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GTX 970 / 980 - Custom Bios

Caporegime
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I've read some reports on here about a possible custom bios that enables higher voltages and power limits. So I delved into it a little bit and sure enough there is a way to do so. Before anyone says anything I haven't yet got my Gigabyte GTX 970 G1 and am unlikely to do any bios modding until much later down the line if it's actually needed.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1517316/...-970-and-980-firmware-nolimits-and-gamestable

http://www.overclock.net/t/1517316/...are-nolimits-and-gamestable/110#post_23040140

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1838369

Just flashed my 2 x Gigabyte G1 GTX970's with the no limit bios. Just did some preliminary test and must say I'm really impressed with it all so far.

Pre-bios flash i could never go above 1550mhz core, now with the consistent 1.275 voltage i breeze through 1580/4000 with the power only reaching 80%.

Ran a bench with Unigene Valley on HD preset and got a average fps of 112 which is a 11% gain from the stock g1 boost clocks.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1517316/...-and-980-firmware-nolimits-and-gamestable/920
 
Last edited:
Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
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Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham
Lot of threads and posts about it.

Voltage isn't shown correctly in GPUz or MSI AfterBurner. The cards actually pull 1.315v - 1.325v

You need to adjust the power sent to the card too otherwise it will still throttle back.

My MSI card with the custom bios, no clock adjustments, will boost to 1550 automatically and it will run BF4 with 1600 core and 8200 memory

Love this card.

Have tried both the gamestable and v7 no limits but the card still throttled with them, so made my own
 
Caporegime
OP
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You need to adjust the power sent to the card too otherwise it will still throttle back.

My MSI card with the custom bios, no clock adjustments, will boost to 1550 automatically and it will run BF4 with 1600 core and 8200 memory

Love this card.

Have tried both the gamestable and v7 no limits but the card still throttled with them, so made my own

What adjustments did you make?
 
Soldato
Joined
11 Sep 2009
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6,138
Location
Limbo
Lot of threads and posts about it.

Voltage isn't shown correctly in GPUz or MSI AfterBurner. The cards actually pull 1.315v - 1.325v

You need to adjust the power sent to the card too otherwise it will still throttle back.

My MSI card with the custom bios, no clock adjustments, will boost to 1550 automatically and it will run BF4 with 1600 core and 8200 memory

Love this card.

Have tried both the gamestable and v7 no limits but the card still throttled with them, so made my own

Can you post your bios please? I was going to go into this but have been putting it off :p Have you compensated for the 2d clock voltage black screen problem?
 
Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
7,614
Location
Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham
http://s000.tinyupload.com/index.php?file_id=79147238733071630181

That has the .roms included, I uploaded it for a guy in the 970 thread.

It also includes MSI gaming and v7 no limits.

custom.rom is the one I tweaked myself. Voltages set, again shows 1.275v but is actually 1.325v with a multi meter, memory increased to 3800 default (7600 instead of 7000), power table tweaked so the card is provided with more juice (285000 vs 250000 of the stock card with improved power from PCIe slot and 6 pin slot), boost table tweaked from 1455 to 1544 maximum so higher boost states throughout the range.

Compare custom.rom to the stock MSI bios - GM204.rom to see what I changed

Obviously take care when flashing, I won't be held responsible, etc.. With no messing around needed, memory is 7600 and core maxes at 1544. Again if your card can't do these speeds normally i'd advise to not flash or to edit the clocks sightly. Mine seems to be a good one

Also don't flash non MSI cards with this for obvious reasons. Use maxwell editor to make changes to your own bios. ASUS owners be careful as you only have one 8 pin connector.
 
Last edited:
Permabanned
Joined
15 Dec 2008
Posts
3,417
Custom BIOS might get you an extra 40-50Mhz, some people get more but there's not a lot to gain tbh.

Disabling GPU boost can help as the cards are always at max clocks which will give a bump depending on the application.

Best thing about being able to mod the BIOS is you can fix the SLI voltage bug.

I've been changing the BIOS for ages and have even made some BIOS adjustments for people.

My own 970's have the following BIOS mods

- Stock memory clock upped to 8Ghz
- GPU Boost disabled
- SLI voltage bug fixed
- Default core speed 1504Mhz
- Voltage set at 1.25v
 
Last edited:
Permabanned
Joined
15 Dec 2008
Posts
3,417
so whats the deal with the sli voltage bug, ive not looked to much into it

The second card always runs at a lower voltage when under load which ultimately limits the boost frequency of the main card.

You can edit the voltage table so that both cards run at the same voltage and they then run at higher clocks as a result of it.
 
Caporegime
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As I said, you only gain 30-50Mhz extra on average.

What you do gain is more consistent and stable boost clcoks which might be worth an extra frame or two.

Not worth it? Always worth it :D

Some have gone from 1500mhz - 1600mhz, which does interest me, although I agree not everyone well get that
 
Associate
Joined
11 Dec 2013
Posts
257
The people that have gained an extra 100Mhz are a very very small minority.

yes and they're probably exaggerating and over-excited. you know the kind of post:

  • zomg i went from 1500-1600!
  • oh it wasn't stable at 1600 so i've lowered it to 1590
  • 1580
  • 1560
  • 1540
 
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