The RX Vega 56 Owners Thread

SpudMaster · 25 May 2018 at 04:57

The hbm voltage doesn't actually change the voltage to the memory, it's something like the lowest the core will drop to if I remember correctly. You need a V64 bios if you want to increase the hbm voltage I'm affraid.

LtMatt · 25 May 2018 at 05:55

starmax said:
No iGPU, using it in a Threadripper build. I think i have an old ATI GPU I can try to boot from. I'll give it a shot tomorrow. Also played with Wattman some more tonight and am able to up the voltage on the memory now. Not sure if I was having a problem before or what exactly. Can't clock the memory over 980 Mhz without getting artifacts, regardless of the voltage, so that's a bit of a bummer. Was hoping for more when I saw it was Samsung.

HBM voltage is lower on the 56 BIOS so as mentioned above, you'll need a 64 BIOS to get HBM clocks over 1000Mhz.

T.Kay · 25 May 2018 at 09:23

Vega was fun to play with, but the 56 wasn't strong enough to run ultra wide for me.

LoadsaMoney · 3 Jun 2018 at 15:24

T.Kay · 5 Jun 2018 at 11:10

LoadsaMoney said:

Nvidia is better in most games sadly.

Sumanji · 6 Jun 2018 at 02:11

Just dropped $ for a Sapphire Pulse card... Need a display to pair it with... Thinking Asus XG35VQ?

Su

JediFragger · 6 Jun 2018 at 04:50

Sumanji said:
Thinking Asus XG35VQ?

Yes but ideally you'd need a 64 to power that res, the 56 can be a little weak at times for that amount of pixels. For a 56 2560x1080 is more suited BUT if you don't mind turning down a few settings it seems good

Kaapstad · 6 Jun 2018 at 15:36

https://www.techpowerup.com/244910/powercolor-radeon-rx-vega-56-nano-hands-on

JediFragger · 6 Jun 2018 at 15:59

Wonder if they will all have coil whine like the original Nano did...

marcday · 9 Jun 2018 at 03:07

starmax said:
Okay, so I tried flashing my Red Dragon Vega 56 with a PowerColor Red Devil Vega 64 bios and it basically bricked it. Luckily these cards have a dual bios setup, so I was able to flip to the other bios and re-boot. Still have not been able to re-flash the corrupted bios back to stock, but I have a working card at this point so I'm not put out much.

I'll just have to stick with the stock bios and aftermarket tools for now. I did try Wattman, but yuck... Afterburner is much easier.

From what I've read, if you are running win10 spring update then ATIflash utility doesn't work. So until they put out a new version you'll need a previous win10 build or a win7 build to flash the card.

Heinz57 · 11 Jun 2018 at 01:37

Is it worth changing from a RX 580 to a Vega 56 at 2560x1440? The Sapphire Pulse seems to get decent enough reviews from some German sites and I'll be looking at freesync in the near future (not interested in being tied to Gsync).

580 is away being repaired (dead fan) and the 56 is tempting me... Had a Radeon 290 for 3 years, then the 580 - sort of bored being stuck at the same performance level for 4 years now.

Play a whole range of games, newer stuff like Battlefield and Battlefront, ME and older stuff like SWTOR.

subbytna · 11 Jun 2018 at 15:35

vega 56 smokes the 580

https://www.anandtech.com/bench/product/1938?vs=1942

Had both and the 580 was good for 1080p, Vega56 is another level of GPU completely.

Remember to use the iChill option when gaming with your AMD cards.

JediFragger · 11 Jun 2018 at 17:11

subbytna said:
Remember to use the iChill option when gaming with your AMD cards.

So it doesn't burn your house down

subbytna · 11 Jun 2018 at 17:30

JediFragger said:
So it doesn't burn your house down

I have the blower card so using the ichill means the fan doesn't spin as much and is quieter. Never had an issue with heat from these vega cards. When playing footy manager and PC Builder sim, no point in having card going full whack when it doesn't need to pump out loads of frames.

Heinz57 · 13 Jun 2018 at 17:27

I managed to get hold of a Sapphire Vega 56 Pulse. So far my feelings are mixed.

Pros in comparison to my Sapphire RX580 Nitro:
*30-50+% quicker in everything I've tried so far. My 580 must have been borderline capable at the settings I've been using at 1440p because everything seems so smooth now.
*at sustained load (after 30+ mins in Battlefield / Battlefront up to 2hrs or so) the card is quieter and heats up less than the 580. Was 67C after 2hrs with 38% fan speed. In comparison the 580 starts off really quiet, but approaches hair dryer volume after 30mins or so. I think the tiny Vega PCB allowing half the heatsink to overhang prevents a lot of heat build up like some of the old Furys.

