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Multi-mixed card setups.

SunnyD

SunnyD

2[H]4U
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Jul 6, 2004
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I'm looking for anyone with experience on how well rigs with multiple cards of different generations play nice together. For example, a machine that might have Cayman (69xx), Pitcarn (78xx) and Tahiti (79xx) cards all in the same cgminer instance.

I do know it runs, but I'm wondering how difficulty it is to tune such a beast and how stable such things might be.

Has anyone run such a setup?
 
Yep. I was running 7970s and 6970s together. Didn't have any super big issues other than what I'd normally expect.

BTW, this was on Win7, not BAMT or SMOS.
 
I've ran mixed cards before. The biggest thing is make sure you have the gpu's setup in the right order that cgminer sees them as in the config file. It's a matter of seperating the settings with a comma with the desired card-specifc settings in the order that cgminer sees 'em.
 
I have 3 rigs with multicard setups in them, they are somewhat of a pain in the ass to tune, but once they are running, they are fine, just like any other rigs. 2 of the rigs I have actually have 3 generations of cards in them, 6970/7870/270(x) cards. Just start CGminer with the -n tag, and see where it's mapping the cards. I've found that just because they show up in GPU Shark or your device manager in a certain order, doesn't mean that's the way CGMiner sees them. Once you get the order correct, its just a matter of finding the settings the cards like.
 
The main issue I have had is, and I still have a thread on here about it, is the gpu-threads #.
Some cards optimize with 1 thread and some with 2.
cgminer "normally" will not allow you to set a different one between cards.
I'm still working with the suggestion of running two instances of cgminer. It works "ok" but I see some things I can't explain that I did not see before when running one instance.
 
Core32 said:
The main issue I have had is, and I still have a thread on here about it, is the gpu-threads #.
Some cards optimize with 1 thread and some with 2.
cgminer "normally" will not allow you to set a different one between cards.
I'm still working with the suggestion of running two instances of cgminer. It works "ok" but I see some things I can't explain that I did not see before when running one instance.
Click to expand...

You can also use sgminer which supports multiple -g variables.
 
Funny you ask, I just setup a 2x Hawaii (290) and 2x Pitcairn (270) and while I Ieventually got everything humming along optimally, it wasn't easy. This was mostly because of cgminer and not Windows/Catalyst related. I noticed it took at least one full Windows 8 reboot for a flashed GPU BIOS to show in correct clocks/voltage in GPU-Z or otherwise. Reboots were also needed when adding card 3 and 4 for my particular setup. I just ended up installing all 4 cards, wiping Catalyst with DDU and reinstalling 13.12 drivers, reboot and all cards detected.

My biggest problem was with cgminer. Setting up multiple GPUs (using the config file), each with different settings. It took me forever to figure out that cgminer would order the GPUs differently depending on the setting. For example, setting intensity was 270,270,290,290 but setting clocks was 290,290,270,270. This happened with thread-concurrency and a couple others as well. It was all trial and error until I got them hashing optimally. Luckily I already knew what each card could hash individually before putting them all in one rig. Even now, cgminer displays the wrong fan RPMs and temps for the wrong card. It's just a display issue so I'm not too concerned about it. I had to use various tools to figure out which card was which.

cgminer - n said my cards were Pitcairn, Pitcairn, Hawaii, Hawaii but as I found out in the config file, this wasn't always the case.
 
edge929 said:
Funny you ask, I just setup a 2x Hawaii (290) and 2x Pitcairn (270) and while I Ieventually got everything humming along optimally, it wasn't easy. This was mostly because of cgminer and not Windows/Catalyst related. I noticed it took at least one full Windows 8 reboot for a flashed GPU BIOS to show in correct clocks/voltage in GPU-Z or otherwise. Reboots were also needed when adding card 3 and 4 for my particular setup. I just ended up installing all 4 cards, wiping Catalyst with DDU and reinstalling 13.12 drivers, reboot and all cards detected.

My biggest problem was with cgminer. Setting up multiple GPUs (using the config file), each with different settings. It took me forever to figure out that cgminer would order the GPUs differently depending on the setting. For example, setting intensity was 270,270,290,290 but setting clocks was 290,290,270,270. This happened with thread-concurrency and a couple others as well. It was all trial and error until I got them hashing optimally. Luckily I already knew what each card could hash individually before putting them all in one rig. Even now, cgminer displays the wrong fan RPMs and temps for the wrong card. It's just a display issue so I'm not too concerned about it. I had to use various tools to figure out which card was which.

cgminer - n said my cards were Pitcairn, Pitcairn, Hawaii, Hawaii but as I found out in the config file, this wasn't always the case.
Click to expand...

