ATI 6950 Unlocked to 6970 Texture fill rate?

[Hady]

I have a Powercolour card and have 900/1350 at 1.15v with the unlocked bios.

Is artifacting the only issue? What games are you experiencing artifacting in?

There is a thread about this issue over on techpowerup. Some were found to be driver/game bugs, others claim permanent damage resulting from running the 6970 bios (hence the appearance of the 6950 unlocked bios). I do hope it is not the latter for you.

Does it artifact at stock 6950 clocks?

No m8 the card runs fine at stock clock and its also fine running unlocked shaders at 840/1325 anything above that and it goes **** up. I am currently using a modified version of my own BIOS (6950).

Also I have tried upping the voltage all the way to 1.275 and no change in stability, the card artifacts/crashes as soon as I try to try a 3d intensive application or the screen just goes funny in windows almost as if my screen has been split in 2.

Looks like this one is going back tbh.

 

[Hady]

Well I doubt the PSU is the problem. 1200watt .

If at 1.175v you get artifacts then try putting it up to 1.200 and see what happens. You can go al the way up to 1.300v but keep the fan up and watch the temps. If the card starts stabilizing with higher voltages then it's looking like a poor clocker. The three links above are powercolours but I've not heard of any problems with that specific brand so I'm really confused.

I wish I could get my hands on it to see myself as it's hard to help with just words when I've not experienced it or read about it. I've not been much help . Sorry.

I hope with higher voltages you will see something change so to let us know what is going on.

Well the higher voltages did nothing unfortunatley m8 but thanks a lot for your effort, Im not sure what else we could try. I think Im going to send it back first thing monday morning and order a Saphire one, what do you think ?.

 

[Hady]

Sure Il give that a go, Il go up in increments of 10

 

[Hady]

This is puzzling me. So it runs fine at 6950 clocks with and without the shader unlock?.

If so, this is what is bugging me. Any overclock at all and then you're experiencing problems. It doesn't seem right. Can you try 2 different 6 pin connectors from your PSU to the card by any chance?. Also have you got a friend with a decent PSU so you can test if it's anything PSU related?.

What graphics card did you have previous to this?. If Nvidia, have you ran Driver Sweeper and removed all traces of the old files?.

Also a shot in the dark would be to create a 10-20gb partition and install a fresh copy of Windows to see if that helps anything. Also a re-seat of the card would be worth a try.

If you were getting a small overclock then I'd say it's a bad clocker even though I've not heard of anything similar, but getting no overclock seems like something is wrong somewhere.

You could try with your CPU at stock, and memory if overclocked.

Ok regarding the PSU unfortunatley no all my friends have crappy pc's so a good PSU from one of them is out the question.

I have just switched back to my original un modded BIOS

Im going to run some test quickly to make sure it runs fine on the original BIOS. Will update shortly.

Also I will try and re seat the GPU and use 2 other 6 pin's. I had a GTX 280 prior to this but have reformatted since then.

 

[Hady]

Ok well I have just run 3DMARK 11 and got a result I would expect, So yes the card runs fine using both locked and unlocked shaders! >.<.

 

[Hady]

Ach it was worth a shot regarding using another PSU.

I hope the test goes well and that something maybe changes with some of the things you're about to try. I wish you stayed in Edinburgh, I'd be round in the morning with my 6950 .



This is why I think it's so strange. One bit of overclocking then everything goes freaky. I really wish I could get my hands on it and test it for you.

Well I hope trying some various things like the re-seat etc might do something as I feel this might not be to do with the card just because it won't overclock at all but will allow the shaders to be unlocked. Too peculiar to put down as a poor clocker yet.

Really apprecciate the time and effort you have put in to helping me (I wish I lived in Edinburgh too )

Im going to have to try the re seat and power connecters first thing tommorow morning Im getting very tired and dont want to make silly mistakes especially when taking components out etc. Please follow my thread I will post again tommorow as soon as I have tried the things you mentioned.

 

[Hady]

I think you should read through this thread http://forums.techpowerup.com/showthread.php?t=137136 and make that decision. As I think it's something other than the card just being a poor clocker due to the ways it's reacting to any overclock at all so because of that I don't want to recommend anything as I'd feel terrible if you got another card and the same thing happened. Yes, we'd know it's something to do with your PC but then it would be a matter of finding what is wrong and hopefully being able to fix it.

