Sapphire Xtreme 5850 THREAD!!!!!!!!

[m3sSh3aD]

So continued from the newbie section.....

I just busted my gigabyte mobo, one with 4 1x PCIE and 1 16x Socket

I put my otherboard in which only as 2 1x and 1 x16, 3 cards BUT............ It looks like i can overclock it..... Im updating to 11.6b ATI driver as it will have 5x5850's as ive hooked a 1200 Watt PSU upand the new drivers support more than 4 cards in windows. Got to get some PCI-PCIE converters though. 1 ordered but need more now that board died onb me Cut a X1 socket up to so no refund O well....

These drivers are taking AGES install though, 20 minutes so far but it is going. I will report back about this card LETTING ME okver volt it, at least in trixx. Its 1am and this is what i love

[m3sSh3aD]

UPDATE:

Strangely it is now allowing me to over clock this card i have in this system now. All @ 990/300b @1.187V. I've had this MSI MoBo connected to these cards before, They DIDN'T OVERVOLT! All thats different is a 1200Watt supply hooked up. Surely can't be that. Loosing my Gigabyte board with 4 1x PCI-E sockets sucks. I cant finbd another board with so many on PCI - PCI-E converter are £20 on ebay. Cables are £5. Cablecaurus? YOU MAD catfish I looked there onced and thought how stupid people are who go there. R.I.P OFF! More money than sense most people though

600Watt coolermaster will do 2 cards and a system. Green black pins are the ones to connect, that is correct. 205 is my 'personal' TDP of these cards up at 1.2Volts, least with the 000SA varient. Soon as i have converters this 1200 is getting hooked up to 5 cards. If all goes well this 'rig' idea of mine will be 10 card beasts. All in a 70cmx40cmx70cm (roughly) area. 2x 1200/1250 PSU's, 10x 5850's & 2x systems. Easily cooled and will get 4Ghash. So, after playing around abit, this project would have cost me around 2K,BUT..... Now with what i know i can get that price down considerably. What you rekon about 4Ghash machine for £2000. Is that a good price, im certain it is. Ill sell them haha

PSU = GO BIG & GO QUALITY, its that simple, they provide the cards with a better constant flow. TRY GET MORE RAILS to diserpate the power more evenly across the cards. BeQuiet have OCK, Links all rails together for EXTREMLY HIGH POWER though, Also, its at least a 4 card system to get a better profit. Plus, if this 5 card system works in windows now, THe 5 card system is awesome. Even with extra cost of PCI converter(s). 1400/1500 Watt would be 6 cards. Of cause, you can always jerry rig PSU's Motherboard sockets then haha

Playing with this overclock anyways. Stuck with 3 cards for now EDIT: 1000/300 @1.193, Looks like PSU is VITAL for getting the most out of your cards. 1200 beast is doing wonders. Although this new card is acting like all the others. Fine by me

[mikeo]

Sounds good! Where are you finding 5850s?

[m3sSh3aD]

You dont need anything processor nor motherboard. I got old athlon duel cores and mobo's. Cheap Cheap Although, limited choice on motherboard. need look for different combo, but you dont need be spending anything you dont have to. 3 x1 and a x16 for 4 cards and a pci to pci-e converter and thats a 5th card

This card is clocked at 1000/300 @ 1.193V, This is spec B, the 'UnVoltable' one that suddenly is! Wont go over even with 1.2V and i've set that my limit, way below the 1.25 ive seen. Well, 1.275 :/ Not for me, Not without them zalaman coolers. My others though are 1015/300 1.2V all day long, Spec A ones. This is on a 1200W supply so power QUALITY is important VERY

[mastergamer]

my hd5850 cards (3 units) running on 950/1,18V for a few weeks fine.
I dont want to go higher, dont want to ruin my cards.
They give me 375Mhash, its fine i think?

[m3sSh3aD]

@mastergamer - the VRMS are safe at 1.250, I dont go over 1.200 just to be safe. You can get 400 mhash out of these all day long. Diablo miner has about .3% stail over phoenix's 1.4%, so use diablo with vector 2, worksize 256, agression 13. Should help a bit

@ Catfish - O mate, My first PC was a DX-66, What a beast. Cant remember if it was 8MB or 16MB Ram. 151mb IBM HDD. Syndicate wars i loved ha ha. X-com - Enemy unknown. Some classics. Sinclair ZX and amiga's and all. Even had a atari jaguer. Think my mum payed about £300 for that and i dont come from a well off family haha Brother was 10 years older so alot got passed down too. All good. That needs go up on semiaccurate's flashback friday Although the names on it haha

Right, that new revision that will over volt is sitting pretty at 1000 but wont gop no higher. Seems to run a little hotter, GPU wise.... Bios version is different to in ino on TRIXX

Card A/000SA - 012.020.000.050.037238
Card B/230SA - 012.020.000.055.000000

I want a play with my mates that does 1020@ stock now but i bet it wont work or stop this one from over volting so im going leave alone The other 2 are going 1015/300 @1.2V, Ill guarentee 1.2V WILL NOT DAMAGE YOUR CARDS! NOR WILL IT GO OVER 205 WATTS. 1.25 wont damage your card but i wont guarentee that. 1 in a million and all 1224mhash from 3 cards. Need those converters now to add 2 more cards into the mix

Unfortunitly im no electrician. Im sure theres devises for the wall though. Im intgerested so ill hgave a look when i have time as well. SUre its just a thing you put inbetenn and it measures the current. GPU-Z will tell you the amps, opn the old cards at least, not the new ones....

