Ubuntu Linux overclocked (4) 5830s 750watt PSU and Radeon Bios editor

[dukejer]

Hi Everyone,

I just added 2 more 5830s to my rig today for a total of 4 5830s now.  I was able to overclock the GPUs to 925 Mhz and underclock the Memory to 300 Mhz and remain stable.  Each card is hashing at 287 M/hashes now.  The whole rig is running at 690 Watts using a 750 Watt PSU.  I could probably reduce the power consumption a little more by removing the CDROM and extra hard drives.  Booting Linux using PXE boot over the LAN could drop all the hard drives and run Linux out of memory.

In order to do this I loaded Unetbootin onto my Ubuntu Laptop and reformatted a 1GB USB Flash Drive to Fat16 and used Unetbootin to install FreeDos.  I also loaded atiflash.exe onto the USB Flash Drive.  After that I was able to boot off the USB Flash Drive on my mining rig into FreeDos safe mode and save a copy of all my 5830 Bioses using atiflash.exe.  This allowed me to bring the flash drive back to my latptop and edit the bioses with Radeon Bios Editor, (RBE), and overclock the GPUs higher then aticonfig would allow me.  RBE will run under Linux using Wine and winetricks to load the vb6run.  After the bioses were edited with the new clock settings I booted off of the USB Flash Drive on my mining rig again and uploaded the new enhanced bioses.

RBE Help from post


http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=11746.0

Also see my post about bitcoin and running linux headless.

http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=9239.0


If you find this post helpful feel free to donate to address: 19oQLN2v1auiGqBDFfxSDUfu8Ax6ooT6xs

- Dukejer.

[Rob P.]

Would love to see the other specs of your rig:

Case, Motherboard, RAM, Power Supply

Would also love a .img of your USB stick, I'm about to do exactly this...

[dukejer]

Would love to see the other specs of your rig:

Case, Motherboard, RAM, Power Supply

Would also love a .img of your USB stick, I'm about to do exactly this...

Hi pickerin,

Not sure I can distribute atiflash.exe but the whole procedure was as simple as running unetbootin to install freedos on a fresh fat16 2GB USB stick and copying atiflash.exe from www.techpowerup.com onto the usb stick.  You can also grab RBE from www.techpowerup.com but that is not needed on the usb stick.

Here are the specs for my system.
Midtower case Generic with 2 case fans.
Corsair TX750 Watt PSU
ASUS M4A78T-E AM3 790GX/SB750 Motherboard
2 GB DDR3 Memory
4 ATI HD Radeons 5830s
2 PCIe x1 to x16 cable extenders from http://cablesaurus.com

Right now I have the side cover off the case and the case on its side to support the additional GPUs.   The two new GPUs are right above the two existing GPUs.  I used a cross bar rapped in duct tape laid across the case to support the two new GPUs.  The M4A78T-E motherboard only has 2 PCIe x16 sockets and 2 PCIe x1 sockets but PCIe x1 sockets do not seem to hinder performance at all.

-Dukejer

If you find this post helpful feel free to donate to address: 19oQLN2v1auiGqBDFfxSDUfu8Ax6ooT6xs

[dukejer]

Hi Everyone,

I now have my 4 cards overclocked pretty stable at different rates using RBE.  Unfortunately one of my cards will not over clock more them 925Mhz GPU and 300 Mhz GPU even with the temperature at 66 degrees.

Hash rate GPU0: 306.50 Mhash/sec
Hash rate GPU1: 295.70 Mhash/sec
Hash rate GPU2: 287.00 Mhash/sec
Hash rate GPU3: 305.50 Mhash/sec
Total                1194.70 Mhash/sec


DISPLAY=:0 sudo aticonfig --adapter=all --odgc

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    984           342
             Current Peak :    984           342
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%

Adapter 1 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    950           330
             Current Peak :    950           330
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%

Adapter 2 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    925           300
             Current Peak :    925           300
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%

Adapter 3 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    984           342
             Current Peak :    984           342
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%


DISPLAY=:0 sudo aticonfig --adapter=all --odgt

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 70.50 C

Adapter 1 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 69.00 C

Adapter 2 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 66.50 C

Adapter 3 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 69.50 C


DISPLAY=:0.0 aticonfig --pplib-cmd "get fanspeed 0"
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 100%

DISPLAY=:0.1 aticonfig --pplib-cmd "get fanspeed 0"
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 85%

DISPLAY=:0.2 aticonfig --pplib-cmd "get fanspeed 0"
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 50%

DISPLAY=:0.3 aticonfig --pplib-cmd "get fanspeed 0"
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 40%

-Dukejer

If you find this post helpful feel free to donate to address: 19oQLN2v1auiGqBDFfxSDUfu8Ax6ooT6xs

[LehmanSister]

Doing this on two 5830's.

