Have you swapped your MSI 7950?

SkodaMart · 18 Nov 2012 at 13:06

Rusty0611 said:
It doesn't need to overclock 'well'. At 1150 which is very easy to hit for all 7950's I'm only 8% slower in BF3 at 1080. If my HIS was on the 7970 PCB I could get to within 5%.

Let us be clear that any 7950 can hit 1150 with a properly functioning cooler. I have so much headroom still and my chip is far from being 'good'. It's your average run of the mill 7950.

People are buying cards based purely on a potential overclock, then returning them when they fall short of expectation.

An overclock is not guaranteed, that's all i'm saying.

RetrogamerX · 18 Nov 2012 at 13:23

SkodaMart said:
People are buying cards based purely on a potential overclock, then returning them when they fall short of expectation.

An overclock is not guaranteed, that's all i'm saying.

Exactly. Every card is different.

[WU-TANG]GZA · 18 Nov 2012 at 13:49

Ofc every card is different but when sentences like this are put in the description:

"while MSI Military Class II components are used to give the highest quality and stability. For gamers seeking overclocking potential, cooling and stability, the R7950 Twin Frozr III/OC graphics card offers the perfect solution!"

I don't think it's out of order for someone to expect decent cooling and a good OC.

I'm not talking about "Oh, I can only get to 1200Mhz on the core and someone else on a forum got up to 1250Mhz therefore I'm sending it back" Obviously that's ridiculous.

Myself, I think it's fair for me to have expected a cooler solution than my REF 6970 which is not something that I am getting. I cannot overclock my card to 1100Mhz without problems.

Is that unreasonable to return that card having read that sentence? No.

Granted, if I were in IC3's position I would be happy as Larry getting decent overclocks at temps that should be better imo but not really a problem.

flopper · 18 Nov 2012 at 13:52

SkodaMart said:
People are buying cards based purely on a potential overclock, then returning them when they fall short of expectation.

An overclock is not guaranteed, that's all i'm saying.

925 to 1100mhz pretty big jump, 1100-1200 not so much.
Not sure why people expect since sometimes you need better cooling also.
if I want silence then I cant run it at 1200mhz gaming uness switching to watercooling..
its more fun with a good oc card, but never have I sent one back for oc ability.
Not even with my cpu that only does 4.7ghz 24/7 I can run 5ghz but then its a bit to much voltage for the effort.

SkodaMart · 18 Nov 2012 at 14:07

I had an EVGA P55 FTW that was a poor overclocker - try stomaching that!

If I went over 3.6 GHz with my i5 750 half my RAM dissapeared even if it was run at stock speed.

When I contacted EVGA to RMA it, they said 'Very sorry, we do not support overclocking of our products'

That was a FTW board as well.

Gregster · 18 Nov 2012 at 14:16

EVGA and MOBOs are a no no from some of the horror stories I have read

SkodaMart · 18 Nov 2012 at 14:21

gregster said:
EVGA and MOBOs are a no no from some of the horror stories I have read

Happy with my new MSi, 'B' grade for £45

I paid £150 for my 'For The Bin' board. :eek:

MSi or Gigabyte mobos for me in the future.

Rusty0611 · 18 Nov 2012 at 14:36

SkodaMart said:
People are buying cards based purely on a potential overclock, then returning them when they fall short of expectation.

An overclock is not guaranteed, that's all i'm saying.

No they're returning them because they've got faulty cooling solutions.

Facts...

TheMorningStar · 18 Nov 2012 at 14:50

Hmmm this is news to me, I'm guessing this bad batch relates to temps or idle temps?

I'm currently idleing at 61c @45% fan speed. This did seem a little high to me so I'm guessing this is a bad card? afterburner is registering a clock speed of 500mhz

Rusty0611 · 18 Nov 2012 at 14:55

TheMorningStar said:
Hmmm this is news to me, I'm guessing this bad batch relates to temps or idle temps?

I'm currently idleing at 61c @45% fan speed. This did seem a little high to me so I'm guessing this is a bad card? afterburner is registering a clock speed of 500mhz

What's it like in game and what's your voltage setting. That's the same temperature mins gets at full load!

SkodaMart · 18 Nov 2012 at 14:57

Rusty0611 said:
No they're returning them because they've got faulty cooling solutions.

Facts...

Oh sorry Rusty, it must have been a dream.

I thought I had seen a thread like this:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18438595

Rusty0611 said:
As the level of overclock is determined by the silicon quality (i.e. luck) you would have been better off getting another Gigabyte WF 3x and hoping for more luck second time round if noise/temps were even slightly a concern.

Rusty0611 · 18 Nov 2012 at 15:53

SkodaMart said:
Oh sorry Rusty, it must have been a dream.

I thought I had seen a thread like this:

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18438595

Yes but with Kepler cards you can't add voltage to compensate for a less than golden chip. Effectively with the Kepler cards you're seeing how far you can go on stock volts.

If you understood the difference between them you wouldn't have even pointed that out.

