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I have bought used R9 280x and it works exactly as I expected it to (pretty good), now I am really a beginner at this, so my hashrate is 16.5MH/S, sometimes little lower, but I heard there's ways to get more hashrates? I've seen people post that they have more hashrates on that card. Also I think my temps are little higher than normal? when mining, it gets to around 87C, it even reaches 91C sometimes, all this under 75-100% fan speed. Also its factory overclocked to 1100mhz.

EDIT: Forgot to mention I am mining ETH

So my questions:

* Is 16.5MH/s the best I can get out of that card? I'd like to know all options that would be worth doing to improve this.
* What should I do about temps? any way to cool them more? Card is already clean from outside at least, I heard things about oiling, or cleaning inside of card, re-applying paste, any of this or anything else worth doing?
* Is it worth overclocking just a little for extra power?
* Any general tips about my situation would be really appreciated.

Thanks!

Right now those cards get around 16.5-17.5MH/s when mining ETH so its normal

If you card is overheating maybe its inside a computer case with bad ventilation, maybe a fan is dying, maybe the thermal paste needs to be respread.

You can also change your bios and undervolt your card and it'll use less power and less heat.

No don't overclock.

Thanks. So what should be my target temp when mining? and is it worth oiling fans and cleaning them from inside? I do hear a little bit of rattling of fans from inside of case but i havent checked source or cause yet. I guess its gpu cuz it only happens when i put fans above 75 percent.

For the R9 280X cards, they are less efficient than the newer 480 cards, so it is better to undervolt to increase efficieny. So the tempearture will drop.

Would not that cause performane and stability issues or any problems in general? :)

That would only happen if you under-volt too much. Lower it a bit and check, then do the same again with more lower value, do it till you see that something is crashing out in the driver or in the hash-rate.

If you're using Claymore miner, you can try it's own under-volting command.

Any good guide around the forums or anywhere explaining undervolting? or do I just use AMD overdrive and lower power percentage? Also, any risk of damaging the card? sorry for annoying questions :)

There is no risk at all involved in under-volting. Lowering power percentage does not under-volt. Search for the under volt command in the Claymore miner thread (if you're using Claymore miner) and just place the command next to the wallet address and pool address in the start file of miner.

I, for myself, don't use any software at all for all the over-clocking and stuff, I simply use the Claymore's own features.

You can ONLY undervolt if you are not using that GPU for browsing the web, gaming, etc. Basically a monitor can't be plugged into it.

 Is this the only GPU you have or do you have it inside a rig with other 280x GPUs.

Whats the make of this 280x? ASUS?

Its a gigabytes 280x, and its actually a dedicated PC for mining but I do have spare monitor plugged in when I am too lazy to use VNC/teamviewer, is that a problem?

Would MSI afterburner work then? I am pretty sure you can directly control voltage there :)

The Gigabyte windforce fans are bad so your temps are normal. If the fans are spinning very slowly or making grinding noises then you can pull off the fan blade and re-oil.

You can leave the monitor plugged in but it will require higher voltage so you won't save on power consumption as much.

And yes you can also try doing it in MSI Afterburner. The undervolt is successful when your temps drop instantly.

https://forum.ethereum.org/discussion/comment/61766/#Comment_61766

This should be a good start to the kind of information you would need for a 280x. Bare in mind, these are old hash specs.

Sometimes my card rises to 22-25MH/s randomly for few minutes, at cost of higher temperature, any idea why or how to keep it?

And an update about everything else, I could not affect voltage in MSI even after I updated BIOS to latest, (gpu bios) I ticked in MSI settings "let me allow voltage control" or whatever, anything else I can do or is my card voltage locked?

I am thinking about opening up my card, cleaning it from inside, re applying the paste and oiling fans later, any risks on that? never opened GPU before. (I will look up guide later, but recommendations are welcome)

Don't open up the GPU. The Gigabyte fans are bad and those cards always will run hot.

If MSI Afterburner doesn't work, use VBE bios editor and change your voltage to like 1.050V.

I could not quite find voltage in VBE, only wattage, so I was too scared to mess with that..

My card is now reaching 91-94C and I stopped mining since that is most likely way too high. I still can't access voltage, any solutions?  :-[

And all others options are really not worth it?

In VBE, go to Powerplay tab.
Select appropriate VDDC value under the core clock value.
For example at core clock 1100 I select 1050 in the drop down. This means a voltage value of 1.05V when core is running at 1100MHz.
Save the BIOS file and flash the card.
Works fine with my two GB cards.  Allows me to run the fans at 44% with temp at 70deg in open case when core is at 1100.

