AMD Radeon RX 460 Unlock is Here – Jump For 896 To 1024 Stream Processors, Gain a 12.5% Performance

LoadsaMoney · 11 Dec 2016 at 17:33

Users of the Radeon RX 460 graphics card are in for a good news. Author of overclocking.guide, der8auer, has managed to unlock the Radeon RX 460, providing a free performance upgrade to users

AMD Radeon RX 460 Firmware Update Unlocks Card Into Full Polaris 11 Chip – Performance Results Detailed

The unlocked card gains you 128 more stream processors and also 8 additional TMUs. This results in a total of 64 TMUs and 1024 stream processors. The performance results speak for themselves as we the site reports improvements up to 12.5% which is a great increase.

http://wccftech.com/amd-radeon-rx-460-polaris-11-unlock/

shankly1985 · 11 Dec 2016 at 17:39

Love this, PC nerds Ftw

mart280 · 11 Dec 2016 at 17:53

Can they unlock my 1070 into a 1080

, stuff like this is great, wish I had a 460 to try this out.

JediFragger · 11 Dec 2016 at 17:53

Good news, makes the 460 a bit less ****-poor

pastymuncher · 11 Dec 2016 at 18:53

It's hardly game changing though is it? A extra 2-3 fps isn't going to make a lot of difference at this end of the market. The stock Strix gets 25/34/29 while the unlocked Strix gets 28/37/32 and is only a 3 fps gain. The stock Nitro gets 29/35/32 while the unlocked Nitro gets 31/37/33 and is even less of a gain at 2/2/1 fps. I don't like the way they have only overclocked the best of the unlocked cards to make it look even better than the stock cards. While it is good to see things like this going on, unless you are heavily into benching there seems to be little point in doing this.

RavenXXX2 · 11 Dec 2016 at 18:56

Just buy the 1050.

Final8y · 12 Dec 2016 at 10:51

pastymuncher said:
It's hardly game changing though is it? A extra 2-3 fps isn't going to make a lot of difference at this end of the market. The stock Strix gets 25/34/29 while the unlocked Strix gets 28/37/32 and is only a 3 fps gain. The stock Nitro gets 29/35/32 while the unlocked Nitro gets 31/37/33 and is even less of a gain at 2/2/1 fps. I don't like the way they have only overclocked the best of the unlocked cards to make it look even better than the stock cards. While it is good to see things like this going on, unless you are heavily into benching there seems to be little point in doing this.

Its depends on the situation and the individual to whether it's worth doing or not.

Keeping above 30fps can make a big impact depending on the game while using Vsync, dropping below 30fps can make some games drop to 15fps Vsync, also 30fps is the minimum dynamic refresh rate threshold on some freesync monitors.

wedrum · 12 Dec 2016 at 10:52

great how peeps find this stuff out.
still free performance well done.

acake · 12 Dec 2016 at 10:56

well it comes down to every little helps and its free cant go wrong with that

Jumper118 · 12 Dec 2016 at 11:01

pastymuncher said:
It's hardly game changing though is it? A extra 2-3 fps isn't going to make a lot of difference at this end of the market. The stock Strix gets 25/34/29 while the unlocked Strix gets 28/37/32 and is only a 3 fps gain. The stock Nitro gets 29/35/32 while the unlocked Nitro gets 31/37/33 and is even less of a gain at 2/2/1 fps. I don't like the way they have only overclocked the best of the unlocked cards to make it look even better than the stock cards. While it is good to see things like this going on, unless you are heavily into benching there seems to be little point in doing this.

you could say the same about overclocking a gpu or even a cpu. All those extra 2-3fps with unlock+oc+cpu oc may give you an extra 5-10 fps overall which is a great improvement for free. If you already have an rx460 it cost nothing.

keaneo · 12 Dec 2016 at 11:10

Again well done AMD, keep it up

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 12 Dec 2016 at 11:17

Wow,it actually hardly changes power consumption either:

https://www.techpowerup.com/228601/...update-liberates-8-tmus-128-stream-processors

The Asus Strix gains nearly 10% overall in performance just from the unlocked shaders.

Seanspeed · 12 Dec 2016 at 11:17

Not *really* a 12% boost overall, that number was cherrypicked from merely one card's minimum framerate gain. Overall improvement seems to be about 5-10%.

Also seems to be only these two specific cards, from what it sounds like.

Still cool, though.

keaneo said:
Again well done AMD, keep it up

This is not AMD's doing.

r7slayer · 12 Dec 2016 at 11:31

Seanspeed said:
Not *really* a 12% boost overall, that number was cherrypicked from merely one card's minimum framerate gain. Overall improvement seems to be about 5-10%.

Also seems to be only these two specific cards, from what it sounds like.

Still cool, though.

This is not AMD's doing.

Yea its RTG

&

Bahhhh humbug. :mad:

If i had a 10% extra performance from unlocking shaders i will take it! Ohh wait i did when i had a 6950 and unlocked it to a 6970 and then it overclocked like a beast! Nothing to grumble at. Also AMD/RTG provide nice driver updates that improve upon performance. They need to keep up that good work

Jumper118 · 12 Dec 2016 at 11:41

Seanspeed said:
Not *really* a 12% boost overall, that number was cherrypicked from merely one card's minimum framerate gain. Overall improvement seems to be about 5-10%.

Also seems to be only these two specific cards, from what it sounds like.

Still cool, though.

This is not AMD's doing.

It is only these two cards atm because they are the only two that roman has test the mod with. You could look at the unlocked bios for say the sapphire and change it so that it could work with any other specific rx460, as long as you know what to look for.

I hope they put this feature into polaris bios editor this would make it easier. For the hd6950 it's just a case of ticking a box in the bios editor.

Seanspeed · 12 Dec 2016 at 11:54

r7slayer said:
Yea its RTG

&

Bahhhh humbug.

If i had a 10% extra performance from unlocking shaders i will take it! Ohh wait i did when i had a 6950 and unlocked it to a 6970 and then it overclocked like a beast! Nothing to grumble at. Also AMD/RTG provide nice driver updates that improve upon performance. They need to keep up that good work

I wasn't grumbling dude. Just correcting an inaccurate claim.

tommybhoy · 12 Dec 2016 at 11:56

Seanspeed said:
This is not AMD's doing.

Lol

CAT-THE-FIFTH · 12 Dec 2016 at 12:53

Best unlock I had ever was the Nvidia 6800LE to a full 6800GT configuaration - apparently the AGP 6800LE cards were only software locked. It doubled the pixel shaders and pixel pipelines.

It would be like unlocking a GTX1060 to a full GTX1080 with slower VRAM.

bru · 12 Dec 2016 at 14:12

Just to mention this.

AMD BIOS Signature Check re-enabled with ReLive, Locks out Polaris BIOS Modders

It would seem that AMD is cracking down on this sort of thing. But of course if you mod your bios to unlock performance then you probably happy to use the workaround mentioned in the article as well.

Final8y · 12 Dec 2016 at 14:42

bru said:
Just to mention this.

AMD BIOS Signature Check re-enabled with ReLive, Locks out Polaris BIOS Modders

It would seem that AMD is cracking down on this sort of thing. But of course if you mod your bios to unlock performance then you probably happy to use the workaround mentioned in the article as well.

Cracking down for the time being maybe until they can work out the bugs with there new ReLive as is, let alone conflicts with the likes of AB, now add AB and modded Bios and its a nightmare.