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Title: 7970 mining thread Post by: yochdog on January 19, 2012, 03:18:12 PM Now that several of us have these cards hashing away, I thought it would be nice to start a thread dealing with the how to best mine with it.
I am running 2x 7970's currently, and will have 4 mining by the end of the day. Tidbits of info: -Will not work with GUIminer -Works great with Diablo -Runs stable even with massive overclock I am getting just over 600 MH/s per card with core set @ 1050 MHz. Memory is underclocked to 600. I had it clocked at 1100 at one point, but the increased hashing rate did not seem to justify the power usage. I am very ignorant on tweaking settings other than voltage and clocks, so I am hoping people smarter than me can add to this thread. Lets figure out how to optimize these bad boys! Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: naz86 on January 25, 2012, 01:23:56 PM read at tomshardware that all cards are rev design at the moment even the pcb is from the same manufacturer..... you should pick the cheapest
Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on January 25, 2012, 03:50:31 PM My 4x7970 xfx are hashing away happily at
v 1068 c 1125 m 1020 mh 2663 it was pulling 1025 watts at these setting, but I have since moved to a 220 line so I cannot tell now. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: despoiler on January 25, 2012, 05:26:18 PM Looks like I will be getting 3 or 4 7970s Can I just assume ASUS has the best card? Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjshabadoo on January 25, 2012, 11:10:20 PM how many Jimm? you didn't say in your post.
Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on January 25, 2012, 11:15:31 PM how many Jimm? you didn't say in your post. 4 cards xfx7970 Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: -ck on January 26, 2012, 12:59:43 AM I committed a little more 79x0 specific code and built a windows binary. Again, no idea if it works, nor if it performs, but here is a windows build:
http://ck.kolivas.org/apps/cgminer/temp/cgminer.exe Just drop it into a 2.1.2 directory, replacing the existing exe. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: sveetsnelda on January 26, 2012, 04:06:39 AM Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. ^This x 1000 Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: RyNinDaCleM on January 26, 2012, 06:57:14 AM Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. ^This x 1000 Try to RMA it! ;) Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: -ck on January 26, 2012, 12:41:01 PM I committed a little more 79x0 specific code and built a windows binary. Again, no idea if it works, nor if it performs, but here is a windows build: Still broken it appears, never mind for now... Should change when I get a 7970 from the sponsor thread :)http://ck.kolivas.org/apps/cgminer/temp/cgminer.exe Just drop it into a 2.1.2 directory, replacing the existing exe. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: ssateneth on January 27, 2012, 09:37:32 AM Now that several of us have these cards hashing away, I thought it would be nice to start a thread dealing with the how to best mine with it. I am running 2x 7970's currently, and will have 4 mining by the end of the day. Tidbits of info: -Will not work with GUIminer -Works great with Diablo -Runs stable even with massive overclock I am getting just over 600 MH/s per card with core set @ 1050 MHz. Memory is underclocked to 600. I had it clocked at 1100 at one point, but the increased hashing rate did not seem to justify the power usage. I am very ignorant on tweaking settings other than voltage and clocks, so I am hoping people smarter than me can add to this thread. Lets figure out how to optimize these bad boys! The hash rate increase is completely justified if you keep it cool and don't increase voltage, since it'll be a linear increase of hashes and watts. Spend $20 for electricity and gain $50 from bitcoin or spend $40 for electricity and gain $100 from bitcoin? I think the choice is obvious. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: yochdog on January 27, 2012, 02:56:24 PM Now that several of us have these cards hashing away, I thought it would be nice to start a thread dealing with the how to best mine with it. I am running 2x 7970's currently, and will have 4 mining by the end of the day. Tidbits of info: -Will not work with GUIminer -Works great with Diablo -Runs stable even with massive overclock I am getting just over 600 MH/s per card with core set @ 1050 MHz. Memory is underclocked to 600. I had it clocked at 1100 at one point, but the increased hashing rate did not seem to justify the power usage. I am very ignorant on tweaking settings other than voltage and clocks, so I am hoping people smarter than me can add to this thread. Lets figure out how to optimize these bad boys! The hash rate increase is completely justified if you keep it cool and don't increase voltage, since it'll be a linear increase of hashes and watts. Spend $20 for electricity and gain $50 from bitcoin or spend $40 for electricity and gain $100 from bitcoin? I think the choice is obvious. Thanks for the tip.....I will definitely keep that in mind. