down to 1.05 and start from there.
 
Ok this is a really dumb question. Please forgive me as I am new to forums in general. How are you guys posting up your system hardware info... God I feel stupid for asking that.:eek:
 
JonnySS said:
Ok this is a really dumb question. Please forgive me as I am new to forums in general. How are you guys posting up your system hardware info... God I feel stupid for asking that.:eek:
Click to expand...

Click on User CP in the ribbon across the top and then go to "Edit Signature"

:)
 
WiL11o6 said:
Dumb question:

I ordered my 7970 and it should be on its way here shortly and I am hearing things about 1.05VID card vs a 1.175VID card and the 1.05 is a much better overclocker. How do I find out off the bat what my card's VID is? If I unerstand VID is the default voltage my 7970 is set to? Meaning if I get a 1.175VID card, does that mean I am getting an inferior chip? Or can I just start overclocking by bumping the volts down to 1.05 and start from there.
Click to expand...

Install the MSI Afterburner Beta and when you launch it it will tell you the voltage. Well, you have to "unlock voltage monitoring" in the settings, but that's basically it.

Mine was 1.112, which in reality worked out to about 1.05. OC's great!
 
I thought MSI AB automatically bumps it up to 1.175 regardless of what your default VID is.
 
Seemed fine last night at 1200 core. Saw some minor artifacting this afternoon though so backed it down to 1175.
WiL11o6 said:
I thought MSI AB automatically bumps it up to 1.175 regardless of what your default VID is.
Click to expand...
Doesn't for me. TriXX does, but Afterburner defaults to 1.049V here.
 
WiL11o6 said:
I thought MSI AB automatically bumps it up to 1.175 regardless of what your default VID is.
Click to expand...

thats what it seems like to me. i cant get the new beta to show me any other voltage than 1.175 as the "default" even after changing the "Graphics Processor Type" to "1050mv".
That particular option did default to 1.175 for me, not sure if thats what the other poster is saying.
 
Haste, Run msiafterburner.exe from the command prompt with the /rr174 switch and post the second number shown (the first is the register polled, of course, which is 174)
 
Ah. I'm still using the previous version.

Saw some minor artifacting at 1175 (@ 1175 mv) after an extended period of time in Heaven loop. A little disappointed, or at least not as psyched as I was when everything seemed fine last night. A little tentative about raising the voltage past 1175 for everyday usage.

EDIT: GPU also got up to 88C in Heaven @ 1175 mv today, at auto fan speed.

EDIT2: And at least I think it was artifacting. Solid red splotches in a line at an angle down roughly the center of the screen. Not used to what I'm seeing, but I figure it's something that shouldn't be there. Always seems to happen at the dragon statue.
 
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Shocked:
*where* were the artifacts exactly? Was it at the rotating Dragon statue?
Ok you just said it was at the dragon statue. I get artifacts at that statue even if I go lower than stock speeds, lol....basically close to the top right of the screen, always at the exact same point (like a black flicker in two places at the same time, with one by the edge of the wing).
 
While playing Witcher 2 I occasionally get a CTD but I don't know if it's related to my overlcock or not. Happens once every few hours.
 
Falkentyne said:
Shocked:
*where* were the artifacts exactly? Was it at the rotating Dragon statue?
Click to expand...
Yeah. I edited my post. Didn't really look like artifacting as I'm used to seeing it but I wasn't sure what else it could have been.

EDIT: I think I see that flicker as well, but it's very very quick. There are some other random flickering stuff as well that make me curious, but I think the others are just lighting.

Curiously, the red splotches I was seeing happen around the same time as the flicker.

EDIT2: I let Heaven run for about 45 minutes (1175/1575 @ 1175 mv), came back and saw a LOT of stuttering I didn't see before. I doubt it's microstuttering since it's single GPU. There were places it looked like a slideshow even though it was running at 30-40 FPS.
 
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