***The Official MSI 5850 Twin FrozeR Thread***

[Marine-RX179]

ok, I'm awared that is already a 'Official 5850" thread, but since OcUK has now sold over 400 of the MSI 5850 Twin FrozeR since the £124.99 pre-order deal was out a week ago on 17th Dec, I think it deserve its own separate thread...kinda like how the GTX460 1GB HAWK has its own official thread. Ideally, the owners of the card can share some overclock settings and results here

Anyway, straight to my overclocking result.

Core clock: 950MHz
Memory Clock: 1250MHz
Voltage: 1.275
Max Temp: 63C
Driver: 10.12


Stability test so far:
Heaven Benchmark 2.1: Directx11, Shaders High, Tessellation disabled, 16xAF, 4xAA, Full screen
Results: 3 loops successful with no problem whatsoever

Additional info: core clock 950MHz would crash in under 10 seconds into Heaven Benchmark 2.1 with voltage 1.250

Important reminder: When we install the new CCC driver, the AA quality is defaulted to lowest, so we need to turn that back up to highest quality.

Update: Driver crashed when playing BFBC2, dropped the memory clock down to 1200MHz seem to be fine now...

Update: Higher overclock attempted
Core clock: 1000MHz
Memory Clock: 1300MHz
Voltage: 1.300
Max Temp: 65C
Driver: 10.12


Stability test so far:
Heaven Benchmark 2.1: Directx11, Shaders High, Tessellation Moderate, 16xAF, 4xAA, Full screen
Results: 3 loops successful with no problem whatsoever

Still don't have time to run more tests with games yet, will get on that eventually...probably will have another quick run on BFBC2 sometime tommorrow (since I'll be out most of the day today)

 

[Marine-RX179]

What games have you played with the above OC and for how long!?

Haven't got round to test with games yet, will do it later. Heaven Benchmark would stress the GPU at 100% usage throughout the bench, so I tends to use it for testing overclock, as it would crash very fast if unstable.

 

[Marine-RX179]

any one got a good stable OC for the r5850 using afterburner?

850-900MHz core clock should be done easy enough on voltage 1.200. I'm still playing with trying to clock it at above 900MHz stable with higher voltage.

 

[Marine-RX179]

my card with afterburner keeps turning down the clocks.... what the hell

EDIT: for some reason i got to reboot to gt afterburner at apply changes

Edit 2: no it keeps changing the clocks to its stock setting! for some reason when ever i enable changes the core voltage it wipes any other clock changes and will not let you set new ones...

Just to check the order of how you save your profile...the following should be the order or how you should do it:

1. You entered the desired values
2. Press 'Apply'
3. Press 'save'
4. Press 1 of the 5 profile slots

And to keep your overclock setting after rebooting the PC, make sure you press the "Apply overclocking at system startup" (it should light up with a green light in front of the sentence)

 

[Marine-RX179]

Next time your on youtube dont press play on the video's...

Right click on one and you will see an option for 'global settings'

You will see a tick box for 'hardware acceleration'... make sure this is unticked.

Restart your comp and you shouldn't have problems with flash video's!

After seeing Monster ninja's post about youtube crashing driver, I quicky went on youtube to see if I have the same problem...and indeed I did. Disabling the 'hardware acceleration' under settings (not global settings) by right-clicking the youtube video and rebooting the PC, now the problem is gone. Thanks for the tip! It's good to see that this thread is actually useful for helping each other solving problems.

Oh and an updating on my overclocking. After crashes after crashes at the beginning of 1st mission on BFBC2, I've finally manage complete 1st mission and settle on a stable overclock of:
Voltage: 1.300
Core clock: 975MHz (1000MHz would crash in BFBC2)
Memory clock: 1100MHz (1125MHz memory clock would crash in BFBC2 with the core clock at 975MHz)

Memory clock 'can' go higher, but it will be at the cost needing to lower core clock if wanting a stable overclock; but as core clock has greater impact on frame rate than memory clock, I think it make more sense to use the current settings, instead of something like core 900MHz and Memory 1300MHz.

My suggestion for overclocking is to leave the memory clock at stock, and try to clock the core clock as high as possible as 1st priority. Then after finding a stable core clock, work the memory clock up (or down) starting from 1100MHz.

Another reminder is that for my MSI 5850 Twin FrozeR, it would crash in under 10 seconds into Heaven Benchmark 2.1 at core 950MHz if only using voltage 1.250mv; voltage 1.300mv on the other hand allows me to run through 3 loops of Heaven Benchmark 2.1 on core clock 1000MHz and memory clock 1300MHz on settings of Directx11, Shaders High, Tessellation Moderate, 16xAF, 4xAA, Full screen.

I think I will stick with the current core 975MHz/memory 1100MHz...and keep gaming a bit to see if I get an crashes.

