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7950 Crossfire Usage issues..
- Thread starter MOOGLEYS
- Start date
I had no such reluctance. I spoke about it quite extensively with people and it wasn't all simply related to the boost or bios. As for changing bios, to be fair, that shouldn't be necessary and I considered it, again it isn't quite as simple as flashing a different non HIS bios as this would have undoubted invalidated the warranty and potentially left me with many of the same problems relating to my setup and no way to return them if the defects were inherent rather than relating to the bios, some of which were inherent in any multi card setup, hence I went back to a single card solution. I was very happy with the 7950s to begin with and aside from a lot of fiddling with drivers and getting video to run correctly they benched well and it was only over time that the began to niggle at me and other issues such as heat, noise and inconsistency, both in crossfire and single card scenarios led me to want to change.
It was easier and more cost effective to replace the 7950s and I am more comfortable and more conversant with nvidia, so I bought one of their cards, as far as performance, outside of benchmarks there is no discernible difference and it requires far less tinkering for me. I also wanted to move away from a multiple card setup and the two choices for me were the 7970 or the 680, I went with the 680 for the above reasons. It's really as simple as that.
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Thanks for the info spoffle, I was curious on the difference, whether it was just the different cooler/bios.
+1
You buy your gpu/s, plug them in and they should just work.
My Ice-Q's did however just plug in, set to 1200/1500 and just worked without any tinkering whatsoever(apart from setting clocks in His iTool).
Why mines did and Castiels didn't, well that's not up to Castiel to find out at the end of the day imho.
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After much fiddling I have completely fixed the usage issue using a pair of 79xx cards.
Windows 8 is the problem. No matter what I do the usage in windows 8 is crap and jumping all over the place. No matter which drivers it still does it.
Completely fresh install of Win 7 complete and the latest beta drivers installed and I'm seeing over %95 usage constant in everything including furmark on both cards. The sudden dips as per my video no longer happen and games are perfectly smooth and the benefits of a second card really show.
It's weird going back to Win 7 but strangely it feels like a breath of fresh air compared to the bloated feel of Win 8.
Windows 8 is the problem. No matter what I do the usage in windows 8 is crap and jumping all over the place. No matter which drivers it still does it.
Completely fresh install of Win 7 complete and the latest beta drivers installed and I'm seeing over %95 usage constant in everything including furmark on both cards. The sudden dips as per my video no longer happen and games are perfectly smooth and the benefits of a second card really show.
It's weird going back to Win 7 but strangely it feels like a breath of fresh air compared to the bloated feel of Win 8.
Ok so it's not windows as I'm now getting the same problem again but on a single card. The clock speed is jumping between 800 and 925 almost constantly during use at stock settings. Setting the power bar to +20 makes no difference. This is causing stuttering and jerkiness in game.
After a good read it seems the problem is the boost bios. The simple fix is to re-flash with the stock bios but it seems the newer HIS iceq cannot be flashed even though they have a dual bios. Apparently the card after flashed will just not display as there is a hardware lock in place. I'm also not willing to try this on a few days old card that should work out of the box.
So it seems HIS are selling cards with a borked boost bios that causes very noticeable performance issues and have decided to not allow people a simple flash to stock to fix.
Both these cards are being returned I have had enough now. One is faulty the other is not fit for use so will DSR.
After a good read it seems the problem is the boost bios. The simple fix is to re-flash with the stock bios but it seems the newer HIS iceq cannot be flashed even though they have a dual bios. Apparently the card after flashed will just not display as there is a hardware lock in place. I'm also not willing to try this on a few days old card that should work out of the box.
So it seems HIS are selling cards with a borked boost bios that causes very noticeable performance issues and have decided to not allow people a simple flash to stock to fix.
Both these cards are being returned I have had enough now. One is faulty the other is not fit for use so will DSR.
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HIS 7950 ICEQ BOOST H795QC3G2M
I have not tried to flash the bios so cannot confirm if the bios can be flashed or not.
Sorry to hear your probs and nothing worse than head scratchers when you just want to plug and play (we expect to be able to do that). Hopefully the replacements will work ok
GTX 680 plugged back in and everything is as smooth as butter with a constant 1280 on the core. Not having the core jump about makes such a difference.
It seems AMD released the boost bios to just get the numbers up on the 7950 to compete with the 670.
The max it can achieve is high but the card fires a lot of voltage at the core to do it which then causes it to throttle back to maintain its TDP. With a non boost bios it seems you can maintain the high clocks with less voltage and no throttling but this requires flashing the bios. I imagine the stock boost bios volts high so all cards will achieve some kind of higher boost clock even the lemon chips.
AMD can claim performance better than the 670 when under boost but the cards just do not cope with it very well and reading on the web the throttling issue seems to be an issue on both the 7950 & 7970 cards.
That's my theory on this one.
It seems AMD released the boost bios to just get the numbers up on the 7950 to compete with the 670.
The max it can achieve is high but the card fires a lot of voltage at the core to do it which then causes it to throttle back to maintain its TDP. With a non boost bios it seems you can maintain the high clocks with less voltage and no throttling but this requires flashing the bios. I imagine the stock boost bios volts high so all cards will achieve some kind of higher boost clock even the lemon chips.
AMD can claim performance better than the 670 when under boost but the cards just do not cope with it very well and reading on the web the throttling issue seems to be an issue on both the 7950 & 7970 cards.
That's my theory on this one.
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It is a pain as I'm sure a bios flash if possible would fix the problem but I'm not willing to risk flashing the bios and possibly bricking a two day old card. It has a dual switch but with reports of not being able to flash who knows if it actually has a dual bios.
AMD have really mucked up what was a decent card with the boost bios. The performance is horrendous in game with spikes and jumps all over the place. It's so obvious the only reason the boost bios is there is to get the numbers up for sales purposes.
AMD have really mucked up what was a decent card with the boost bios. The performance is horrendous in game with spikes and jumps all over the place. It's so obvious the only reason the boost bios is there is to get the numbers up for sales purposes.
I think you'll find HIS mucked up. AMD are not responsible for a faulty bios created by an AIB.
AMD designed the boost bios and set the voltages from what I have read. There are quite a few other cards inc 7970's having issues with boost type bios's.
My reference 7970 runs a constant 1200 on the core. I might try a boost bios on it and see if it fluctuates.
Might want to check first before making those statements Matt
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/HD_7950_Boost_BIOS_Upgrade/
I've had a good look round but cannot see a lot of other cards having this issue. Where are you getting this from?
Might want to check first before making those statements Matt
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/AMD/HD_7950_Boost_BIOS_Upgrade/
Its possible that HIS might have adjusted their own bios which could be causing these issues though. Unless its happening on all boost cards and people are keeping quiet about it and not saying anything.
I tried a boost bios myself and certainly didn't have an issue with gpu usage dropping. I quickly went back to my stock bios though as the boost hampered my overclocking.