Have you tried a CMOS reset?. I'd try this when changing the 6 pins over and the re-seat though.

Sometimes I try to turn my PC on and it tries to turn on then fails just as it gets power, I then have to turn it off by the mains wait a few seconds and try again, this can happen once and then work or sometimes 6-7-8-9 times in a row this also happened with my prior build which consisted of:
Asus Striker II eXtreme
QX9650
DDR3 4GB (cnt remember timings)

the only component I have salvaged from that build is this toughpower PSU (reason i bought such a big PSU is becauseI had x2 9800 GX'S ).

Think I may have a faulty PSU? (how comes my CPU OC works then?)

Sorry for all the questions again thanks for answering.

 

[Hady]

Alright buddy, bed time talk to you tommorow!.

 

[Hady]

Ok guys Im going to try a few things now (Just woke up how pathetic lol), First thing is im going to use a different PCI-E slot aswell and changing the x2 6 pin connnecters, and formatting my system and installing slightly older drivers than the ones Im using and try and OC again.

What ya think guys, good plan of action?

 

[Hady]

Ok im taking my thread back!, lol. I have just come back from my local component shop with a brand new 780w PSU time to test with a diff PSU.

Will update on results.

 

[Hady]

J.D, I couldnt get the card past 880/1325 even when bumping up the voltage to 1.275, I have put together my old rig:
QX9650
Asus Striker II eXtreme
4GB Corsair DDR 3 (will add timings)
the new 780w PSU

Right so completely different system which means I have changed EVERY component apart from the graphics card.

Will update results.

 

[Hady]

My guess is you are using the wrong voltage registers.

Test this to raise your V:
http://forums.guru3d.com/showpost.php?p=3848256&postcount=51


If that works make a permanent fix:
http://forums.guru3d.com/showpost.php?p=3848212&postcount=46

Use 'VDDC_VT1556_Defaults = 9A 51 9B 80' for XXX in the above post.


You might also try changing V with RBE. It sounds like in your case VID3 (which is what most use) will not work and you'll have to change VID4.

Also leave PowerTune at 0%.

Could you just clarifiy what you meen by You might also try changing V with RBE, Also i will try forcing constant voltages now.

 

[Hady]

Oh..so your card is responding to V. If so disregard my ^ post. I was of the understnading that you were getting NO response to V changes, couldn't go over 840 core no matter the V. If you are getting better clocks with increased V then you are using correct V registers.

Yeah well I was wrong 880 locks up now, the only stable clock i can manage is 840/1325

 

[Hady]

RBE is a BIOS editor. You really shouldn't need to go that route though, if we can get your V up in AB.

When you raise V in AB are you seeing increased load temps?

I dont get a chance for it to increase to the point where I would notice a difference, I just forced constant voltage and tried again at 1.175 880/1375 and locked up right away. Im starting to get fed up of the ****ing thing. -.-

 

[Hady]

The card in a completely different machine makes absloutley no difference, Really does look like this is just a bad card.

 

[Hady]

Yes I am on my own modified 6950 BIOS, I will do tests checking max temps for you now. Will post results very shortly, thanks for helping!.

 

[Hady]

Did you restart AB after changing the setting?

And yes I sure did restart AB

 

[Hady]

Ok here are the results tropical guy, it looks like it is taking the increased voltage, I am using 3d Furmark to bench at 10 minutes at a time and using a constant fan speed of 50% to cool.

1.1v = max load temp of 73-74c at the 10 minute mark
1.25v = max load temp of well put it this way im at 85c and im at the 5 minute mark.

Any thoughts?.

 

[Hady]

The only thing you can do now is try OCing the core again leaving the memory at 1250 to rule out that the memory could be the issue.

Try 880 at 1.185~1.2V. What I have found is that it takes about 20mv to get each 10MHz of core speed. So if you are stable at 840 1.1V you should need about 80mv more or 1.180V to reach 880. If it still won't OC, well your card just isn't as good as others. Some just won't respond well to V.



Good Luck

Well I have put the card back in to the I7 atleast I know its not my system and its the card. I will give that a shot. If all else fails DSR Monday!!

 

[Hady]

Stable at 880/1325 1.185V looks like it is whenever I try and clock the Memory is when it gives up!.