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: tacotime on January 28, 2012, 02:16:33 AM Looks like I will be getting 3 or 4 7970s Can I just assume ASUS has the best card? Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. Most of the 7970s out right now are reference boards and are pretty much the same Sapphire is just AMD's OEM branding and is mostly okay -- not great, not bad XFX has by far the best warranty on their cards (lifetime) Asus, Gigabyte and MSI all make good cards with decent aftermarket cooling options. If you want a card that is going to live a long time, get something with solid cooling on the VRMs, RAM and GPU Personally I would buy this one if you're on risers: http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/graphics/33697-gigabyte-radeon-hd-7970-oc-gv-r797oc-3gd/?page=14 Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: despoiler on January 28, 2012, 06:14:38 AM Looks like I will be getting 3 or 4 7970s Can I just assume ASUS has the best card? Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. Most of the 7970s out right now are reference boards and are pretty much the same Sapphire is just AMD's OEM branding and is mostly okay -- not great, not bad XFX has by far the best warranty on their cards (lifetime) Asus, Gigabyte and MSI all make good cards with decent aftermarket cooling options. If you want a card that is going to live a long time, get something with solid cooling on the VRMs, RAM and GPU Personally I would buy this one if you're on risers: http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/graphics/33697-gigabyte-radeon-hd-7970-oc-gv-r797oc-3gd/?page=14 1) Sapphire makes the most AMD cards in the entire world 2) Sapphire has made AMD since the dawn of AMD time 3) because of 2) Sapphire has an R&D role with AMD 4) Sapphire makes all of the FirePro cards 5) regardless of branding Sapphire makes all of the dual GPU cards Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. XFX is nothing more than a tier 3 card maker. That is why their warranty has to be so good. Their cards suck. EDIT:Gigabyte, Asus, and MSI all make really good cards too. I would consider them top tier makers along with Sapphire. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: sveetsnelda on January 28, 2012, 06:43:04 AM XFX finds any way possible to cut costs -- even if it means sacrificing long-term reliability. Part of this is just good business sense I guess, but I find it completely obnoxious when I pay for a top-tier card and don't get any of the accessories with it (and pay the same price). My Sapphire 7970s came with:
My XFX 7970s came with:
They're the same price (although some vendors are marking up the Sapphire cards currently). I only ordered the 2 XFX cards because they were the only ones in stock at the time. Also, *every* non-ref Sapphire card I've ordered (and I've ordered a lot) have been absolutely top-notch. Their coolers always seem to do such a good job at removing heat without needing some 5 pound gaudy HSF with flimsy fans (hi, Gigabyte). Gigabyte's heatsinks themselves have been great though... Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on January 28, 2012, 07:08:15 AM posting initial results of test:
2 rigs each has: mobo: crosshair V cpu: phenomx4 psu: seasonic 1250 mem: 4g 1600 all defaults 4x5970 filesys: 4g corsair mini linuxcoin cgminer voltage: 1.05 clocks: 820/300 killwatt: 1170 Mh: 2970 5x7970 filesys: wd green 500g win7 diablo voltage: 1.056 clocks: 1049/685 killwatt: 1160 Mh: 3120 looks to me like the 7970 can/will compete head to head with the king Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: ssateneth on January 28, 2012, 10:54:20 AM Newest version of HWiNFO64 supports reading VRM data (CHL8228): https://i.imgur.com/ZRNOi.png Second entry looks to be the ram vreg. I see you're underclocking ram. Can you try it with stock memory clocks (idk what it is, 1350?) and screenshot again? I'm curious as to where the extra power is going. My money is most of the extra power gets sucked by the GPU since it has to control the RAM. It's just a curiosity more than anything. Could also give me a point of refernce as to how much heat the ram is actually outputting. 0.5w/chip looks like no extra cooling is actually needed (heat can escape through the BGA and into the PCB). Even if its 2W/chip, I imagine the same will hold true. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: ssateneth on January 28, 2012, 12:26:46 PM https://i.imgur.com/cHp3k.png I do notice the power draw -- and heat -- of the higher memory clock more than this would indicate. And I've just got the single card. FWIW the newest Afterburner supports undervolting memory. I had trouble downclocking my memory with that version so I reverted to b10. I did try memory at 1.1550V when my memclock was ~685 and it seemed stable, no noticeable power draw change for me. The min voltage seemed to be 1.500V ... who knows, on a 4x rig maybe you could squeeze out 10W. INteresting, thanks. I suppose power is being used somewhere that the two VRM sensors would indicate. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: film2240 on January 31, 2012, 05:52:23 PM I'd be interested in getting one of these cards HD7970 (or HD7990 when its out).Only issue is the cost and that additional cost for upgrading my PSU.In UK both are expensive.