Oh right! found it, but one thing I want to confirm before going ahead and assigning my voltages, on 1100 by default it shows 1200 VDDC, but max VDDC my GPU gets when mining according to CPUID monitor is 1.094, how come? should I assign 1050 to last two? there are only last two values available to change.

So this is what I am going to do, is it correct?
https://i.gyazo.com/475d6eb45fcb878193b18d65a58b36c8.png

Yes, those figures are good.

I did that and updated BIOS to it, according to CPUID monitor voltage was same, my temperatures hit 91C again while mining :(

What should I do then?

This is what VBE is showing for my BIOS.
Overview tab:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/m3xthfui0d6xgl0/gb_280x_1.png?raw=1 (https://www.dropbox.com/s/m3xthfui0d6xgl0/gb_280x_1.png?raw=1)

Powerplay tab:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/ptpkdq2yic6e3ch/gb_280x_2.png?raw=1 (https://www.dropbox.com/s/ptpkdq2yic6e3ch/gb_280x_2.png?raw=1)

When gpu core is running at freq up to 1000MHz then the VRM is programmet to apply 1019 mV.  
When core is running at a freq between 1000 and 1100 then the applied voltage is 1050 mV.
The measured voltage may be lower in both cases.
When I was playing with this a couple of years ago I was using a wattmeter to confirm the effect of the lowered voltage.
Another note: If you are struggling with high temperatures, then it may help to reapply the thermal paste on the gpu chip.
On the Gigabyte you only have to unscrew 4 screws to separate the fan assembly from the gpu.  If you are not sure, there are
plenty of good guides on Youtube.
Cheers.

Okay I just discovered after all this flashing bioses that in GPU-Z my bios version is still original. I tried following http://www.overclock.net/t/1353325/tutorial-atiwinflash-how-to-flash-the-bios-of-your-ati-cards this tutorial. But everything remains same, my GPU reached 89C again and its still going, voltage is same.

What could I be doing wrong? Also. if I re-apply thermal paste, would Deepcool Z5 be any good? I am getting a sewing machine oil today and I will do both paste and fan oiling unless I fix my BIOS problem.

You can use atiflash to both read and write BIOS to the card.
To store a copy of the BIOS on your GPU to disk,  do the following:

This will save the BIOS on the card to a file named origbios.rom:
atiflash -s 0 origbios.rom  
0 if your card is in slot 0.

Store this file in a safe place for later, when you need to flash the card back to original BIOS.

Open the file in VBE, make the changes described earlier and save the result with a new name, tweaked.rom
Now, you can flash your card with the saved ROM:
atiflash -p 0 tweaked.rom.

Then shutdown your computer and restart and you should be good.
Now, if your computer doesnt boot, then assume you bricked your card.
In that case take a deep breath, flick the switch on the top of the card (you card has dual bios).
Restart the comp.  When up and running, flick the BIOS switch back, then run atiflash -p 0 origbios.rom
to restore card with original BIOS.  Then do your trouble shooting from there.

Have never used Deepcool myself, but by the name it sounds like it should do the job :-)
I have used Gelid GC Extreme in the past and have been happy with the result.

Since it reaches 94C, are you sure all 3 fans are spinning? Do the thermal paste but if it runs at 94C now then I don't think it will do much. The fan bearing seems shot.

I have replaced thermal paste. Could not oil fans because I could not quite unplug 3 pin fan connector.

It currently hit 80C, I dont think it will go too much higher its been mining for 8-10 minutes now.

Would 80C-85C be okay for mining 24/7?


Hmm, that is what I did pretty much except I downloaded new BIOS (latest one) and copied it and named it "[Its name]MODIFIED", it told me that it was flashing bios and I waited 1-2 minutes and it finished, when I restarted everything was the same.

About fans, yes when I looked all of them seemed to be spinning perfectly and equally at least from what I saw.

try

ATIWinflash -unlockrom 0
ATIWinflash -f -p 0 YOURBIOS.ROM


In MSI Afterburner your Voltage reading should be lower.

Thanks, I did that but got still same outcome :/

Okay to make it more detailed I just noticed it did change BIOS version. But nothing else was changed. right now its running 82-83C. I am not really sure what else to do  :'(

MSI still shows no voltage at all and CPUID monitor shows original 1.094v