AMD - How To Overclock The Official Way Using Afterburner + Step By Step Overclocking Guide + Comple

WingZero30 · 8 May 2013 at 09:12

LtMatt said:
Yes you should tick to disable ULPS. I will add that in somewhere as its not very clear now. Cheers Me.

Not 100% sure of that card probably around 90c.

What is your cpu? Probably a bottleneck.

Q9650@4Ghz

So far overclocking the core and it passes Extreme HD benchmark at 900Mhz comfortably. However upping the core to 925Mhz results in artifacts and black screen. So my 5850 is stable at 900Mhz core overclock. Will overclock the memory now and see how far it goes. Btw my non-reference sapphire 5850 is voltage locked.

LtMatt · 8 May 2013 at 09:20

WingZero30 said:
Q9650@4Ghz

So far overclocking the core and it passes Extreme HD benchmark at 900Mhz comfortably. However upping the core to 925Mhz results in artifacts and black screen. So my 5850 is stable at 900Mhz core overclock. Will overclock the memory now and see how far it goes. Btw my non-reference sapphire 5850 is voltage locked.

Ah that cpu should be fine with that gpu then id imagine. Does seem strange you're not getting full gpu usage though. As you have an older AMD card probably best off using 13.4 WHQL drivers and 13.4 Caps file if you aren't already. Low gpu usage can also be a sign that the core clock is struggling as well so make sure you give it a good test of games to see if its ok.

chris-82 · 8 May 2013 at 16:30

A quick question I have wf3 7950 underwater with a aquacomputer block I'm currently running1150/1450 @1.225v for my 24/7
And 1240/1540 for my max @1.3v
Both run very similar temps which I believe (at work) to be around 45c core 47c 0n memory whilst gaming
My question is what is a safe voltage for 24/7 on water? And what are safe clocks for 24/7 to avoid damage?or are clocks irrelevant and only the volts and temps make the difference? And can I push further voltage wise or would this be unwise?

LtMatt · 8 May 2013 at 16:34

chris-82 said:
A quick question I have wf3 7950 underwater with a aquacomputer block I'm currently running1150/1450 @1.225v for my 24/7
And 1240/1540 for my max @1.3v
Both run very similar temps which I believe (at work) to be around 45c core 47c 0n memory whilst gaming
My question is what is a safe voltage for 24/7 on water? And what are safe clocks for 24/7 to avoid damage?or are clocks irrelevant and only the volts and temps make the difference? And can I push further voltage wise or would this be unwise?

1.25v is perfectly safe and so should 1.3v be as well providing you keep temps in check. Your temps are excellent so i wouldn't worry too much. You can go higher than 1.3v i believe with some tools but that could potentially shorten the life span of your card. Maybe it will be ok for suicide runs but for 24/7 i wouldn't advise it.

wazza300 · 8 May 2013 at 16:36

I need to learn to overclock my 7970's memory,never really dabbled as I use trixx but need to learn to use afterburner so I can up the mem voltage

do you need much more than stock 1.6v? im limited to 1500mhz on stock v,up from standard 1375mhz

LtMatt · 8 May 2013 at 16:39

wazza300 said:
I need to learn to overclock my 7970's memory,never really dabbled as I use trixx but need to learn to use afterburner so I can up the mem voltage

do you need much more than stock 1.6v? im limited to 1500mhz on stock v,up from standard 1375mhz

With a 7970 you can typically reach 1700+ or higher before you need to add voltage to the memory. I prefer not to go crazy on the memory voltage personally though and try and keep it below 1.638v if possible.

wazza300 · 8 May 2013 at 16:49

1700+ game stable?

I havn't tried with this new cooler and heatsinks yet but last time I couldn't go much above 1500mhz and it would lock up in games

LtMatt · 8 May 2013 at 17:00

wazza300 said:
1700+ game stable?

I havn't tried with this new cooler and heatsinks yet but last time I couldn't go much above 1500mhz and it would lock up in games

I can do 1750 stable gaming without touching the voltage and my memory is only an average clocker in total. Uncle Pete's 7970 can go much higher than mine.

wazza300 · 8 May 2013 at 17:02

ill have to try again

wazza300 · 8 May 2013 at 18:26

just set it to 1700mhz and played 30 minutes of crysis,seems fine

it wouldn't go above 1500mhz with stock cooler though,but vrm temps were above 100c then

Loxa · 17 May 2013 at 18:38

How come MSI AB reads Voltage of 1125 when my default voltage is 1250?

After being in Arma2 for a while its also reading a max VDDC of 1.438 :s

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Make Afterburner show real voltage

Show real voltage in Afterburner for 7970s.
Warning: Spoiler! (Click to hide)With Afterburner closed, open your Afterburner install directory, traverse to profiles. There will be a config file for each card or cards inside. If you have more files than cards, then you can just delete all the files, ie. VEN_1002&DEV....cfg. This will effectively reset Afterburner. Now run Afterburner again and it will configure your cards and create new config files. Now you can edit the newly created config files. Close AB and...

