Nvidia boost...

[steveoz]

How exactly does this work?

I never saw my old cards go above the boost clock, my two 980TI's gainward GS's are quoted as having a 1241 boost clock.

One stays at 1344 rock solid and the other at 1366.

The top one is hotter as expected, but still very good at an average of 70 when gaming.

So why are they boosting much higher than I expected? And if one is boosting to 1366, but the other still looks good in terms of temp and power, why isn't it matching?


Cheers!

 

[steveoz]

Ok so a quick google did actually get me my answer. I never actually knew all these years that the boost clock will just ramp up as long as the GPU is within thermal and power limits.

I never recall seeing this on my previous GPU's, just assume they were running at the quoted boost clock.

So with that said, is 1344 / 1366 good for 980ti's out of the box with no tweaks in place? I seem to be getting AMP Extreme boost clocks out of it without any playing.

 

[Rroff]

The boost works in steps (something like 13MHz or so not sure off the top of my head what the 980ti uses) so it might be that while its comfortable within its current bin the next step up is just too much for it.

 

[varkanoid]

So with that said, is 1344 / 1366 good for 980ti's out of the box with no tweaks in place? I seem to be getting AMP Extreme boost clocks out of it without any playing.

yes especially if your base clock is around 1000mhz

 

[steveoz]

The boost works in steps (something like 13MHz or so not sure off the top of my head what the 980ti uses) so it might be that while its comfortable within its current bin the next step up is just too much for it.

That would make sense.

I just ran furmark again, I am actually getting 1353 / 1366 so 13mhz different.

My memory isn't as good as it used to be lol.

It's a bit strange, as you would think in SLI they would run the same clocks, IE the faster one would downclock to match the slightly weaker one.

It would seem though if they are both that close, that they are two pretty well matched GPU's

ASIC quality isn't as good as the AMP's I had though, although they were also wildly different. One has 82% while the other had 70.1. These both have 72 ish IIRC.

 

[steveoz]

yes especially if your base clock is around 1000mhz

Cool thanks, no experience with 980TI's, just took the step up with the somewhat bargain prices and retired my 780's.

When I loaded up EVGA and saw them over 1300 I was surprised.

*EDIT* Loving Witcher 3 in 21:9 now, have absolutely everything maxed out inc all post processing hairworks for all characters etc and getting a healthy 100fps+ still

Was definitely worth the step up, my 780's were starting to show their age!

 

[Rroff]

It used to work that way (downclocking the faster card) and forcing the clocks to be different with SLI used to result in terrible microstutter if there was more than a couple of percent difference or so but they don't seem to bother enforcing it any more.

 

[steveoz]

It used to work that way (downclocking the faster card) and forcing the clocks to be different with SLI used to result in terrible microstutter if there was more than a couple of percent difference or so but they don't seem to bother enforcing it any more.

I always thought stutter was just a by product of SLI in some games that it wasn't supported terribly well, but it makes sense that this could contribute towards it.

Is there anyway of forcing clocks rather than just an offset? As far as I can tell they are linked.

 

[stooeh]

These 2 970s boost to 1367 and 1380 MHz respectively. In SLI they both run at 1367 MHz.

 

[Rroff]

I always thought stutter was just a by product of SLI in some games that it wasn't supported terribly well, but it makes sense that this could contribute towards it.

Is there anyway of forcing clocks rather than just an offset? As far as I can tell they are linked.

I don't think it causes any issues these days - just used to back in the day.

 

[Awahwah]

Mine run at the same clock speed of 1366 without aid. If got them at 1404 at the moment though.

 

[setter]

The boost works in steps (something like 13MHz or so not sure off the top of my head what the 980ti uses) so it might be that while its comfortable within its current bin the next step up is just too much for it.

Yup, 13Mhz steps on the 980ti. Boost clock on mine is 1329Mhz, but once it hits 63c it drops to 1316Mhz.