 

[Marine-RX179]

I managed to the drop the voltage from 1.300mv down to 1.260mv while keeping the core 975MHz/memory 1100MHz without crashing in Heaven Benchmark 2.1, max temp is now only 58C at 45% fanspeed (can't hear it).

Will try BFBC2 again when I have time.

 

[Marine-RX179]

Wow, these cards are really poor overclocks. Haven't seen this thread before, here's my 2p on the card:


Seeing that my reference Sapphire 5850 did 920/1200 at 1.15V and 835/1200 at 1.087V, this struggles to get 830/1200 at the default 1.1V, son, I'm disappoint.jpg

I think you might have just been lucky to land a core that doesn't require much extra voltage to keep the overclock stable. Putting voltage used aside, at least it 'can' hit overclock at above 900MHz...now think of the poor souls who bought the non-reference 5850 (not MSI/Asus) and couldn't clock it beyond 800MHz stable because of no voltage tweak. Let's 'assume' these cards require more voltage for overclock...you have to bare in mind it comes with a very good custom cooler which keep the temp way down; I don't think a reference 5850 overclocked to 975MHz with its reference cooler would be able to keep the temp below 60C while running Heaven Benchmark.

 

[Marine-RX179]

I dont think these cards are great overclockers like some reference ones, although they are quiet and run cool so I dont see any problem really considering mine does:

(950/1250 @ 1.254) 69c max in Heaven bench. 10.12

What I found it that for my overclock it is easy enough to get it stable for Heaven Benchmark 2.1 (I can run Heaven stable with 1000core, 1300 memory at voltage 1.300mv), but when I test it in BFBC2 the overclock is not stable enough and the game/driver would crash...may be BFBC2 stress some parts of the graphic card which the Heaven Benchmark does not.

The only stable overclock in both Heaven Benchmark 2.1 and BFBC2 I managed so far is voltage 1.260mv, core clock 975MHz, memory clock 1100MHz.

I'm now trying for a different overclock profile which using a lower voltage try to get a stable overclock that won't crash in BFBC2...may be something like 900MHz core clock.

P.S. Your 5850 is about 10C higher in temp than mine (my overclocked 5850 temp max at 58C in Heaven Benchmark 2.1 at 45%~50% fan speed)...do you not have a decent case with good airflow?

 

[Marine-RX179]

Final overclock update:
After numberous crashes in BFBC2 (the game itself with HBAO enabled stress the GPU 100% nearly of throughout the entire duration of the 1st mission) and lots of tweaking, I finally managed to settle on the following two overclock profiles which doesn't crash in BFBC2 or Heaven Benchmark 2.1...

Profile 1:
Voltage: 1.260mv
Core clock: 975MHz
Memory clock: 1100MHz
Max temp in Heaven Benchmark 2.1: 58C (fanspeed 48%)

Profile 2:
Voltage: 1.240mv (driver would crash at lower than this voltage when running BFBC2 at 900MHz core clock)
Core clock: 900MHz
Memory clock: 1200MHz (driver would crash at higher than this memory clock when running BFBC2)
Max temp in Heaven Benchmark 2.1: 56C (fanspeed 47%)

Just a reminder everyone's card is different, so what works for me might not neccessarily works for others. But I think this info would be good as reference.

 

[Marine-RX179]

Marine- those clocks/temps are very nice.

I get 80C with 850core/1100mem/1.270voltage with Furmark running for 15mins. That's with fan speed at 90.

Time to upgrade this ancient case me thinks

Yea. Cases with just exhaust fans is not enough...you should get a case that got good air-intake as well (and ideally a fan mount at the side-panel next the the graphic card which you can install an intake fan for directly deliverying cool air to the graphic card).

 

[Marine-RX179]

If you do install an intake fan on the side-panel next to the graphic card, do make sure you use a dust filter (otherwise cool air won't be the only thing that it is delivering to the graphic card...dust as well )

By the way, voltage 1.270 seem a bit high for just overclocking to 850MHz...have you try lowering the voltage to see if it will remain stable? For 850MHz, I'd try with 1200 first...if stable, the try lowering voltage; if not stable, then increase voltage at 0.010 at a time

 

[Marine-RX179]

My card has a broken voltage controller, no matter what I set it to, it's locked at 1.088V (that's what GPU-Z shows me). MSI Afterburner reports voltage changes but my card isn't stable at any clocks but default. Was I really unlucky?

No. In GPU-Z my VDDC is stucked at 1.088v as well. So I think may be GPU-Z is not reading the VDDC of the MSI 5850 Twin Frozer properly...may be because of it being a custom designed PCB?

And I can tell you that changing the voltage in MSI Afterburner does make a difference...so I'd just ignore what GPU-Z's telling you regarding that.

