Power Drain amout issues [Closed~]

[Fiyasko]

  The reward is based off of how Much you help me, Only one person will get paid, Minimum payment .1ßtc

So, I have Two computers, One with Dual XFX6970BE's (for gamimg), And my miner wich WAS a Dual 6990 miner, But i sold a card and bought a 2nd 6870 and a 5830, The miner is currently running One MSI 6990@stock core/mem/volt, and One 5830 Running @875core/stockmem/stockvolt,

The gamimg computer WAS running a single 6870BE OC'd too 1000core 1200mem. Running with no problems, stock volt, and could goto 1040 with stock volt
It HAD a 600W PSU and the comp has a 1090TBEPhenomIIx6oc'd@3.85ghz.
Now it has Dual 6870's at Stock, because anything above stock causes my computer to randomly Freeze after about 3-10mins (940core 1150mem)
It Has a 1000W PSU. Same specs for comp.

The Miner Has a 1200W PSU, So I was wondering if the 1000W would be better suited to run in the Miner, and have the 1200W in the Gamer, So that it would re-enable me to overclock my cards.

FIRST COME FIRST SERVE, YOU GET BUMPED IF BETTER INFO ARISES BEFORE I PAY YOU
time is nolonger of the essence i am afk

LegitBit is the winner! of .2btc!

[1713260415]

1713260415

[Zagitta]

I doubt it's an issue with your PSU, but what brand is it? Also tell us more about driver version, OS etc

Edit: Also what miner, OC tool and so on

[Goldenmaw]

Have you tested both cards one at a time, under full hashing load conditions?  I thought I had a PSU problem too until I discovered one of my 5830's was a stinker and couldn't handle the OC its bros were shouldering. So I clocked the weak link down a bit, problem solved.

[Litt]

time to throw that miner out the window or take chances on burning yoru house down.

[Fiyasko]

All cards are running full load mining.

Both comps are running win7Ultimate,x86

Both PSU's are RAIDMAX
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817152044 1000W
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817152045 1200W

[Fiyasko]

time to throw that miner out the window or take chances on burning yoru house down.

Get out of my thread, Cooling is not an issue, I have a Trench dug to supply cold air, And more

[Uzza]

I suggest you use the 1000w in the mining rig, and underclock the memory on both cards to save on power usage.

My 4870 saves 30 watt by underclocking from 900 to 190. You could see similar savings on those cards, giving more headroom for overclocking core, while still being within 1000W.

I suggest you use MSI Afterburner to do the underclocking if it's on Windows.
Install it and go to the installation directory. Open the MSIAfterburner.cfg and scroll down until you find "[ATIADLHAL]". Replace that section with the following:

[ATIADLHAL]
EnableUnofficialOverclocking   = 1
UnofficialOverclockingEULA   = I confirm that I am aware of unofficial overclocking limitations and fully understand that MSI will not provide me any support on it
UnofficialOverclockingMode   = 2
AccessibilityCheckingPeriod   = 0

When you underclock then, you need to close MSI Afterburner and reopen it after turning the memory clock to it's lowest. Repeat until you get down to the clock you want.

If you can do it, and the cards remains stable, you can also undervolt it to save on power and heat.

[w0mbat]

its most def. not the PSU. 2xhd6870+1090t oc wont need more than a good 600w psu.

freezing means there something wrong with the cards/one of them.

1. check if u connected everything correctly
2. try them separately, w/ and w/o oc

[Fiyasko]

UnofficialOverclockingMode   = 2 Two, you say... Hmmmm

[Uzza]

I have seen both 1 and 2, and apparently the difference is that 1 allows the clocks to change if the card runs idle, for automatic downclocking, while 2 forces it to stay at the designated clock.

[Zagitta]

AFAIK the 6990 and 5830 will consume more power than 2 6870 so i think you should stick with the 1000W in the gaming computer and first do as Goldenmaw said just to make sure it's not the second 6870 that can't get past stock...

A better way to do so (assuming you're using MSI afterburner) would actually be to go into settings and uncheck the "Synchronize settings for similar graphics processors" and then overclock each card on it's own little by little while checking stability by having a miner run on the card you're testing...

[LegitBit]

It's probably not power that is causing the issue, likely its either a buggy card, or the motherboard needs a firmware upgrade.

Test over-clocking with each card individually, see if the freezes occur only with one card, or if they work separately just fine.

To make sure power is not the issue:
You can get a simple multimeter for 10-15 bucks from nearly any hardware store/walmart to test the 12v Rails when at full load, see if they drop amperage significantly, that could also be an issue. Setting the cards on different Rails is also a good idea.