I saw was this: http://www.kikatek.com/product_info.php?products_id=241798&strAction=NoStock for £416.I noticed also that in UK a lot of these cards are out of stock.Could there be a high demand in UK for mining/gaming? The hashrate (600MHash) is much better than my heavily OC'd HD6950 (which gives ~400Mhash/s stable as PSU can't seem to cope above this).Lets see,my HD6950 only cost me £177.50 whereas HD7970 costs £416 for a 200Mhash/s boost.So in UK,I'd be paying (£416 - £177.50) £238.50 extra just for a boost in 200Mhash/s so not a really good path for me yet. In my case,you'd also have to factor an upgrade in PSU and the lesser value you'd get from my old one (current PSU is 5yrs old+) so that would add to costs even more. I just wish that these HD7970s were much cheaper so I could get my hands on one.I wonder why it won't work with GUIMiner (thats the only mining app I can use as the others are too complex/cumbersome for me) ? I'm happy to know that I can get 0.6GHash/s (600M/hashs) from 1 GPU. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: yochdog on January 31, 2012, 07:27:55 PM I'd be interested in getting one of these cards HD7970 (or HD7990 when its out).Only issue is the cost and that additional cost for upgrading my PSU.In UK both are expensive. I saw was this: http://www.kikatek.com/product_info.php?products_id=241798&strAction=NoStock for £416.I noticed also that in UK a lot of these cards are out of stock.Could there be a high demand in UK for mining/gaming? The hashrate (600MHash) is much better than my heavily OC'd HD6950 (which gives ~400Mhash/s stable as PSU can't seem to cope above this).Lets see,my HD6950 only cost me £177.50 whereas HD7970 costs £416 for a 200Mhash/s boost.So in UK,I'd be paying (£416 - £177.50) £238.50 extra just for a boost in 200Mhash/s so not a really good path for me yet. In my case,you'd also have to factor an upgrade in PSU and the lesser value you'd get from my old one (current PSU is 5yrs old+) so that would add to costs even more. I just wish that these HD7970s were much cheaper so I could get my hands on one.I wonder why it won't work with GUIMiner (thats the only mining app I can use as the others are too complex/cumbersome for me) ? I'm happy to know that I can get 0.6GHash/s (600M/hashs) from 1 GPU. Its all about density for me now.....MH/dollar is secondary. Thus, I am basically down to only using 7970's and 5970's where they are able to fit. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on January 31, 2012, 07:53:14 PM I'd be interested in getting one of these cards HD7970 (or HD7990 when its out).Only issue is the cost and that additional cost for upgrading my PSU.In UK both are expensive. I saw was this: http://www.kikatek.com/product_info.php?products_id=241798&strAction=NoStock for £416.I noticed also that in UK a lot of these cards are out of stock.Could there be a high demand in UK for mining/gaming? The hashrate (600MHash) is much better than my heavily OC'd HD6950 (which gives ~400Mhash/s stable as PSU can't seem to cope above this).Lets see,my HD6950 only cost me £177.50 whereas HD7970 costs £416 for a 200Mhash/s boost.So in UK,I'd be paying (£416 - £177.50) £238.50 extra just for a boost in 200Mhash/s so not a really good path for me yet. In my case,you'd also have to factor an upgrade in PSU and the lesser value you'd get from my old one (current PSU is 5yrs old+) so that would add to costs even more. I just wish that these HD7970s were much cheaper so I could get my hands on one.I wonder why it won't work with GUIMiner (thats the only mining app I can use as the others are too complex/cumbersome for me) ? I'm happy to know that I can get 0.6GHash/s (600M/hashs) from 1 GPU. Its all about density for me now.....MH/dollar is secondary. Thus, I am basically down to only using 7970's and 5970's where they are able to fit. agreed....HOWEVER it is very hard to pull out a 2.1G 5870 rig that is only pulling 925watts and been running for months without problems. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: yochdog on January 31, 2012, 08:26:37 PM I'd be interested in getting one of these cards HD7970 (or HD7990 when its out).Only issue is the cost and that additional cost for upgrading my PSU.In UK both are expensive. I saw was this: http://www.kikatek.com/product_info.php?products_id=241798&strAction=NoStock for £416.I noticed also that in UK a lot of these cards are out of stock.Could there be a high demand in UK for mining/gaming? The hashrate (600MHash) is much better than my heavily OC'd HD6950 (which gives ~400Mhash/s stable as PSU can't seem to cope above this).Lets see,my HD6950 only cost me £177.50 whereas HD7970 costs £416 for a 200Mhash/s boost.So in UK,I'd be paying (£416 - £177.50) £238.50 extra just for a boost in 200Mhash/s so not a really good