 

[Marine-RX179]

It does appear to be a mighty poor overclocker though, what clocks can you get with 1.2V?

Haven't really been trying to find out, as my minimum target is 900MHz, and I need 1.240v in order to stop BFBC2 from crashing.

 

[Marine-RX179]

Can someone do a Heaven run and post a screenie @ 1080p

5850@ core 1000MHz/memory 1300MHz
1080p 4xAA 16xAF Tessellation Moderate and Normal:

 

[Marine-RX179]

I can't get mine too 1000 core.

It seems with the same settings though with tessalation normal the extra 70mhz = 1.1fps average extra!

Im going to see if I can get the bench to run at 950 core...

The core 1000MHz/memory 1300 was actually on 1.300v lol Also, while it is stable on Heaven Bench, it would crash in BFBC2.

Refer to my post at #39 on the settings that I manage stable in BFBC2 and Heaven.

 

[Marine-RX179]

I think for the extra core clock you might get out of it with any voltage over 1.2v not worth it in my opinion. Chances are you will get most of your overclock with a voltage upto 1.2v and the little you can push it with a higher voltage than that probably isn't going to make all that difference!

Not gonna use the 1.300v and 1000MHz for standard gaming. I've already settle on the two overclock profile I listed my post at #39.

 

[Marine-RX179]

thats the stock setting... thats what i run it on... dont like it you GTFOi dont play DX11 games... i also like to have my fps about 30fps thats really all i care about..

Actually I found is that with moderate level of tessellation (not normal level), 1920x1080, 4xAA, 16xAF, besides the low frame rate dipping to around 24fps in the very beginning of Heaven Bench (due the heavy amount of tessellation I think), for the rest of the bench the overclock 5850 would pretty much remain at around 30fps and above.

Considering you are only on 1680x1050 res, I think it might be possible for you to get reasonable frame rate using moderate tessellation, 4xAA, 16xAF. Your 5850 would probably struggle a bit at stock speed, but I think if you work at overclocking the card, it should give you good enough result on smooth enough frame rate.

Edited:
I ran the Heaven Bench at 1680x1050 dx11, 4xAA, 16xAF, moderate tessellation with my two stable overclock profiles (instead using the 1000core/1300memory). The settings are core900MHz/memory1200MHz/voltage1.240v and core975MHz/memory1100MHz/voltage1.265v, and here is the result:

From my previous bench, I found that by turn the tessellation from moderate to disable, it would give around 10fps high in frame rate (and that was at 1920 res, so for 1680 res it might give even more frame rate than that). So basically if you can overclock your 5850, you should be able to run the bench at 1680x1050 dx11, 4xAA, 16xAF, tessellation (disabled) with minimum frame rate at around 35fps.

But I have to say...with minimum frame rate at close to 25fps with moderate tessellation is not bad result at all.

 

[Marine-RX179]

hmm looks like marine-rx179 has either not seen my post or is ignoring it/not bothering to answer, guess I'll go talk to myself as usual

Ah sorry...I did read your post, but I can't really recall my bios setting at the top of my head. You should have a look at the following...this is what I used as a base reference when I first attempting my overclock:
http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=571646

My Q6600 require vcore of 1.49v in bios in order to manage prime stable for 12 hours (couldn't be bothered for longer than that). The reason I need such a high vcore is because my Q6600 G0's VID is 1.3125v, and my 4th core is weaker than the other 3 so I needed the extra voltage to keep it stable. For my Q6600 G0 3.6GHz overclock, I use 400x9, with memory at 800MHz to keep the 1:1 ratio.

As for benchmark results, I'm not too bother with the numbers at the moment as my only focus was to find the best overclock setting with acceptable voltage. I did use BFBC2 for testing stability, and after numbermous crashes, I eventually settled on the two profiles I listed at post #39. And during BFBC2, the GPU usage was pretty much at 99-100% almost throughout the entire duration of the 1st mission, so the Q6600 at 3.6GHz is definitely not bottlenecking the 5850. And I have upgrading from a iiyama 1680x1050 20" monitor to a BenQ G2222HDL 1920x1080 res 21.5" LED monitor a few days ago.

 

[Marine-RX179]

i cant change the voltage on my card as soon as i do the card just crashes even if i only change the voltage a tiny bit....

Have you "enabled the unofficial overclock" yet?

 

[Marine-RX179]

I'm trying the max 775/1125 overclock with Unofficial Overclocking disabled at @1.095V.

The card gives me serious headaches refusing to overclock at all

Has anyone tried contacting MSI about a more updated BIOS? They could have at least get rid of the limits.

Just curious...have you tried higher voltage for overclock, or are you having the same problem as Monster ninja on upping the voltage?