Bitcoin Forum

Other => CPU/GPU Bitcoin mining hardware => Topic started by: jjames888 on June 12, 2012, 08:02:40 AM



Title: Special 7950 boards unlocked to 7970 rating
Post by: jjames888 on June 12, 2012, 08:02:40 AM
I found this. I don't know how true it is. Just thought I would post it.

http://videocardz.com/32782/amd-radeon-hd-7950-modified-to-7970
http://vga.it168.com/a2012/0507/1345/000001345261.shtml

The card is chinese.
Quote
"A rough translation suggest that this model is named A795 Fire Hurricane, but this card is not the same as reference card sold worldwide, it has better components and is also equipped with 6+8pin power connectors (just like 7970). According to the source, this card is also featuring 5+1 phase PWM."

https://i.imgur.com/3kADM.jpg

It would be cool if one of us in china, as I know there are, could get one of these and try it out?
It would also be cool if one of us could aquire the bios for this card and try it out on our cards.


Title: Re: 7950 unlocked - supposedly
Post by: AzN1337c0d3r on June 12, 2012, 05:52:25 PM
Quote
this card is not the same as reference card sold worldwide, it has better components and is also equipped with 6+8pin power connectors (just like 7970).

It looks to be a special board. Thus normal 7950s are not unlockable and this isn't all that interesting and the title a bit misleading.


Title: Re: 7950 unlocked - supposedly
Post by: aqrulesms on June 12, 2012, 06:31:52 PM
Why would they want to sell a supposed 7950 with the same hardware of 7970? That's quite a waste economically if I understand it right.


Title: Re: 7950 unlocked - supposedly
Post by: aqrulesms on June 12, 2012, 07:40:03 PM
Quote
this card is not the same as reference card sold worldwide, it has better components and is also equipped with 6+8pin power connectors (just like 7970).

It looks to be a special board. Thus normal 7950s are not unlockable and this isn't all that interesting and the title a bit misleading.

What should I change the title too

"Special 7950 boards unlocked to 7970 rating"


Title: Re: Special 7950 boards unlocked to 7970 rating
Post by: Aseras on June 12, 2012, 07:55:01 PM
probably more likely that some idiot/kid/assembler used a tray of 7970 cores on 7950 boards


Title: Re: Special 7950 boards unlocked to 7970 rating
Post by: aqrulesms on June 12, 2012, 08:01:59 PM
probably more likely that some idiot/kid/assembler used a tray of 7970 cores on 7950 boards

Yeah that's what I thought.  Why would there be extra processing power just locked away for no reason except to make it cheaper? (thereby reducing overall profit margins)


Title: Re: Special 7950 boards unlocked to 7970 rating
Post by: crazyates on June 12, 2012, 08:13:53 PM
Same reason why AMD Phenom II X4 s were sold as X3. Maybe the die tested good before assembly, but some shaders failed QA testing after assembly?


Title: Re: Special 7950 boards unlocked to 7970 rating
Post by: MrCruncher on June 12, 2012, 09:06:04 PM
This isn't all that uncommon. Only recently (5years or so) have firmware/program options have
given us the ability to try to unlock the card further. It's all about binning. Some pieces of silicon
are better than others which is why you have different tiers of performance.

In the 1980's you could open up certain computers and literally flip a toggle switch to double the
RAM size (256k to 512k). However, the stores sold the ones with 512k RAM for a premium even
though they were identical.


Title: Re: Special 7950 boards unlocked to 7970 rating
Post by: AzN1337c0d3r on June 12, 2012, 09:10:07 PM
In the 1980's you could open up certain computers and literally flip a toggle switch to double the
RAM size (256k to 512k). However, the stores sold the ones with 512k RAM for a premium even
though they were identical.

Aren't there certain Core i3 processors you can buy an "upgrade code" for?


Title: Re: Special 7950 boards unlocked to 7970 rating
Post by: MrCruncher on June 12, 2012, 09:15:15 PM
In the 1980's you could open up certain computers and literally flip a toggle switch to double the
RAM size (256k to 512k). However, the stores sold the ones with 512k RAM for a premium even
though they were identical.

Aren't there certain Core i3 processors you can buy an "upgrade code" for?

Yep, looks like they did.

http://www.geek.com/articles/chips/intel-introduces-software-upgrade-for-some-core-i3-pentium-chips-20110815/ (http://www.geek.com/articles/chips/intel-introduces-software-upgrade-for-some-core-i3-pentium-chips-20110815/)


Title: Re: Special 7950 boards unlocked to 7970 rating
Post by: Tannke on June 12, 2012, 11:36:34 PM
I already posted about this (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=80349.msg889892#msg889892) on May, no more news in EU or US since then.