GPUs: 2x Sapphire HD5830
Mobo: Crosshair IV Formula 890FX
CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1090T 3.2G AM3

Overclock settings: 975/340 @ 1.163v.
Miner Settings: poclbm VECTORS BFI_INT AGGRESSION=12 FASTLOOP WORKSIZE=256

Currently stable with the windows open in the evening. Will keep a close eye on it come the morning sun.

Both running at ~304.5Mhps.

Remains stable unless I run cpuminer, which I don't really need anyways. Hopefully it will stay stable

Code:

Thu Jun  9 20:45:32 PDT 2011

*** Temperature ***

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 57.00 C

Adapter 1 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 61.50 C
*** Clocks ***

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    975           340
             Current Peak :    975           340
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%

Adapter 1 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    975           340
             Current Peak :    975           340
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%
*** GPU #0 Stats ***
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 85%

Temperature for thermal controller 0 is 57.000000
Current Activity is Core Clock: 975MHZ
Memory Clock: 340MHZ
VDDC: 1163
Activity: 99 percent
Performance Level: 2
Bus Speed: 5000
Bus Lanes: 16
Maximum Bus Lanes: 16

*** GPU #1 Stats ***
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 85%

Temperature for thermal controller 0 is 61.500000
Current Activity is Core Clock: 975MHZ
Memory Clock: 340MHZ
VDDC: 1163
Activity: 99 percent
Performance Level: 2
Bus Speed: 5000
Bus Lanes: 16
Maximum Bus Lanes: 16

*** CPU and Misc Sensors ***
k10temp-pci-00c3
Adapter: PCI adapter
temp1:        +0.0°C  (high = +70.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)

atk0110-acpi-0
Adapter: ACPI interface
Vcore Voltage:         +1.44 V  (min =  +0.80 V, max =  +1.60 V)
CPU/NB Voltage:        +1.15 V  (min =  +0.80 V, max =  +1.60 V)
CPU VDDA Voltage:      +2.49 V  (min =  +2.00 V, max =  +3.00 V)
DRAM Voltage:          +1.55 V  (min =  +1.40 V, max =  +1.90 V)
HT Voltage:            +1.20 V  (min =  +0.80 V, max =  +1.50 V)
NB Voltage:            +1.10 V  (min =  +0.90 V, max =  +1.35 V)
SB Voltage:            +1.11 V  (min =  +0.80 V, max =  +1.50 V)
+3.3V Voltage:         +3.36 V  (min =  +2.97 V, max =  +3.63 V)
+5V Voltage:           +5.06 V  (min =  +4.50 V, max =  +5.50 V)
+12V Voltage:         +11.95 V  (min = +10.20 V, max = +13.80 V)
CPU Temperature:       +34.0°C  (high = +40.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)
MB Temperature:        +34.0°C  (high = +35.0°C, crit = +95.0°C)
NB Temperature:        +44.0°C  (high = +65.0°C, crit = +95.0°C)
SB Temperature:        +36.0°C  (high = +35.0°C, crit = +75.0°C)
OPT_TEMP1 Temperature:  +0.0°C  (high =  +0.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)
OPT_TEMP2 Temperature:  +0.0°C  (high =  +0.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)
OPT_TEMP3 Temperature:  +0.0°C  (high =  +0.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)


Thu Jun  9 20:45:37 PDT 2011

[asfas16123]

Hi Everyone,

I now have my 4 cards overclocked pretty stable at different rates using RBE.  Unfortunately one of my cards will not over clock more them 925Mhz GPU and 300 Mhz GPU even with the temperature at 66 degrees.

