**WARNING: DO NOT BUY POWERCOLOR 290 PCS+ CARDS FOR MINING (NOW RESOLVED THESE CARDS ARE FINE)!!**

[Gibbo]

Hi there

It is with great shame I have to post this.

Today I was testing the Powercolor 290 PCS+ card, the card has the absolute best cooling solution I've seen so far and in Heaven it was hitting 1220-1240MHz core and 6600-6800MHz memory, so not a bad result at all.

Then I thought, OK lets do a little bit of mining on this card to see what hash rates it was capable of as they are outfitted with Hynix memory.

In short within seconds of starting mining the PC shuts off with the graphics reporting OCP protection, requiring a hard reset.

I have tried everything, all kinds of voltages, all variations of clock speeds etc. etc. The only way I can get this card to mine is by having the core clocked 750MHz or less, which gives a less than 700 hash rate.

I can max voltages, I can even set the RAM to 1500MHz and she will mine.

The moment I move that core beyond 800MHz irrelevant of voltage I either get driver not responding or OCP protection.

This is clearly the cards BIOS kicking in OCP way too early or Powercolor's VRM's are the fault.

But right now **DO NOT** buy Powercolor 290/290X PCS+ if you intend on mining. If you are gaming, they are one of the very best cards currently available.

I shall feedback in this thread with info from Powercolor as I get it, fingers crossed a BIOS will resolve this as otherwise its a great card.

Powercolor 270 and 280 series are fine and make very good miners I am glad to report.

 

[Gibbo]

Just checked the website, good to see you put the warning on the website for none forum customers.

And thats why OCUK are great!

Yep, we are enthusiast so I love testing and playing with the hardware and if I find an issue which I can't fix there and then, I will report it to you guys.

Hopefully they will fix it because, wow what a cooler!!!

 

[Gibbo]

Does this include folding?

Only tested mining us GUIminer and tried several settings. Best hash could get upto was 700 hash by fiddling with card and mining settings.

Basically anything really over 800MHz on the core and she just shuts down with OCP protection.

Yet I can run Heaven without issue at 1240MHz core........

 

[Gibbo]

What is the difference between mining and say Heaven? I would have thought they are both GPU intensive the same?

Good for you to let customers know.

Mining seems way more intensive on a cards VRM's and current draw, compared to benchmarks and gaming.

We want these cards to sell, I did buy a few of them and are the only uk etailor with stock, but this is a major issue, so had to warn potential buyers.

I shall test more next week and hope for a resolution from Powercolor.

 

[Gibbo]

There was a bios expert posting a fair bit at https://litecointalk.org/index.php?topic=12369.0, you could try posting the bios there to see if the aggressive volt protection could be adjusted. I guess this won't help if powercolor skimped on the vrms though, what kind of vrm temps do you get with these cards with the low speed mining settings?

Very low, it's got some of the best vrm cooling I've seen. At such speeds around 50c.

 

[Gibbo]

As others have said thanks for the warning its appreciated, as a side note how did you find the noise levels in heaven compared to the other custom cooled cards ?

I'd say it's the quietest and most powerful of any 290, but it's huge.

 

[Gibbo]

Use the memory info test program: http://www.mediafire.com/download/voj4j1rlk0ucfz4/MemoryInfo+1005.rar

Or latest GPU z

 

[Gibbo]

Do you own a 290 tri-x as well? I would really like to know how the cooler noise of both compare (at the same clocks and temperatures if possible). This would probably be tremendously helpful for a lot of gamers deciding whether to get a sapphire or powercolor card.

The Tri-X and the PCS+ coolers are near identical in noise levels, you can't really call it to be honest. All I would say is the PCS+ with fans maxed out is 3-5c cooler than the Tri-X with all fans maxed out. No doubt simply because the PCS+ cooler is a 2.5-3 slot sized cooler.

 

[Gibbo]

Mine just reboots, no need to reset or anything, no BSOD, just a reboot and all is well - possibly a PSU issue but its plenty powerful enough (although I cant remember how much I know its breater than 750W and a good make).

You have a Powercolor 290 PCS+?
For us it is either driver not responding or OCP protection.

Reboot/shut down is more akin of poor PSU, but a 750W should be fine. We did our testing with a 1200W unit.

 

[Gibbo]

It's cool you are warning potential mining buyers, but as a non-miner I would still be put off.

Giving how hot these cards run I can imagine the OCP and OVP are there purely just to stop the card cooking itself, and with how much mining can stress a card.

And, Navin says this might be on MSI cards too? maybe you should test all the brands offering 290's and see whats going on.

Maybe they are all protecting themselves from warranty claims when these cards burn out after a month of mining if they were unlimited, or had higher OCP/OVP.

Have you not read my guide to which card to buy?

Ive tested every single brand of 290 card in benchmarks, gaming and mining. It's already done!

The MSI's mine absolutely fine, I had one mining for about two weeks without issue.

 

[Gibbo]

Gibbo, did you test the MSI with its stock BIOS, as it is that BIOS which has the issue with mining. With the ASUS BIOS on the card instead, there is no such issue. That is why you were going to send the details to MSI.

Yes and again did not have any issues with mining on it, about 920 hash if memory recalls.

I needed the Asus BIOS to get stability at 6000Mhz memory OC, otherwise I just ran it at 1250MHz memory.

 

[Gibbo]

Hi there

We've done some more testing today, seems the first batch of cards had a GPU fault, not something we've actually seen before.

Testing a different batch and so far so good, happily mining at 860-880 hash and stable.

 

[Gibbo]

Thinking about ordering one of these. I don't mine and would be solely used for gaming. What temps did you see at the max overclock you mentioned earlier in the thread? Will be looking to stay with one card so the powercolour seems a good choice.

Hi there

62c with 100% fan, which was not that loud actually, now I've got some mining around 50-55c whilst mining with 100% fan, or sub 70c with 50% fan which is silent.

It is an excellent card, one of the best, just need to do some more testing for mining.

Also one minor issue, the backplate is very good but protrudes from back of card as is on stand-offs, so it has no performance benefit, it is merely aesthetics. Problem this causes is very limited space for 3-4 CF setups.

 

[Gibbo]

Is it not possible to flash these cards with a different bios to get rid of the OCP protection? and potentially make them better miners?

Nope, because the BIOS has not changed, it just seems the first 2-3 cards we checked were from a carton and the GPU's are faulty and mining picks it up.

Obviously mining is far more stressful on a card than gaming or benchmarking and showed it up.

Tested a few today, no issues, so if they pass over-night testing, I shall update this thread.

 

[Gibbo]

Hi there

I had forgotton all about this thread, these cards are absolutely fine, we've sold 60pc to one customer who built a farm and is having no issues with them and we have since tested them without issue.

 

[Gibbo]

One custom bought 60 powercolor cards?

That was a smaller order, biggest so far is one customer who purchased 300pc of MSI 280X gaming and another customer who went with 120pc of Sapphire 290 Tri-X.

We've taken some huge orders, but were having a booming year, AMD sales have tripled and NV sales have doubled, its great news for us.

 

[Gibbo]

I would imagine a lot more of the motherboards will have been sold too lol

Motherboards don't get hit so hard as there is so many different models and everyone is buying something different. PSU, everyone wants biggest gold/platinum they can get. CPU yes Celeron and Sempron is popular.