With regards to your original (wide of the mark) comment: without any hard facts I am yet to see a single 7950 not reach 1150 with voltage that produces acceptable temperatures. Most will do 1200 although depending on your own particular chip, noise and heat can become an issue from this point onwards. At 1200 you're within 5% of my old very golden 680. I would say that with a more 'normal' 680 - say with an overclocked boost of 1240 MHz - you're practically even at 1080 with those clocks.

Move to 1440 or multi monitor and the difference - as shown by my benchmarking - becomes quite large. At clocks of 1150/1700 and a resolution of 1920*1080 I was around 8% slower than my golden 680 in BF3. At the same clocks but moving to 5760*1080 I was 26% faster with the 7950's which is a 34% swing.

If you take these numbers in line with the price of the cards it's quite remarkable the difference. It's difficult to recommend anything other than a 7950 for the high end at the moment unless there's specific requirement (3D monitor / PhysX etc) because if you want to push the card and make it a little loud you can get performance of less than 5% of this generations top end single GPUs. The card is quiet at 1150 (a working non MSI one!) and mine actually requires a good chunk more voltage for 1150 clocks than either of my MSI's did.

Arcane · 18 Nov 2012 at 16:52

Rusty0611 said:
Move to 1440 or multi monitor and the difference - as shown by my benchmarking - becomes quite large.

I've struggled to find any meaningful 1440 benchmarks for SLI/Crossfire using 12.11 vs 310.54, most seem to link back to your thread which is 5760x1080. I'd really like to see some as I intend to run single screen 1440 & also 1080@120hz or 3D.

IC3 · 18 Nov 2012 at 17:57

squarebutt said:
IC3, why are you worried about your temperatures, which are actually fine. You keep quoting your old cards temperatures, but higher temperatures may be a resultof the new card doing more than the old one.

I think you just fancy the Gigabyte, but to be honest, you made the choice when you bought the MSI. You can't expect OC to exchange it for no reason other than you have changed your mind. The MSI should be equally as good as the Gigabyte on performance. Temperatures and fan noise will be the only difference, but thats probably why the Giga cost more than the MSI (Usually).

MSI suppose to have the best cooling thou...
I will stay with the card but the temps and OC aint the best.
Lets hope that the 2 bequiets intakes will make a difference...

TheMorningStar · 18 Nov 2012 at 18:58

Rusty0611 said:
What's it like in game and what's your voltage setting. That's the same temperature mins gets at full load!

well I have a 3d profile in AB that takes me to 1100/1575 (i think from the top of my head the max clock anyway) with a voltage of 1.050v. I believe that runs in the 70s/80s at 100% fan (auto) I'll have to check when I have time but meanwhile I would like some detals of what to expect from a good and bad card, is there a press release or anything?

IC3 · 18 Nov 2012 at 19:02

TheMorningStar said:
well I have a 3d profile in AB that takes me to 1100/1575 (i think from the top of my head the max clock anyway) with a voltage of 1.050v. I believe that runs in the 70s/80s at 100% fan (auto) I'll have to check when I have time but meanwhile I would like some detals of what to expect from a good and bad card, is there a press release or anything?

I cant even reach those clocks...

1100/1500 1.25v crashes... dont want to go any higher than this...

Geo-Gamer · 18 Nov 2012 at 19:05

IC3 said:
I cant even reach those clocks...

1100/1500 1.25v crashes... dont want to go any higher than this...

what is your asic quality? I know this is a load of ball **** but i would like to know anyway

IC3 · 18 Nov 2012 at 19:07

Rusty0611 said:
It doesn't need to overclock 'well'. At 1150 which is very easy to hit for all 7950's I'm only 8% slower in BF3 at 1080. If my HIS was on the 7970 PCB I could get to within 5%.

Let us be clear that any 7950 can hit 1150 with a properly functioning cooler. I have so much headroom still and my chip is far from being 'good'. It's your average run of the mill 7950.

what voltage should i try with 1100/1400 ?
Iv tried 1.25v after not even 1 min of heavy heaven benchmark my pc restarted.

Geo-Gamer said:
what is your asic quality? I know this is a load of ball **** but i would like to know anyway

?

TheMorningStar · 18 Nov 2012 at 19:20

IC3 said:
I cant even reach those clocks...

1100/1500 1.25v crashes... dont want to go any higher than this...

My Asic is 90.1%, take that as you will. My card will do 1250 and maybe 1300 but I didn't really have time to play and refine, there was some issues with the unlocked version of AB messing up the gfx also and I have not looked into applying the work around for that either yet, it's all on the list.

My card has always seemed hot to me and others have commented but I'll look into it a little more, had a quick read around and it seems these problems are related to the TIM? Only? and MSI supports replacement of TIM without voiding warranty?

IC3 · 18 Nov 2012 at 19:29

TheMorningStar said:
My Asic is 90.1%, take that as you will. My card will do 1250 and maybe 1300 but I didn't really have time to play and refine, there was some issues with the unlocked version of AB messing up the gfx also and I have not looked into applying the work around for that either yet, it's all on the list.

My card has always seemed hot to me and others have commented but I'll look into it a little more, had a quick read around and it seems these problems are related to the TIM? Only? and MSI supports replacement of TIM without voiding warranty?

Will IC diamond 7c be good to replace the one MSI applied?
Will I lose my 3 year warranty?