Hash rate GPU0: 306.50 Mhash/sec
Hash rate GPU1: 295.70 Mhash/sec
Hash rate GPU2: 287.00 Mhash/sec
Hash rate GPU3: 305.50 Mhash/sec
Total                1194.70 Mhash/sec


DISPLAY=:0 sudo aticonfig --adapter=all --odgc

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    984           342
             Current Peak :    984           342
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%

Adapter 1 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    950           330
             Current Peak :    950           330
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%

Adapter 2 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    925           300
             Current Peak :    925           300
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%

Adapter 3 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    984           342
             Current Peak :    984           342
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%


DISPLAY=:0 sudo aticonfig --adapter=all --odgt

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 70.50 C

Adapter 1 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 69.00 C

Adapter 2 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 66.50 C

Adapter 3 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series 
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 69.50 C


DISPLAY=:0.0 aticonfig --pplib-cmd "get fanspeed 0"
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 100%

DISPLAY=:0.1 aticonfig --pplib-cmd "get fanspeed 0"
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 85%

DISPLAY=:0.2 aticonfig --pplib-cmd "get fanspeed 0"
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 50%

DISPLAY=:0.3 aticonfig --pplib-cmd "get fanspeed 0"
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 40%

-Dukejer

If you find this post helpful feel free to donate to address: 19oQLN2v1auiGqBDFfxSDUfu8Ax6ooT6xs

what happened when you tried to overclock the "bad" card further? did it crash but you just were able to flash its bios back?
can you up the voltage like this?

[dukejer]

what happened when you tried to overclock the "bad" card further? did it crash but you just were able to flash its bios back?
can you up the voltage like this?

Hi asfas16123,

It would lock up just the one card.  The Mhash/sec would run for a couple of seconds and then freeze.  The GPU temperature would then drop from about 70 degrees to around 40.  Now I watch my GPUs for lower temperatures after they are started.  If they drop to some unrealistic level I know they are locked up.

-Dukejer

If you find this post helpful feel free to donate to address: 19oQLN2v1auiGqBDFfxSDUfu8Ax6ooT6xs

[dukejer]

Doing this on two 5830's.

GPUs: 2x Sapphire HD5830
Mobo: Crosshair IV Formula 890FX
CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1090T 3.2G AM3

Overclock settings: 975/340 @ 1.163v.
Miner Settings: poclbm VECTORS BFI_INT AGGRESSION=12 FASTLOOP WORKSIZE=256

Currently stable with the windows open in the evening. Will keep a close eye on it come the morning sun.

Both running at ~304.5Mhps.

Remains stable unless I run cpuminer, which I don't really need anyways. Hopefully it will stay stable

Hi lehmansister,

Did it make it through the night?    Are you running this under Ubuntu?

Thank you,

-Dukejer

[LehmanSister]

Hi lehmansister,

Did it make it through the night?    Are you running this under Ubuntu?

Thank you,

-Dukejer

Yes, and it's doing alright without the outdoor night air. It's currently about 65F outside, and is rapidly climbing to 75F. Seems to be holding just fine.

Summer temperatures reach up to 100F, so I'll probably setup an external/internal temperature monitor before July when the real heat hits, and use a function to control the overclocking. Or maybe the BTC/USD/Energy/difficulty cost cross will make it worthwhile to use the air conditioner.

Currently at the following:

Code:

Fri Jun 10 12:10:45 PDT 2011

*** Temperature ***

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 59.00 C

Adapter 1 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 65.00 C
*** Clocks ***

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    975           340
             Current Peak :    975           340
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%

Adapter 1 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    975           340
             Current Peak :    975           340
  Configurable Peak Range : [600-875]     [900-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%
*** GPU #0 Stats ***
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 85%

Temperature for thermal controller 0 is 59.500000
Current Activity is Core Clock: 975MHZ
Memory Clock: 340MHZ
VDDC: 1163
Activity: 99 percent
Performance Level: 2
Bus Speed: 5000
Bus Lanes: 16
Maximum Bus Lanes: 16

*** GPU #1 Stats ***
Fan speed query:
Query Index: 0, Speed in percent
Result: Fan Speed: 85%

Temperature for thermal controller 0 is 65.000000
Current Activity is Core Clock: 975MHZ
Memory Clock: 340MHZ
VDDC: 1163
Activity: 99 percent
Performance Level: 2
Bus Speed: 5000
Bus Lanes: 16
Maximum Bus Lanes: 16

