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How are the 69xx overclocking?

Marvin

Marvin

Marvin

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27 Nov 2009
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Maidstone, Kent
As title really - I seem to remember reading in reviews that the 69xx series overclocks were not brilliant (tens of MHz rather than hundreds), has there been any progress?

Mainly interested in down-scaling my rig, going to a single card, getting rid of watercooling and so on.

Also, what is noise like on the stock cooler? Or is it still better to get a MSI/Sapphire 'cooler' cooler version?
 
Without voltage adjustment, I have 900/1450 on mine. 100 on the core, 200 on the memory isn't bad at all eh? ;)

Bit hot under load though, probably cos I have my fan at 30% constant :)

Gonna get an AC accelero or something to sort that ;)
 
950/1450 on my 6970, temps and noise are fine and with sapphire trixx or afterburner i can set up a fan profile that drops temps without adding any noise, i think i can overclock more when i have the time to mess about with it but to be honest dont realy need it any faster
 
The 6950's are the pick here imo. You can unlock the shaders and overclock it easily to 950 with a small voltage bump. There are reports of some 6970s going into the 1050/1100 and further but you are looking into 3rd party cooling solutions and watercooling for that.
 
6900 series seems to have complex overclocking, i've been trying to find some info of what people have achieved. Only seen one "review" after voltage tweak became available and it claimed 949 on the core with 1.24v...even though there are claims of 950 on the core with stock 1.175v before voltage tweaks was supported by anything and nearly 1100 more recently.

Could be poor cooling solutions holding some people back as they are not willing to increase the fan speed.

Personally i'm not brave enough to overclock on hotfix drivers and with beta 3rd party tools, especially as all but one program cant tell me basic info about the 2nd card and thats not working perfectly either.
After 11.1's are released I may give it a go even with one card at a time if I must.
 
I used RBE for the first time tonight and at 1.175 voltage (6970 stock voltage) my HiS 6950 runs at 975/1500. Many passes of 3dMark11, Heaven and Pro Evo 2011.

p5128

http://3dmark.com/3dm11/477062

I've been seeing some nice gains going from 1325Mhz memory to 1400, 1450 and then 1500. I won't post all the links here as it will just be messy.

This is with the 6950 modded to only unlock the shaders due to glitches on Pro Evo 2011 and the odd one or two on Heaven 2.1 when flashed to the 6970 BIOS. I can now confirm it was the memory timings due to this overclock not glitching in Pro Evolution 2011 at 1500Mhz speed as the glitches appeared pretty quickly with the 6970 BIOS even at 1325Mhz speed. Also when I was using the 6970 BIOS my voltage was 1.175 so it wasn't the core that was giving me the glitches.

With the memory at 1500Mhz on the 6950 BIOS I know my RAM isn't up to running at 6970 timings.

I'm beating my 5025 score by over 100 points and that was flashed to 6970 @ 950/1375. http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=18170880&postcount=404

I'm just going to put the voltage to 1.200 in RBE and see if I can run at 1000Mhz core, hopefully 1050Mhz :).

All on 10.12a driver.
 
Excellent, so the overclocks aren't as limited as the initial reviews made out, well that's something.

What are the stock coolers like? What do people reckon? While I'm happy to make certain noise concessions going from water to air, I don't like whiny rackets that past GPUs have been (4850! GTX470! et al)...
 
The coolers IMO are not the noisiest but they are not quiet either, if you are doing some extreme overclocking (20%+) then you will probably need a custom air solution unless you don't mind 50% fan speed (which I do!) :)
 
currently have 900/1400 everything stock fan never goes above 32 % will push it later just finished overcloking cpu, so will do gpu upcoming weekend.
 
Hmm, so the stock cooler is noisy and quiet... :p

I guess it's too subjective - I find the noise my pump makes really annoying, and it's the only thing in the case that makes any discernible noise.

So, do I go 6950 or 6970?
 
If you go for mega overclocks on air then expect to have to ramp the fan up. Otherwise you'll just have to see what temps you're getting for the overclock you want at the fan speed that doesn't mess with ya melon :D.

A bit tricky and I really don't know what to advise. You could try one and see how you feel, otherwise why not just sell one of your 480s and keep the other one?.
 
J.D said:
If you go for mega overclocks on air then expect to have to ramp the fan up. Otherwise you'll just have to see what temps you're getting for the overclock you want at the fan speed that doesn't mess with ya melon :D.

A bit tricky and I really don't know what to advise. You could try one and see how you feel, otherwise why not just sell one of your 480s and keep the other one?.
Click to expand...

I want to get rid of the watercooling too - far too much time/money invested in it, and GTX480s have horrible coolers. The other reason is I'm moving to a 27 or 30" screen (so 2560 type resolutions) and would prefer 2GB memory, as I noticed the GTX480's gets a little close in some games to running out (Dirt 2 especially).

I'm also going to see what the GTX560 launch brings, and then hopefully the 6990 will be announced soon.
 
Marvin said:
I want to get rid of the watercooling too - far too much time/money invested in it, and GTX480s have horrible coolers. The other reason is I'm moving to a 27 or 30" screen (so 2560 type resolutions) and would prefer 2GB memory, as I noticed the GTX480's gets a little close in some games to running out (Dirt 2 especially).

I'm also going to see what the GTX560 launch brings, and then hopefully the 6990 will be announced soon.
Click to expand...

Ahh so the WC is going too, right well that would make things interesting due to the gamble of "Will this be too noisy for my delicate ears" :D.

Well I think my 6950 (One card) at 100% fan speed was louder than my friends 480s in SLI @ 100% fan speed. Although his side case was muffling the sound. Also I never have ran it past 70% fan speed for normal use (I was being cautious at my first voltage increase so 70% seemed fine :D).

For the resolution you're moving too, I can't argue against wanting the 69-- series. I would cross off the GTX560 though if big resolution gaming was making the 69-- series 2GB look appealing. They may be quieter but what can the GTX560 do that the 570 and 580 can't. Apart from reach 1Ghz on the core :p.

The 6990 or 6950 (no point in 6970 IMO) is looking tempting and I hope if you do that you're happy with your purchase. I wonder how long it will be for the GTX dual card :).
 
I think I'll go for the 6950 -> unlock route, but are the 6970s overclocking further than unlocked 6950s is the question?

And yes, you're absolutely right on this front:
J.D said:
"Will this be too noisy for my delicate ears" :D.
Click to expand...
 
my 6950 with unlocked shaders can do 930/1450 1.175v as long as the temp stays below 62c, which is easy to do when fan set to 48%.
 
Last edited:
gareth170 said:
my 6950 with unlocked shaders can do 930/1450 1.175v as long as the temp stays below 62c, which is easy to do when fan set to 48%.
Click to expand...

Do you think that someone who wants a quiet system will be happy running at 48% fan speed?. What do you think of your card at this fan speed?. I think it would bother Marvin but I can live with it at this speed. 60% is quite audible and 70% is as far as I will go with headphones on as without, my speakers would have to be blaring to drown out the fan.

Marvin, maybe search on Google for how loud these cards get before purchasing.

I'm also not sure if 6970s are reaching higher overclocks :(.
 
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