Oh lord, I was hoping that wasn't the case. That's exactly what I was hoping to avoid.
 
couldn't you just run multiple instances of cgminer? That's what I am doing. I have 2 different config files for my 2 cards (both 7870) and just start each one up with a different bat file
 
TMCM said:
couldn't you just run multiple instances of cgminer? That's what I am doing. I have 2 different config files for my 2 cards (both 7870) and just start each one up with a different bat file
Click to expand...
You still need to know exact device # of each card, and the sequence you start the batch files can also have an effect.
That's where I am seeing the issues.

And for what it's worth, I built the latest version of sgminer and got errors when trying to run the so-called multiple gpu-threads fix.
"gpu-threads" : "1,1,2" returns an error.......
I asked about this in my other thread but I don't think anyone had an answer for me.
Very possibly I am entering it wrong.
 
Core32 said:
Wasn't able to get it to build for some reason, but my understanding is that the latest sgminer is based on that.
Click to expand...

I haven't gone through to update my systems yet. You doing it on BAMT or something?
 
No, I installed my setups using Ubuntu, straight up.
I have used BAMT and it was good for the easy Linux startup but I didn't like not knowing more about the build.
So independent me went solo.... :)
 
Here's what I've noticed In one of my rigs.

In one of my multi-GPU rigs, I fire up CGMiner with the -n option, it shows

GPU-0 Radeon 6900 series Caymen
GPU-1 Radeon 7800 series PitcairnXT
GPU-2 Radeon R9 200 series Pitcairn
GPU-3 Radeon R9 200 series Pitcairn

This is what I set my config with and this is how they show up in the Device Manager.


But when I open CGMiner and start mining it reads like this:

GPU-0 Radeon R9 200
GPU-1 Radeon R9 200
GPU-2 Radeon 6900
GPU-3 Radeon 7800

I have no freeking idea why It mixes them up, but I don't really care. I know what all the cards do and their temps, its just a pain in the ass thinking your looking at one card when your actually looking at another. I've heard there is a --GPU-Reorder command...or something of the like in CGMiner, but I haven't tried it yet.

I have had no problems with Windows 8-8.1 seeing up to 6 video cards though...
 
Don't think I've seen this mess.
What shows from cgminer -n also shows when I run it mining.

Question. How do you "when I open CGMiner and start mining it reads like this....."
When it's running I see nothing but the GPU #. Nothing about what card it is...
 
I'll post a screenshot of cgminer shenanigans later tonight.
 
I've used 3 gens at the same time.

Cgminer does report them wrong, card 1 temp might be card 4's. It's easy to figure out if you just change one thing at a time and try some really low number so you can tell which is which. Set all the others high and change each card one at a time to see which card it affects.

Once you figure out which is which it shouldn't change.

You still have to optimize one at a time.
 
edge929 said:
I'll post a screenshot of cgminer shenanigans later tonight.
Click to expand...

Better late than never. I give you said shenanigans.

The 290s have the 1015/1060 core clocks, 1375/1425 mem clocks, 65% and 70% fan speed, 32768 TC, 20 intensity and the higher temps/fan speeds. The other 2 cards are 270s.

cgminer.gif
 
Holy crap!
So the temps and fan speeds of 0,1 really belong with the hash rates of 2,3......
I see nothing like that on my rigs in Ubuntu...............so far.
This is a Win box, correct?
If I had worked through that eff-up during my startup I might have just quit :)
How long did it take for you to get the order right for all parameters?
Looks like a good reason to NOT mix cards within a rig...
 
Yeah, Windows 8.1. After unhooking my risers to add some cable ties and then hooking them back up exactly as they were (I went one at a time) my rig is now randomly unstable. In order to find the card(s) having problems I'm going to start using a separate cgminer instance for each card (so 4 total) giving each one their own config file.

I had another rig where I tested each card separately so I had a good idea what they could do on their own. Setting fan speed high and keeping all other params at a common/attainable speed I was able to figure out which was which. I knew that higher TC than a card could do would crash cgminer so I was able to figure that out. Took me a few hours to do all of this.
 
Last edited:
^^ It's theoretically possible if you set CGMiner/SGMiner to the AMD cards, and CUDAMiner to the nvidia cards.. but the bigger issue will be getting the drivers to play nice with each other.
 
hcforde said:
Can you use AMD and Nvidia cards in the same machine
Click to expand...

Yup, got a 780 and a 270X mining together in the same box right now. Just have to put flags in to only include the relevant cards in each miner.
 
Parja said:
Yup, got a 780 and a 270X mining together in the same box right now. Just have to put flags in to only include the relevant cards in each miner.
Click to expand...

And how exactly does one do this? I've tried to run 2 instances of cgminer/kalroth/sgminer using device 0,1 for my 270s and device 2,3 for my 290s but regardless of which one I start up, it will start all 4 cards at those settings. I also tried using --remove-disabled with no luck.

cgminer -n orders the cards:
Pitcairn
Pitcairn
Hawaii
Hawaii
 
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