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OCUK 6970 TFIII (Lightning) review.

always4lora said:
would you really notice much difference going over 1ghz?
Click to expand...

Nah not really. Maybe another 5% over 940. And for the power it consumes and so on it really isn't worth it.

Also, I found that 3DM11 will crash the card before anything else does tbh. It gets a bit blocky then just freezes.

And no, I wouldn't dare putting this firmware on a regular card. You have to remember this is not a stock PCB or card so could be laid out differently?

I don't know man but I wouldn't risk it.
 
ALXAndy said:
Nah not really. Maybe another 5% over 940. And for the power it consumes and so on it really isn't worth it.

Also, I found that 3DM11 will crash the card before anything else does tbh. It gets a bit blocky then just freezes.

And no, I wouldn't dare putting this firmware on a regular card. You have to remember this is not a stock PCB or card so could be laid out differently?

I don't know man but I wouldn't risk it.
Click to expand...

Me neither, if i had the spare cash i would though. Someone must have tried the old 6950>6970 bios update /crack first with the risk of bricking it
 
Well most 6950 2gb have dual bios for that purpose.

Basically the OEMs knew if they didn't do that people would brick the only bios it had and then just return the card lmao.
 
i've taken my card out and it turns out i was already in performance! When i go 1 to the left i got the beeping. looked online and it appears theres been a few others who's cards were already in performance mode.
 
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Good going :D

It seems that there could be more honest reasons for the reboxing tbh..

I would imagine one of them was that MSI knew the 7970 was coming and needed to clear old stocks to make way.

Some are going to not want to do it of course, and those I would imagine failed to make the grade when tested for overclocking prowess, but others could have quite simply been a case of them not wanting to waste time trying to market a card that is considered "old technology".

Now we need more to come forth and let us know how they got on :D

It's nice though, now all you need to do is throw a switch to overclock or go back to stock :)
 
Just done my and it worked fine, thanks for the guide, easy to follow.

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Hows everybody's temps. I idle at 30c and never go over 65c on full load, got HAF-X case, then again my room is like antarctica:eek:
 
Nice find, I'm doing a full reinstall this weekend so will hopefully get time to whack this on my card at the same time; I'll let you know how I get on.
 
ALXAndy said:
O.K.

When my card was in its stock "Silence" setting I tried to clock it to "Normal" Lightning speeds. This means 940mhz with stock voltage (1174 or what not).

However, when I did it would crash during 3dm11 unless I pushed up the voltage to 1.2v (or 1200mv).

OK.

So today after spending ages looking I finally found a bios dump from an actual Lightning card. This means that at stock clock on the bios the core speed is 940mhz at stock volts.

On the back of your card is a switch. By default it is set to Silence. It has three stages. One click over from Silence is Performance. This, basically, is the second bios on the card for overclocking with and modifying ETC for LN2.

So. I found the bios for the actual lightning (940mhz 1174mv) and flashed it to the second bios that is labelled Performance. If you click to the third setting you will select no bios and the card will not post (mistake on MSI's behalf).

What's odd is that if I clocked the bios that is loaded onto the Silence setting to 940mhz with stock volts it would fail any benchmark or stress test. However, when the actual Lightning bios is loaded onto the card it works perfectly at that clock (940) with stock volts.

You can get the bios from here.

http://www.techsupportforum.com/for...-crap-on-me-when-i-put-load-on-it-570283.html

You need to create an account, but that's no biggie.

Then do the following.

Download something called Radeon Bios editor. The filename for it is RBE_128.exe and I got it from Techpowerup. This will allow you to verify the bios and show the clock speeds and so on.

Then download ATI Winflash. The latest version is 2.0.1.14. Again, that can be downloaded from Techpowerup.

Then download GPUZ.

O.K now shut down the PC.

Find the white switch, and carefully set it one place across. If you go both two places your GPU will not have a bios to load and your PC will just beep like a piggy.

So once you have set it to bios 2 (or Performance) boot your PC.

EDIT. Load GPUZ and back up the bios on there (880mhz)

Load Winflash, flash on the bios in the link I sent you. Reboot when it tells you to.

Load Afterburner, click "reset" at the bottom. Your AB screen should now look like this.

bios-1.jpg


OK, when it looks like that you are now running an actual Lightning bios, stock clock of 940mhz with the stock voltage.

Run 3Dmark11, see if it passes. If it does compare your score comparatively with your rig vs an I7 950 stock clock w 6gb ram.

Pat yourself on the back, 'cos you just made your card worth £50 more :D
Click to expand...

cheers just done this. what the benefits of flashing to this BIOS. more OC headroom I take it is it?
 
Possibly..

It's just awesome if you don't want to push it really hard. Gives it the proper Lightning clocks for closing in on £75 less money :)

Glad yours went OK !


P.Dhillon said:
Hows everybody's temps. I idle at 30c and never go over 65c on full load, got HAF-X case, then again my room is like antarctica:eek:
Click to expand...

Mine idles in the low 40s and peaks in the mid 70s. However, I have my Deltas set to 20% (non audible) If I crank the PCIE lane ducted Delta fan to 40% (when you can begin to hear it) my temps are around the same as yours.

Thing is, Deltas make the most evil scary noise, so as long as I'm below 80c I'm happy :)
 
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slade said:
I've run same benchmarks... but to scared to play BF3 @ that speed :D . I'm running 12.1 drivers so not approved by FM apparently.

6970b.png
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Slade, what volts are you running?

Is that on standard bios? Those memory speeds are crazy too!

Is your card running stable at those clocks?
 
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Yeah, you're missing that it was overclocked to 960mhz with 1250mv :D

When I initially wrote the review the card was OC to 960mhz. I wanted it at 940 as default though (as per the £350 Lightning).

TBH I haven't overclocked it since that first 960. No point really.
 
Ah i see! Makes sense now! So atleast you are getting Lightening speeds at stock volts (?), for less cost.

I wonder if this bios would let you clock higher with less voltage. Would be nice to see what scores you could get.

Thanks for the heads up.
 
ALXAndy and P.Dhillon: What would you say the benefits of the lightening bios are? less volts for a higher clock? (Just want to get this right in my head!). Cheers.
 
You're turning it into a £350 card. It's as simple as that.

Out of the box it's only clocked to regular 6970 speeds. Loading on that bios (if it is stable) turns it into a proper Lightning card.

That's all.
 
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