Negatives:
*Minimum fan speed seems to be much higher on the Vega over the 580, so it's instantly audible once the fans start up (about 1400rpm, vs 800rpm on the Nitro). For more graphically basic games, it means I don't get the near silence I had before.
*Looks/feels a little cheap compared to the 580 Nitro, but not surprising as the Pulse is below the Nitro.
*It's a bit of a squealer. Not quite on the coilwhine levels I recall my Fury/Nano being, but it's an annoying pitch and present even at 60fps and youtube videos.. The 580 has coil whine (I've long given up thinking I can get a non-whining card with my EVGA P2), but it's much deeper and not present at low fps.

Overall I'm happy enough, but the coil whine thing and the low minimum fan speed has given me an injection of "buyer's remorse". Not fully decided yet.

Also: in GPU-Z the PCI link never seems to drop to x1.1 (or whatever it is) at idle like all previous cards I can remember have done. It stays at 16x 3.0 - bug, or it's designed like this?

LtMatt · 13 Jun 2018 at 17:36

Heinz57 said:
I managed to get hold of a Sapphire Vega 56 Pulse. So far my feelings are mixed.

Pros in comparison to my Sapphire RX580 Nitro:
*30-50+% quicker in everything I've tried so far. My 580 must have been borderline capable at the settings I've been using at 1440p because everything seems so smooth now.
*at sustained load (after 30+ mins in Battlefield / Battlefront up to 2hrs or so) the card is quieter and heats up less than the 580. Was 67C after 2hrs with 38% fan speed. In comparison the 580 starts off really quiet, but approaches hair dryer volume after 30mins or so. I think the tiny Vega PCB allowing half the heatsink to overhang prevents a lot of heat build up like some of the old Furys.

Negatives:
*Minimum fan speed seems to be much higher on the Vega over the 580, so it's instantly audible once the fans start up (about 1400rpm, vs 800rpm on the Nitro). For more graphically basic games, it means I don't get the near silence I had before.
*Looks/feels a little cheap compared to the 580 Nitro, but not surprising as the Pulse is below the Nitro.
*It's a bit of a squealer. Not quite on the coilwhine levels I recall my Fury/Nano being, but it's an annoying pitch and present even at 60fps and youtube videos.. The 580 has coil whine (I've long given up thinking I can get a non-whining card with my EVGA P2), but it's much deeper and not present at low fps.

Overall I'm happy enough, but the coil whine thing and the low minimum fan speed has given me an injection of "buyer's remorse". Not fully decided yet.

Also: in GPU-Z the PCI link never seems to drop to x1.1 (or whatever it is) at idle like all previous cards I can remember have done. It stays at 16x 3.0 - bug, or it's designed like this?

Can you adjust the minimum fan speed?

Heinz57 · 14 Jun 2018 at 12:35

AMDMatt said:
Can you adjust the minimum fan speed?

I'm not sure, the min fan speed is 400rpm in the radeon settings. The fan is fairly deep whir and it doesn't have the annoying resonance of the Nitro 580, so it's something I could live with.

The coil whine is really conflicting me though. It's even present on an idle desktop for 15-30 mins after I've closed a game and I see no way that it could be improved since it occurs at even low fps. Not switching PSU again like I tried with the Furys, the EVGA Supernova P2 is a decent model so far as I'm aware.

LtMatt · 14 Jun 2018 at 12:47

Heinz57 said:
I'm not sure, the min fan speed is 400rpm in the radeon settings. The fan is fairly deep whir and it doesn't have the annoying resonance of the Nitro 580, so it's something I could live with.

The coil whine is really conflicting me though. It's even present on an idle desktop for 15-30 mins after I've closed a game and I see no way that it could be improved since it occurs at even low fps. Not switching PSU again like I tried with the Furys, the EVGA Supernova P2 is a decent model so far as I'm aware.

Try adjusting the max fan speed a bit, i find it hard to believe the fan is running at 400rpm and is noisy.

Are you using separate 8PIN cables for each connection on the GPU?

Heinz57 · 14 Jun 2018 at 12:56

AMDMatt said:
Try adjusting the max fan speed a bit, i find it hard to believe the fan is running at 400rpm and is noisy.

Are you using separate 8PIN cables for each connection on the GPU?

It seems to be ignoring those settings, it starts at 1400-1600rpm and will drop to 1300rpm or so on lower load. I think I'd have to install something else to change the fan curve.

There's 2 separate cables, each with an 8pin, running from the PSU to the card

LtMatt · 14 Jun 2018 at 13:53

Heinz57 said:
It seems to be ignoring those settings, it starts at 1400-1600rpm and will drop to 1300rpm or so on lower load. I think I'd have to install something else to change the fan curve.

There's 2 separate cables, each with an 8pin, running from the PSU to the card

Try using MSI Afterburner to see if that will allow you more precise control over the fans.
http://www.guru3d.com/files-details/msi-afterburner-beta-download.html