Also check with the manufacturer of the motherboard for a bios update, sometimes that fixes issues. Also in the bios you can sometimes set "constant voltage" or "load spectrum" or similar, that should make over-clocking the GFX more stable.

Adjusting the PCI frequency/HT freq, can help on some AMD mobos.

[Fiyasko]

The cards are fine, Im currently Mining, Playing DIRT 3, And typing this message (dirt in windowed to proove my point)
Nothing is wrong

[Zagitta]

The cards are fine, Im currently Mining, Playing DIRT 3, And typing this message (dirt in windowed to proove my point)
Nothing is wrong

A card can work perfectly fine and still not be able to OC more than a few mHz above stock...

[Goldenmaw]

Hashing stress and gaming stress are very different things.  Case in point, everybody can downclock their Graphics card memory to a ridiculous degree, and this works wonderfully for mining, but try that while trying to fire up Crysis and watch things grind to a screeching halt.  Test your cards, one by one, in a live fire exercise - mining under stress.

Also... Raidmax PSUs are really that bad.  Never trust their box numbers.  They can handle normal usage just fine, generally, but the constant and steady drain taxes them in dangerous ways.  If you're using raidmax PSU's, it really is a possibility that they are the problem!

[Uzza]

A card can work perfectly fine and still not be able to OC more than a few mHz above stock...

And it can also happen because the actual chip is one of the lesser ones in a batch.

I can suggest you try to overvolt the cards a small amount, if you have enough leeway temperature wise, to see if it helps in stability when overclocking.

Also... Raidmax PSUs are really that bad.  Never trust their box numbers.  They can handle normal usage just fine, generally, but the constant and steady drain taxes them in dangerous ways.  If you're using raidmax PSU's, it really is a possibility that they are the problem!

If they indeed are that bad, then you should definitely recommended you use the 1200w PSU in your gaming rig.

[LegitBit]

Like the others said, no two gpu's are exactly the same, there are always imperfections in the circuitry that can prevent higher than normal speeds.

Try out what I mentioned, over-clock each card separately, (with only one card in the case at a time) to see which is causing the issue.

A systematic approach to testing is always the most effective.

It's probably not power that is causing the issue, likely its either a buggy card, or the motherboard needs a firmware upgrade.

Test over-clocking with each card individually, see if the freezes occur only with one card, or if they work separately just fine.

To make sure power is not the issue:
You can get a simple multimeter for 10-15 bucks from nearly any hardware store/walmart to test the 12v Rails when at full load, see if they drop amperage significantly, that could also be an issue. Setting the cards on different Rails is also a good idea.

Also check with the manufacturer of the motherboard for a bios update, sometimes that fixes issues. Also in the bios you can sometimes set "constant voltage" or "load spectrum" or similar, that should make over-clocking the GFX more stable.

Adjusting the PCI frequency/HT freq, can help on some AMD mobos.

[kiwiasian]

I'd like to second the idea that it is not a problem with the PSU
Your first 6870 that (supposedly) did 1040 core on stock volts is of a very clean and good fabrication batch.
Your second 6870 is more than likely from an "average" or "below average" batch that cannot get high clocks without the volts.

You can overclock each card separately. The good card you can run at 1000 stock volts and you can leave the other one at stock. All this can be accomplished in Afterburner, just make sure each GPU has a separate clock control.

If your second 6870 is of reference design, you can bump the volts to try to get it as high as the other one.

Also, mining and gaming are NOT good stress testers in the first place. Get a real stress tester like Furmark to verify if your overclock is truly stable. Just because you can play games and not crash does not mean your overclock is stable.

[Goldenmaw]

I respectfully disagree, Kiwi.  Hashing makes minimal use of video memory and extreme use of the GPU.  Naturally, this means that a slight flaw in the GPU will be more pronounced in a setup that has the GPU running faster than it ever safely could without the memory downclocked. Ergo, the best stress test for hashing, is hashing.

[LegitBit]

I respectfully disagree, Kiwi.  Hashing makes minimal use of video memory and extreme use of the GPU.  Naturally, this means that a slight flaw in the GPU will be more pronounced in a setup that has the GPU running faster than it ever safely could without the memory downclocked. Ergo, the best stress test for hashing, is hashing.

Although the best test for hashing is hashing, the best test for a truely stable overclock is something that stresses both heavily. I believe this is what he meant, though I may be wrong.

Mining may only use a small amount of ram.. but it does use it, so any instability in the ram will affect mining, despite being less pronounced or even unnoticeable.

Both RAM and Core must both be stable and able to communicate to each-other without collisions or fluctuation.