path for me yet. In my case,you'd also have to factor an upgrade in PSU and the lesser value you'd get from my old one (current PSU is 5yrs old+) so that would add to costs even more. I just wish that these HD7970s were much cheaper so I could get my hands on one.I wonder why it won't work with GUIMiner (thats the only mining app I can use as the others are too complex/cumbersome for me) ? I'm happy to know that I can get 0.6GHash/s (600M/hashs) from 1 GPU. Its all about density for me now.....MH/dollar is secondary. Thus, I am basically down to only using 7970's and 5970's where they are able to fit. agreed....HOWEVER it is very hard to pull out a 2.1G 5870 rig that is only pulling 925watts and been running for months without problems. I hear ya.....but at some point, that becomes the ONLY option to increase hashing speed (excluding the Bitforce miracle, or course). Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: Keninishna on February 01, 2012, 12:44:22 AM I'd be interested in getting one of these cards HD7970 (or HD7990 when its out).Only issue is the cost and that additional cost for upgrading my PSU.In UK both are expensive. I saw was this: http://www.kikatek.com/product_info.php?products_id=241798&strAction=NoStock for £416.I noticed also that in UK a lot of these cards are out of stock.Could there be a high demand in UK for mining/gaming? The hashrate (600MHash) is much better than my heavily OC'd HD6950 (which gives ~400Mhash/s stable as PSU can't seem to cope above this).Lets see,my HD6950 only cost me £177.50 whereas HD7970 costs £416 for a 200Mhash/s boost.So in UK,I'd be paying (£416 - £177.50) £238.50 extra just for a boost in 200Mhash/s so not a really good path for me yet. In my case,you'd also have to factor an upgrade in PSU and the lesser value you'd get from my old one (current PSU is 5yrs old+) so that would add to costs even more. I just wish that these HD7970s were much cheaper so I could get my hands on one.I wonder why it won't work with GUIMiner (thats the only mining app I can use as the others are too complex/cumbersome for me) ? I'm happy to know that I can get 0.6GHash/s (600M/hashs) from 1 GPU. Your avatar is of trunk bay... I was just there that place is like disneyland for adults. :P Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: film2240 on February 01, 2012, 08:51:21 AM Your avatar is of trunk bay... I was just there that place is like disneyland for adults. :P So thats what the place is.I've always wondered what that place was.I adopted that avatar as I like the nice landscapes.Didn't know that is like a Disneyland for adults, Ken. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: JWU42 on February 01, 2012, 04:00:45 PM posting initial results of test: 2 rigs each has: mobo: crosshair V cpu: phenomx4 psu: seasonic 1250 mem: 4g 1600 all defaults 4x5970 filesys: 4g corsair mini linuxcoin cgminer voltage: 1.05 clocks: 820/300 killwatt: 1170 Mh: 2970 5x7970 filesys: wd green 500g win7 diablo voltage: 1.056 clocks: 1049/685 killwatt: 1160 Mh: 3120 looks to me like the 7970 can/will compete head to head with the king I assume you are comfortable running at 1160/1170 watts on a 1250 watt psu since the PSU is probably pushing 88% (~1020W) and within the general practice of driving it not beyond 80%? For those of us less wise (like me), we must remember that the draw from the wall is not what the PSU is outputting and the 1250 measurement is output and NOT draw. Thanks in Advance! Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on February 01, 2012, 04:16:20 PM posting initial results of test: 2 rigs each has: mobo: crosshair V cpu: phenomx4 psu: seasonic 1250 mem: 4g 1600 all defaults 4x5970 filesys: 4g corsair mini linuxcoin cgminer voltage: 1.05 clocks: 820/300 killwatt: 1170 Mh: 2970 5x7970 filesys: wd green 500g win7 diablo voltage: 1.056 clocks: 1049/685 killwatt: 1160 Mh: 3120 looks to me like the 7970 can/will compete head to head with the king I assume you are comfortable running at 1160/1170 watts on a 1250 watt psu since the PSU is probably pushing 88% (~1020W) and within the general practice of driving it not beyond 80%? For those of us less wise (like me), we must remember that the draw from the wall is not what the PSU is outputting and the 1250 measurement is output and NOT draw. Thanks in Advance! I believe the seasonics are rated for continuous output at the advertised rate (1250,750,etc) and will deliver higher peak power levels. google it. seasonic is the one!! Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: sveetsnelda on February 01, 2012, 09:16:01 PM ^This. As long as you load the power supply properly, you'll trip a 15A 120V breaker before overloading this PSU. Again, be careful though. this is actually a FOUR rail PSU even though the packaging indicates otherwise.
Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on February 01, 2012, 11:47:35 PM ^This. As long as you load the power supply properly, you'll trip a 15A 120V breaker before overloading this PSU. Again, be careful though. this is actually a FOUR rail PSU even though the packaging indicates otherwise. I actually did this just as a comparison to the 5970. Now the config is as follows: Not sure if this is one rig or tw0 ;) power 220V Psu's 3 seasonic 2x1250 1x650 mobos 2 7970 10 (5 each mobo) the 1250's are powering 4x7970 + mobo + hd the 650 is powering 1 7970 on each mobo #1 clocks 1143 volts 1162/685 core/mem #2 clocks 1125 volts 1125/685 core/mem Mhash #1 3453+ (i haven't hooked a monitor on it in days, so dont remember exactly) Mhash #2 3340 total 6790+ uptime, 170k accepted shares.. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: JWU42 on February 08, 2012, 03:36:03 AM So getting very close to 700 Mh per card. I am getting closer to building a rig!
Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on February 08, 2012, 04:44:33 AM So getting very close to 700 Mh per card. I am getting closer to building a rig! no reason to wait.. a 5970 is a 750Mh card. :) Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: HolodeckJizzmopper on February 08, 2012, 06:44:06 AM no reason to wait.. a 5970 is a 750Mh card. :) <pedant> 800Mh Stable@800Mhz overclock </pedant> Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on February 08, 2012, 02:21:36 PM no reason to wait.. a 5970 is a 750Mh card. :) <pedant> 800Mh Stable@800Mhz overclock </pedant> I have over 20 of these... at 820/300 they get a solid 373 per core... Please show us pics of 800Mh getting 400......stable Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: JWU42 on February 08, 2012, 03:03:37 PM no reason to wait.. a 5970 is a 750Mh card. :) <pedant> 800Mh Stable@800Mhz overclock </pedant> I have over 20 of these... at 820/300 they get a solid 373 per core... Please show us pics of 800Mh getting 400......stable Agreed - Mine run at 800 / 300 or 800/180 (Phoenix/CGMiner) and don't get past 368 Mh/s. @jjiimm_64 - yes, price gap isn't as large as it was 6 weeks ago when you could get a 5970 for $300. I am still a sucker for 5870's for under $130, though. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: yochdog on February 08, 2012, 05:59:16 PM no reason to wait.. a 5970 is a 750Mh card. :) <pedant> 800Mh Stable@800Mhz overclock </pedant> I have over 20 of these... at 820/300 they get a solid 373 per core... Please show us pics of 800Mh getting 400......stable What are you using for this? I use GUIminer with afterburner, and I cannot seem to get more than 315-320 per core. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: HolodeckJizzmopper on February 08, 2012, 07:00:23 PM https://i.imgur.com/JDaCF.png
Not sure what to say, folks. GPU 0 is a 6970 GPU 4&5 are the 5970 Using Phoenix w/Phatk Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on February 08, 2012, 07:42:05 PM https://i.imgur.com/JDaCF.png Not sure what to say, folks. GPU 0 is a 6970 GPU 4&5 are the 5970 Using Phoenix w/Phatk sorry to be so skeptical.... I see that 4 and 5 do indeed look like a 5970 v1.05, missing fan and all, 1. what is gpu 1,2,3 ? Please show all 5 running! I am willing to bet that the 2 windows your showing at 400Mh are not the 5970, if it is the 5970 your clocking it to 900! it is simple math.cycles in hashes out. you clock a 5870 down to 800 and see what you get! Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on February 08, 2012, 07:43:14 PM no reason to wait.. a 5970 is a 750Mh card. :) <pedant> 800Mh Stable@800Mhz overclock </pedant> I have over 20 of these... at 820/300 they get a solid 373 per core... Please show us pics of 800Mh getting 400......stable What are you using for this? I use GUIminer with afterburner, and I cannot seem to get more than 315-320 per core. cgminer. controls fans, clocks, and mem with one click. Fk afterburner Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: HolodeckJizzmopper on February 08, 2012, 08:20:46 PM 1. what is gpu 1,2,3 ? There is no GPU 1, 2 or 3. That's how the two cards (3 GPUs) show up as logical devices for me. No idea why they aren't sequentially numbered. Same for a 2 x 6970 + 1 5770 setup I have; the first two 6970's show us as GPU 0 and 4, and the 5770 shows up as GPU 8. Same for a 1 x 6970 + 1 x 6990 setup I have; 6970 shows up as GPU 0 and the 6990 shows up as GPU 4 and 9. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: Mousepotato on February 08, 2012, 08:37:35 PM Wow, Jizz that's nuts. Would you mind sharing your Phoenix command line options? What driver+SDK version are you using?
Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on February 08, 2012, 08:52:29 PM Wow, Jizz that's nuts. Would you mind sharing your Phoenix command line options? What driver+SDK version are you using? Really... I could add 1.2gig to my farm with those options, without using anymore electricity :) Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: HolodeckJizzmopper on February 08, 2012, 08:55:07 PM Wow, Jizz that's nuts. Would you mind sharing your Phoenix command line options? What driver+SDK version are you using? Using Catalyst 11.11 on a headless Win7 box (Absolutely nothing connected to any of the video adapters) Phoenix 1.7.3. cmdline: phoenix -u <localproxy> -k phatk BFI_INT FASTLOOP=false AGGRESSION=7 DEVICE=n WORKSIZE=128 VECTORS Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: bulanula on February 08, 2012, 10:30:44 PM Wow, Jizz that's nuts. Would you mind sharing your Phoenix command line options? What driver+SDK version are you using? Using Catalyst 11.11 on a headless Win7 box (Absolutely nothing connected to any of the video adapters) Phoenix 1.7.3. cmdline: phoenix -u <localproxy> -k phatk BFI_INT FASTLOOP=false AGGRESSION=7 DEVICE=n WORKSIZE=128 VECTORS What is that localproxy and how do I get one ? Thanks ! Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: -ck on February 08, 2012, 11:12:01 PM Since this is the 7970 mining thread, I'll paraphrase what I put on the cgminer thread:
Okay for those who want to get 7970 working well with cgminer on linux, I've been up most of the night since I got the card (lol) trying to get it working and then fiddled with settings to find a sweet spot. Firstly: There is no actual "stable release" driver for this GPU yet. The driver you're directed to is a special release not really version numbered (like 12.1 etc). The 12.1 driver does NOT work with 7970 so when I put the 7970 in the machine with 6970s it didn't even show up. Then when I installed the GCN ati driver amd-driver-installer-8.921-x86.x86_64.run the 6970s wouldn't show up! Goddamn amd. I modified the xorg to add the extra devices, and xorg would start up but cgminer would just crash opencl when starting. After much searching around sharky suggested I change the card order, so I put the 7970 into slot 1 and the 6970s into slots 2-4. Again the ati driver didn't show up the 6x devices with aticonfig --lsa, and wouldn't configure the xorg for more than just the 7970. Then I checked the GPU positions Code: lspci | grep VGA I used the PCI bus position entries and edited the xorg.conf file into the following generic version: Code: Section "Monitor" This would still only show up one device with aticonfig --lsa, but cgminer could detect them all. Code: cgminer -n After much playing around, I found the particular card I had would run stable at clockspeeds of 1200/1050. The 7970 has a mandatory no-more-than 150 difference between the GPU engine clockspeed and the GPU memory clockspeed much like the 6970 had a 125 difference. Note that with windows overclocking tools they can get around this using other backdoors to the devices which I can't do. Powertune of +5% provided the most boost to performance as I've seen with the 6970s and going over this made no difference. On first successful running, I noticed the dreaded CPU usage bug was back! Luckily I heard this was not universal and Code: export GPU_USE_SYNC_OBJECTS=1 Then I played around with various combinations of gpu threads and intensities and found that there is an inflexion point in intensity where the CPU usage jumps up from the usually very low usage. With 1 GPU thread, an intensity up to 13 does not increase CPU usage. With 2 threads an intensity of 11 does not. More threads did not help hashrate. Now bear in mind that this is an unmodified cgminer 2.2.3 so no new fancy kernels, but here is the final performance with intensity 11, engine 1200, memory 1050, powertune 5. See if you can spot the 790 amongst these ;) : Code: GPU 0: 71.0C 4125RPM | 694.5/694.8Mh/s | A:355 R:1 HW:0 U:10.18/m I:11 So that's with the now ancient poclbm kernel in cgminer that was modified recently just to work with 7970 aka GCN but has no real performance enhancements. Now I need to fiddle with kernels and wait to see what diablo comes up with as well. Note that GCN ONLY works with the 2.6 SDK which has lousy performance on other cards, so I kept my old .bin files for the 6970s so that cgminer would just use those instead of regenerating them after I installed the new driver and sdk. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: Mousepotato on February 08, 2012, 11:55:21 PM Using Catalyst 11.11 on a headless Win7 box (Absolutely nothing connected to any of the video adapters) Phoenix 1.7.3. cmdline: phoenix -u <localproxy> -k phatk BFI_INT FASTLOOP=false AGGRESSION=7 DEVICE=n WORKSIZE=128 VECTORS Thanks! I'll have to upgrade my Phoenix later. I think I'm still on 1.50. Are you using whatever SDK came with 11.11? I remember there being some issues with CPU load with that driver IIRC. Sorry for veering off-topic. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: HolodeckJizzmopper on February 09, 2012, 12:14:46 AM What is that localproxy and how do I get one ? https://github.com/c00w/bitHopper CPU issues with 11.11 are irrelevant to me as my boxes are all multicore dedicated to mining. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: JWU42 on February 09, 2012, 01:35:29 AM Multicore isn't the issue - it is the additional (unneeded) power draw from a pegged CPU core.
Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: HolodeckJizzmopper on February 09, 2012, 04:18:03 AM "AGGRESSION=7" Best I can tell, pool and local proxy is reporting accurately. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: padrino on February 09, 2012, 04:27:41 AM Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. XFX is nothing more than a tier 3 card maker. That is why their warranty has to be so good. Their cards suck. EDIT:Gigabyte, Asus, and MSI all make really good cards too. I would consider them top tier makers along with Sapphire. Sadly between XFX, Sapphire, Gigabyte and MSI cards my only failures have been Sapphire cards. I used to run mostly Sapphire for the reasons mentioned above but have since jumped to XFX and have had much better luck. Might have just been my bad luck but after 3 I decided it was more than that.. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: Therilith on February 10, 2012, 10:24:04 AM I guess this is as good a place as any to ask a few general GPU questions, especially since they relate to my plans to buy a 7970 for my main rig that will spend a fair bit of time shuffling bits. Despite being what might very well qualify as a gamer, I've never really been on the bleeding edge of hardware purchases. As such, I know embarrassingly little about GPUs.
1. I read somewhere that there is a minimum time after the release of a new card during which AMD only allows third party manufacturers to sell reference cards. If true, how long before that changes? After my purchase of a poorly labeled 6950 that had all manner of odd quirks and was even missing the dual BIOS functionality, I've decided that if I buy a 7970, it'll be a reference model. Once burned, hella paranoid. 2. I did some research on the forums, and a random internet-stranger said that the 7970 is already fairly close to the maximum possible hashrate. Are any further improvements likely? 3. Would you recommend any particular brand? If I'm buying a reference card, it would seem like price and warranty are the only things that matter. 4. Are all reference cards built with the same fans and GPU "case"? Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: cmg5461 on February 10, 2012, 09:44:24 PM no reason to wait.. a 5970 is a 750Mh card. :) <pedant> 800Mh Stable@800Mhz overclock </pedant> I have over 20 of these... at 820/300 they get a solid 373 per core... Please show us pics of 800Mh getting 400......stable jim, what are your setting for your 5970's? at 825/300 I'm getting 340/gpu Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: DeathAndTaxes on February 10, 2012, 09:49:26 PM posting initial results of test: 2 rigs each has: mobo: crosshair V cpu: phenomx4 psu: seasonic 1250 mem: 4g 1600 all defaults 4x5970 filesys: 4g corsair mini linuxcoin cgminer voltage: 1.05 clocks: 820/300 killwatt: 1170 Mh: 2970 5x7970 filesys: wd green 500g win7 diablo voltage: 1.056 clocks: 1049/685 killwatt: 1160 Mh: 3120 I hope that is watts or you forgot a decimal. :) Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: someone703 on February 13, 2012, 12:48:34 AM jim, what are your setting for your 5970's? at 825/300 I'm getting 340/gpu At 825/150 @ 1.05v I'm getting ~375 mhash/s from each core. Haven't tried dropping the voltage any to see if it'd remain stable at 825/150 though. I can bump it up to 850/150 @ 1.05v and get ~390 mhash/s but then I get stability issues where the screen will go black and I get a notification saying the driver stopped responding and it recovered but cgminer stops working until I restart it. This only happens when I'm actively browsing with the computer at this setting though. If I just let it run by itself overnight it's stable. BTW - is 1.05v the default voltage for a 5970? Tried Googling it but didn't get any concrete answers. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: jjiimm_64 on February 13, 2012, 01:09:51 AM jim, what are your setting for your 5970's? at 825/300 I'm getting 340/gpu At 825/150 @ 1.05v I'm getting ~375 mhash/s from each core. Haven't tried dropping the voltage any to see if it'd remain stable at 825/150 though. I can bump it up to 850/150 @ 1.05v and get ~390 mhash/s but then I get stability issues where the screen will go black and I get a notification saying the driver stopped responding and it recovered but cgminer stops working until I restart it. This only happens when I'm actively browsing with the computer at this setting though. If I just let it run by itself overnight it's stable. BTW - is 1.05v the default voltage for a 5970? Tried Googling it but didn't get any concrete answers. 1.05 is the default. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: TheHarbinger on February 13, 2012, 01:42:50 AM jim, what are your setting for your 5970's? at 825/300 I'm getting 340/gpu At 825/150 @ 1.05v I'm getting ~375 mhash/s from each core. Haven't tried dropping the voltage any to see if it'd remain stable at 825/150 though. I can bump it up to 850/150 @ 1.05v and get ~390 mhash/s but then I get stability issues where the screen will go black and I get a notification saying the driver stopped responding and it recovered but cgminer stops working until I restart it. This only happens when I'm actively browsing with the computer at this setting though. If I just let it run by itself overnight it's stable. BTW - is 1.05v the default voltage for a 5970? Tried Googling it but didn't get any concrete answers. 1.05 is the default. That's pretty low since all my 5870s are 1.163 at stock voltage. Downclocked to 1.100. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: JWU42 on February 13, 2012, 01:45:13 AM Yes - the 5870 cores on a 5970 have to be downclocked and voltage reduced to comfortably stay with specs for PCI-e.
5970 = 1.050 5870 = 1.163 Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: chungenhung on February 21, 2012, 10:59:09 PM Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. ^This x 1000 Try to RMA it! ;) Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: DeathAndTaxes on February 22, 2012, 02:49:50 PM Yes - the 5870 cores on a 5970 have to be downclocked and voltage reduced to comfortably stay with specs for PCI-e. 5970 = 1.050 5870 = 1.163 Good news is mining uses a lot less power (due to underclocked and underutilized memory) so you can restore the voltage back to 5870 levels. The bad news is power consumption increases by the square of the voltage. So (1.163/1.050)^2 = ~22% increase in GPU core power. 22% increase in GPU core power = 22% increase in thermal energy (heat). :( That is at the same clock. If you increased the clock 15% to take advantage of that increased voltage you are looking at 1.22 * 1.15 = 41% more thermal energy than an overclocked 5970. This is more than the cooling system can handle even at 100% fan. Of course is you are doing something exotic: * watercooling * oil immersion cooling * piping 20C air directly into air intake :) Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: DOH! on April 01, 2012, 05:54:11 AM Looks like I will be getting 3 or 4 7970s Can I just assume ASUS has the best card? Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. Most of the 7970s out right now are reference boards and are pretty much the same Sapphire is just AMD's OEM branding and is mostly okay -- not great, not bad XFX has by far the best warranty on their cards (lifetime) Asus, Gigabyte and MSI all make good cards with decent aftermarket cooling options. If you want a card that is going to live a long time, get something with solid cooling on the VRMs, RAM and GPU Personally I would buy this one if you're on risers: http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/graphics/33697-gigabyte-radeon-hd-7970-oc-gv-r797oc-3gd/?page=14 1) Sapphire makes the most AMD cards in the entire world 2) Sapphire has made AMD since the dawn of AMD time 3) because of 2) Sapphire has an R&D role with AMD 4) Sapphire makes all of the FirePro cards 5) regardless of branding Sapphire makes all of the dual GPU cards Sapphire makes the best AMD cards. XFX is nothing more than a tier 3 card maker. That is why their warranty has to be so good. Their cards suck. EDIT:Gigabyte, Asus, and MSI all make really good cards too. I would consider them top tier makers along with Sapphire. XFX killed their lifetime warranty except on the 600 dollar version of their cards, the double d. Since it doesn't add a second lifetime for resale, I think I'll stick with the 2 year warranty on the 529 dollar cards, or the three year on gigabyte/asus. Just picked up a sapphire for 475 today, and got a secondhand asus for 490 last week. Slowly replacing my older 5000 series cards with mining proceeds and ebay sales of the 5000 cards, going to be a profitless couple of months, but it's worth it imo to get into cards that have full warranty. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: DiabloD3 on April 03, 2012, 07:47:46 AM 2. I did some research on the forums, and a random internet-stranger said that the 7970 is already fairly close to the maximum possible hashrate. Are any further improvements likely? Yes. Possibly, I'm still trying to beat the compiler here. Title: Re: 7970 mining thread Post by: noncecents on December 29, 2012, 12:48:26 AM Any luck with that compiler beating since April?
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