Gigabyte WF3 7950 (1000/1250 @ 1.25V Stock)

[p4xil]

Hello fellow newbies!

I just wanted to share my optimization for these cards.

As you probably know new Gigabyte cards come with locked voltage at 1.25V and stock clocks at 1000Mhz GPU, 1250Mhz memory. This makes cards run hot and power consumption is high.
I have 3x 7950 setup and system took over ¨950W and it was really hard to keep them under 75C at stock clocks with 85% fan speed. Hashes were (avg) 610kh/s per card.

Later I found out that there is an older official BIOS (F43), which has lower voltage lock and lower clocks. So I tried it and flashed the cards.
Here is how I did it:

1. Download F43 Bios: http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=4121&dl=1#bios
2. Download atiflash: http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/2230/ATIFlash%204.07.html
3. you need DOS bootable USB drive. I used this tutorial: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/46707-ms-dos-bootable-flash-drive-create.html
4. put F43 Bios and ati flash to USB drive
5. Turn off the computer
6. Put BIOS Switch on the GPU to number 1 http://www.jagatreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/gigabyte-amd-hd-7950-dualbios-switch.jpg
    If anything goes wrong you can just put switch back to number 2 and you have factory default BIOS.
7. Boot with USB drive to DOS
8. Flash to F43 BIOS version (change xxxxxx.F43 to he name of the BIOS file)

Code:

atiflash -p 0 xxxxxx.F43

9. Reboot

Now my cards are at 900/1250 @ 1.090V stock.

I use this cgminer config:

1155/1420 core/memory clock speed
Thread Concurrency 24000
Workload 256
Threads per gpu 1
lookup gap 2
Intensity 19
Power Limit 20%

Code:

cgminer --thread-concurrency 24000 --lookup-gap 2 --gpu-engine 1155 --gpu-memclock 1420 --gpu-powertune 20 -w 256 -I 19 -g 1

I am getting (avg) 2005 kh/s with all three cards, so around 668 kh/s per card without HW errors and low stales on stratum pool.
Temperatures are around 65C with 65% fan speed and power consumption dropped for ¨50W per card.

F43 BIOS was total winner in all aspects - power, performance and temperatures.
So if you have the same card, I strongly recommend you to do the same.
You will still need an open rig with extra fan(s) to get decent temperatures.

Here is my latest screenshot of cgminer:


If you appreciate this tutorial and it is saving you money you can donate some coins
LTC: LVs3WjD3KfZQ2xniqqqkG2j4Fwetzybpxb

Have a great day!

P4xil

P.S.: you can try with TC 16384. It works even better for some. I got 60 kh/s more but I also got around 5 HW errors/day, so it seems 24000 is optimal for my setup.

Disclaimer: I am taking no responsibility for any damage you might have by following these instructions. There is always some risk involved when flashing the BIOS, so you must know what you are doing.

[kendog77]

How old are your 7950s? I think the new models are voltage locked by the hardware.

I followed the instructions above and downgraded to the F43 bios, and noticed no differences in temperature. I still need to check and see if the cards are using less power at the outlet...

Also, I thought the --gpu-powertune option added voltage, so I'm confused as to why you downgraded to the F43 bios, and then added 20% using the gpu-powertune option?

I'm glad this worked out well for you, but am very confused as to why I'm not seeing the same results. I think it's because the new gigabyte 7950s contain a hardware voltage lock.

[wildbud]

How old are your 7950s? I think the new models are voltage locked by the hardware.

I followed the instructions above and downgraded to the F43 bios, and noticed no differences in temperature. I still need to check and see if the cards are using less power at the outlet...

Also, I thought the --gpu-powertune option added voltage, so I'm confused as to why you downgraded to the F43 bios, and then added 20% using the gpu-powertune option?

I'm glad this worked out well for you, but am very confused as to why I'm not seeing the same results. I think it's because the new gigabyte 7950s contain a hardware voltage lock.

Did you find out if the new versions can be unlocked?

[007158]

Worked for me - -200w on 3 card setup and lower temps.

[computer]

Worked for me
good job

[zpm]

just wondering, do you have more control/configuration options with cgminer than guiminer with cgminer as backend?

[2502]

Thank You, great instruction!

[arlumba]

it works on my rev.2

[SocPsyProf]

I've got 2 Gigabyte 7950s in a Windows 8 rig housed in a Corsair 500R case with 2 front panel fans and a back panel fan. I'm running the cards at stock speeds with the sides of the case off and am seeing one of my cards run at 83 C and the other at 68 C. The GPU fans are running at 100% nonstop, and I'm only getting ~470Mh/s out of each card. I'm brand new to all this - will moving to the older firmware bring temps down and Mhashes up? Or should I put the hotter one out on a riser cable? Stick a box fan in front of the rig? Send the hot card in for replacement?

Any advice is appreciated.

[usahero]

I've got 2 Gigabyte 7950s in a Windows 8 rig housed in a Corsair 500R case with 2 front panel fans and a back panel fan. I'm running the cards at stock speeds with the sides of the case off and am seeing one of my cards run at 83 C and the other at 68 C. The GPU fans are running at 100% nonstop, and I'm only getting ~470Mh/s out of each card. I'm brand new to all this - will moving to the older firmware bring temps down and Mhashes up? Or should I put the hotter one out on a riser cable? Stick a box fan in front of the rig? Send the hot card in for replacement?

Any advice is appreciated.

The temperature is not too high, the problem is ventilator working at 100% nonstop. That is not very good.


Your cards would probably work better using F43 Bios. Puting a card on riser cable is helpful as well. I do not know how much MHs is ok for 7950, as I only mine scrypt - I never got very high hash rates on bitcoin mining (on sha256) - but over 500MHash/s is standard rate for sure. I get around 640 KHash/s on properly configured cards running at 1100/1250 MHz (scrypt).

[SocPsyProf]

It looks like switching over to the F43 BIOS really helped! I'm running both cards at 1100/1420, +20 power limit, and temps are holding steady at 83 and 68 C respectively, with the fans running at 75%. Both cards are now hashing at about 515 Mh/s. SWEET.

One thing I was curious about: in Afterburner, my core clock slider now maxes out at 1100 instead of 1200 like before. Is there any way to get my clock running above 1100 on this BIOS firmware? I'd love to be hashing even faster if I could.

[CryptoBadger]

Just FYI, the most recent new Gigabyte cards won't allow you to flash the F43 BIOS onto them. You can tell if you have one of these if your current BIOS has "FT0" in it. More info here:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=197871.0