Add this under the Settings for each card you have.

[Settings]
VDDC_CHL8228_VIDReadback = 0
MVDDC_CHL8228_VIDReadback = 0

**Cannot seem to find a method for a 7950

hlxbravo · 20 May 2013 at 22:11

So I followed this and got my Sapphire 7950 Vapor X to score the following on Unigine :

MAXED OUT SETTING
1170x1500@1200

FPS: 44.5
Score: 1863
Min FPS: 21.8
Max FPS: 85.0

COMFORTABLE SETTING
1170x1425@1200

FPS: 43.8
Score: 1832
Min FPS: 21.0
Max FPS: 85.2

Everything was running sweet, even played 3 hours of Crysis 3 at maxed settings with no issue.

I have DVi to my 27" 144Hz monitor and the HDMI runs to my 58" plasma, with CCC set to set to "extend these displays", however CCC identifies my monitor as screen 1 and my TV as screen 2, but Win7 shows these the other way round, monitor is 2 and TV is 1 (??)

My monitor is the main desktop and the TV is the extended desktop, which is where I was running XBMC (TV) on Saturday evening. However I had reason to turn my monitor on and the screen was a mass of vertical lines that I couldn't shift, had to reboot to lose them, although the TV was unaffected.

So I have gone back to stock settings for now, until I work out what caused it, I believe it may be a GPU memory issue from the OP post. Were my clocks a bit aggressive ? Like I said, it was fine when playing Crysis 3, just not happy sitting at desktop when the other output was in use. :confused:

MrMarvelous · 21 May 2013 at 15:44

Guys i've followed this guide to a tee and i've either done something wrong or my card is a crap clocker. It's the Sapphire Dual-X with stock clocks of 925/1375, i've managed to get it to 1100/1700 but looking at the Unigine Heaven 4 thread my score looks well below par for a 7970.

I have the voltage at 1250 but the core just flat out refuses to go above 1100 and I don't really want to be pumping any more voltage in if i can. the temperatures remain at 60c max while running Unigine but it still seems a bit crappy.

LtMatt · 21 May 2013 at 16:33

Your score looks fine to me you're using lower clocks. Is your card definitely not voltage locked? Did you see the voltage change in gpu-z?

Loxa · 21 May 2013 at 17:57

MrMarvelous said:
Guys i've followed this guide to a tee and i've either done something wrong or my card is a crap clocker. It's the Sapphire Dual-X with stock clocks of 925/1375, i've managed to get it to 1100/1700 but looking at the Unigine Heaven 4 thread my score looks well below par for a 7970.

I have the voltage at 1250 but the core just flat out refuses to go above 1100 and I don't really want to be pumping any more voltage in if i can. the temperatures remain at 60c max while running Unigine but it still seems a bit crappy.

How did you get the voltage to show correctly?

LtMatt · 21 May 2013 at 18:00

Thrust are you able to change voltage and see the changes take effect in gpu-z? Afterburner typically sets a default voltage on the first run based on your asic but all ghz cards are 1.25v stock volts anyway.

Loxa · 21 May 2013 at 18:45

I used trixx a week or so ago and i could change the voltage (the change did take affect in gpu-z) in that and it showed 1250, my card is a 7950. Just wondering why whenever i use MSI AB it always shows 1125

The Voltage in gpu-z is 1250 but can sometimes go as high as 1448 which is strange.

LtMatt · 21 May 2013 at 18:50

Thrust4Money said:
I used trixx a week or so ago and i could change the voltage (the change did take affect in gpu-z) in that and it showed 1250, my card is a 7950. Just wondering why whenever i use MSI AB it always shows 1125

Not sure mate. Probably best to pop over to guru3d forum afterburner section and ask Unwinder.

Loxa · 22 May 2013 at 15:32

LtMatt said:
Not sure mate. Probably best to pop over to guru3d forum afterburner section and ask Unwinder.

Spoke to him last night, there's know support for Gigabyte that's why it doesn't show correctly. Might as well switch back to TRIXX really since that shows all the values.

If Im wanting to swap to another OC Program do i have to re-install my GPU driver as well or can i just uninstall MSI AB and that will be enough

LtMatt · 22 May 2013 at 15:38

Thrust4Money said:
Spoke to him last night, there's know support for Gigabyte that's why it doesn't show correctly. Might as well switch back to TRIXX really since that shows all the values.

If Im wanting to swap to another OC Program do i have to re-install my GPU driver as well or can i just uninstall MSI AB and that will be enough

Good stuff that explains it then.

Just uninstall afterburner and you're good to go. Gigabyte have their own overclocking tool but last time i used it, it was absolutely terrible with extremely limited voltage control.