*** CPU and Misc Sensors ***
atk0110-acpi-0
Adapter: ACPI interface
Vcore Voltage:         +1.44 V  (min =  +0.80 V, max =  +1.60 V)
CPU/NB Voltage:        +1.15 V  (min =  +0.80 V, max =  +1.60 V)
CPU VDDA Voltage:      +2.49 V  (min =  +2.00 V, max =  +3.00 V)
DRAM Voltage:          +1.55 V  (min =  +1.40 V, max =  +1.90 V)
HT Voltage:            +1.20 V  (min =  +0.80 V, max =  +1.50 V)
NB Voltage:            +1.10 V  (min =  +0.90 V, max =  +1.35 V)
SB Voltage:            +1.11 V  (min =  +0.80 V, max =  +1.50 V)
+3.3V Voltage:         +3.36 V  (min =  +2.97 V, max =  +3.63 V)
+5V Voltage:           +5.06 V  (min =  +4.50 V, max =  +5.50 V)
+12V Voltage:         +11.95 V  (min = +10.20 V, max = +13.80 V)
CPU Temperature:       +35.0°C  (high = +40.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)
MB Temperature:        +38.0°C  (high = +35.0°C, crit = +95.0°C)
NB Temperature:        +45.0°C  (high = +65.0°C, crit = +95.0°C)
SB Temperature:        +38.0°C  (high = +35.0°C, crit = +75.0°C)
OPT_TEMP1 Temperature:  +0.0°C  (high =  +0.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)
OPT_TEMP2 Temperature:  +0.0°C  (high =  +0.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)
OPT_TEMP3 Temperature:  +0.0°C  (high =  +0.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)

k10temp-pci-00c3
Adapter: PCI adapter
temp1:        +0.0°C  (high = +70.0°C, crit = +90.0°C)


Fri Jun 10 12:10:50 PDT 2011

[LehmanSister]

Yes, and it's doing alright without the outdoor night air. It's currently about 65F outside, and is rapidly climbing to 75F. Seems to be holding just fine.

Peaked at about 75F outside, had the windows closed for that, GPU temps seemed to peak around 65/68 with an external fan circulating to the rest of the house. Cool breeze started up outside, opened the windows and now I'm back to:

Code:

*** Temperature ***

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series  
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 58.00 C

Adapter 1 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series  
            Sensor 0: Temperature - 63.50 C
*** Clocks ***

Still kinda warm out, currently 71F 30m after peak day heat.

[LehmanSister]

Did it make it through the night?    Are you running this under Ubuntu?

Still stable. And sadly yes, Ubunturd. I'm going a more pure Debian route, as soon as I can, but I'm swamped. I think there's some more general work being done in that regard, that I'm not following. System requires some manual work daily to keep it purely on geothermal cooling.

[dukejer]

Still stable. And sadly yes, Ubunturd. I'm going a more pure Debian route, as soon as I can, but I'm swamped. I think there's some more general work being done in that regard, that I'm not following. System requires some manual work daily to keep it purely on geothermal cooling.

Hi lehmansister,

I am glad your system is still stable.  I do not mind Ubuntu for for my day to day work.  I have tried every Linux distribution under the sun from Lsl, Yggdrasil, Slackware, Redhat, Debian, Gentoo, Suse, etc. to even creating my own.  I find Ubuntu a good trade off that is easy enough to manage.   The problem with configuring other distributions to run optimally is time and in Bitcoin mining downtime is lost money!     I do not like the new GUI at this stage for Ubuntu.  I still find myself in classical mode at this time.  Maybe it will grow on me.  If I was to do this as a job full time I would probably roll my own for some more efficiency and boot the servers using PXE boot over the LAN so I would not need a hard drive or CDROM sucking up any unneeded watts.    The last system I set up was built only using the mini.iso from Ubuntu.  Then I only loaded Xorg and other packages to build ATI drivers and set up the rest of the mining software.  I did not load a full desktop.  I run all my systems with the minimum number of needed processes and I also boot and run them headless.

- Dukejer

[Basiley]

try Debian testing[aka "sid"], then, which is actually [re-fashioned/crippled]essence of [over-promoted/buggy]Ubuntu "distribution".
in my experience, its more capable, stable, consistent.
this time its Debian 7, code-named "Wheezy".
you can also try "unstable" branch too, but only for not mission-critical stuff. but even this kind of Debian, break infrequently

[LehmanSister]

try Debian testing[aka "sid"], then, which is actually [re-fashioned/crippled]essence of [over-promoted/buggy]Ubuntu "distribution".
in my experience, its more capable, stable, consistent.
this time its Debian 7, code-named "Wheezy".
you can also try "unstable" branch too, but only for not mission-critical stuff. but even this kind of Debian, break infrequently

Got Wheezy sitting in town waiting for me (where there's decent internet), been meaning to go that route for awhile.