[mastergamer]

1,25V is safe to the vrams 

i dont think so, atleast my one cant handel it, above 1,2V i get blackscreen with 100% fan after a while, as higher the voltage is, as earlier the card fails.
I only testet it at one card, the other never failed, but i havent pushed them any further then 960mhz and 1,18V.
I will stay at this clocks, the difference is too less to risk a dead card.

and btw, my 7 year old psu was designed to deliver about 465W, at the wall my pc needs about 540W 

So i think i shouldn overvolt them to 1,25V hehe

[Mousepotato]

How are you guys getting 1.25v?  I use AMD GPU Clock Tool to adjust core/memory speeds and while there's a drop-down box to adjust voltage, it doesn't seem to work and my voltage gets auto-adjusted to 1.088v.  I've been running stable @ 1020MHz @ 410-412 MH/s for 3 days now without a problem, so should I even be worried about voltage at this point?

[Jack of Diamonds]

@mastergamer - the VRMS are safe at 1.250,You can get 400 mhash out of these all day long.

I hope people don't try setting their voltage to 1.25V after reading this.

It's not safe and just about no chip will be able to absorb this in the long run. Sure you might get big hash rates, for a few weeks before the VRAM busts.

1.2V is probably the highest anyone should settle for if they are into mining for the long run rather than benchmarking.

so should I even be worried about voltage at this point?

If you want to be cautious, you can buy a heat sensor for about 10 bucks from a hardware store. Then point it at the VRM, if the temp is at 80-110c you have nothing to worry about.

If it shows 140c+ then it's better to tone down the core frequency or voltage.

[Xephan]

1,25V is safe to the vrams 

i dont think so, atleast my one cant handel it, above 1,2V i get blackscreen with 100% fan after a while, as higher the voltage is, as earlier the card fails.
I only testet it at one card, the other never failed, but i havent pushed them any further then 960mhz and 1,18V.
I will stay at this clocks, the difference is too less to risk a dead card.

and btw, my 7 year old psu was designed to deliver about 465W, at the wall my pc needs about 540W 

So i think i shouldn overvolt them to 1,25V hehe

1.25V is lower than what could immediately kill the VRMs (Voltage Regulators, not vRAM), but they would likely die from heat long before you discover what's the max you can go with.

[m3sSh3aD]

@mastergamer - the VRMS are safe at 1.250,You can get 400 mhash out of these all day long.

I hope people don't try setting their voltage to 1.25V after reading this.

It's not safe and just about no chip will be able to absorb this in the long run. Sure you might get big hash rates, for a few weeks before the VRAM busts.

1.2V is probably the highest anyone should settle for if they are into mining for the long run rather than benchmarking.

so should I even be worried about voltage at this point?

If you want to be cautious, you can buy a heat sensor for about 10 bucks from a hardware store. Then point it at the VRM, if the temp is at 80-110c you have nothing to worry about.

If it shows 140c+ then it's better to tone down the core frequency or voltage.

Well, that was my bad i meant 1.2 is safe, and i know no ones blown anything around there. 1.25 can be found by a simple search on the tinter web. I got a thermo thing, none of them(vrms) over 100. THey throttle at 125/130 degrees so you will see a decrease in mhash before the card totally bricks. ATI hardware this, Always had better build quality imho. Get sufficent cooling, im not using cases, But tables

[DBordello]

Is anybody here running linux?  What are you using to adjust the voltage? 

[m3sSh3aD]

Im certain OSX isnt very good for mining. I read somewhere a 5870/5850, cant remember which, does 180mhash in OSX and 400+ in windows. Thats over a 50% hit. Unless he was doing something wrong in OSX thats bad. Linux however isnt far behind, im guessing to it been open source rather than closed on OSX and people have been making the video drivers better all the time for linux, mac, well, its down to them(or amd).

Im with catfish, OSX is good, apple are the problem these days. Although you gotta give it to there marketing arm, and patent.... The petent system needs re working too. Noit even going get into monsanto and crew about patenting LIFE! Sick. Its a shame that apple have took the direction they have cause they have a superior OS over windows

I like that arm may be in contention to around 2015, maybe later but that will mix things up. Also graphite chips in the future will change the game. Multiple types of memory being developed. I been out of tech for a decade cause its been very dull and boring been drip fed. The system we have today slows technology down cause the company's have to recoup what they've invested. I believe a new way of society is needed with the advances over the last 150 years. Take note that thats the industrial age and the technological/information age. 2 of the most 'advancing' ages of all. In 150 years...... Thats not long at all. the powers that be and all need removing and people need to start working together more. Goverments have lost there way the world over and forgot what they were put there for, Manage there own part of the world, NOT OTHERS!!! Everyones to interested in everyones business instead of looking after there own. I have strong views here, and this isnt the place

These cards still holding. These converters are co0ming from china or thaiwan, cant remember but there going be end of week/next week. Im skint for next few weeks so Until then i'm running a lonely 3 cards. 1225mhash from them though

[m3sSh3aD]

1.225 is quite common with sapphire cards....

http://forums.extremeoverclocking.com/showthread.php?t=341934

I might see what more i can get out of these. 68 is the top temp and VRMs are below 100. THrottle at 125 anyways so ill see the impact soon as it hits. I got spares so.....