[ANN] Catcoin - Scrypt meow!

[vaelrock]

Installing new card drivers now. Tense moment as I see whether my PSU can handle two high powered cards.  

I'm trying to get a new gpu aswell to help with the hash rate, don't know if I should get a 7950, a 280x or a 290, kind of tight on money right now and although it's an investiment with return so I don't know how should I handle this ..

Well, I have it working alongside my GTX 670 now.

The R9 280x provides nice bang for buck, but it runs pretty hot. It's fine though, as they can take the heat, but when it gets to max temp I drop from 700mhash/sec to 635mhash/sec, so realistically to get max performance I'll need to watercool it. It's a bit annoying that I bought the best performing/cheapest R9 280x that I could find, because I'll have to buy a Universal GPU waterblock to cool it now, as it's a non-reference board. Oh well. It'll still be way better than the stock air cooler. A decent 240 radiator should keep it running at 700mhash.  

The water cooling should pay itself off over time via increased lifespan and possible overclocking, a little risky for long term use though.

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-msi-radeon-radeon-r9-280x-gaming-3g-28nm-6000mhz-gddr5-gpu-1000mhz-boost-1050mhz-2048-streams-hd

One of the cheapest 280X I have found and it is the MSI gaming version and can hash at 700-720 normal (no OC)

£240

Is that a fact, or based on posted performance? I ended up getting; http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-xfx-radeon-r9-280x-boost-6000mhz-gddr5-gpu-850mhz-boost-1000mhz-dvi-hdmi-mdport-voltage-unlocked

Because it was the best I could find, myself.

Watercooling is cool and all, but it's hassle to set up and is quite expensive.

The XFX you chose has a custom cooling so you should be able to run it on air without any problem.

Most custom PCB's 280x can run with a nice undervolt (< 1.1V, except if you're unlucky) at 1050 to 1100 MHz for the core, and 1500Mhz for the RAM (always 1500, except if your memory can go to 1800 without crashing and you want to overclock the core too).
The biggest problem is the VRM's temp. I don't know what XFX has put on their cards, but on cheap Sapphire Dual-x (got 8 of them at ~213€ each just before Christmas), this is the main problem. I can have gpu's running at 60°C to 65°C without any problem, but VRM's can go up to 105°C. At this temp, the card starts to throttle and I can't keep them running at ~725kh/s.

But if you're putting your cards in a single PC case without big air flow, then yes you may need a water cooling. My cards are on custom made wood frames with a fan in front of them.

[Nullu]

Installing new card drivers now. Tense moment as I see whether my PSU can handle two high powered cards.  

I'm trying to get a new gpu aswell to help with the hash rate, don't know if I should get a 7950, a 280x or a 290, kind of tight on money right now and although it's an investiment with return so I don't know how should I handle this ..

Well, I have it working alongside my GTX 670 now.

The R9 280x provides nice bang for buck, but it runs pretty hot. It's fine though, as they can take the heat, but when it gets to max temp I drop from 700mhash/sec to 635mhash/sec, so realistically to get max performance I'll need to watercool it. It's a bit annoying that I bought the best performing/cheapest R9 280x that I could find, because I'll have to buy a Universal GPU waterblock to cool it now, as it's a non-reference board. Oh well. It'll still be way better than the stock air cooler. A decent 240 radiator should keep it running at 700mhash.  

The water cooling should pay itself off over time via increased lifespan and possible overclocking, a little risky for long term use though.

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-msi-radeon-radeon-r9-280x-gaming-3g-28nm-6000mhz-gddr5-gpu-1000mhz-boost-1050mhz-2048-streams-hd

One of the cheapest 280X I have found and it is the MSI gaming version and can hash at 700-720 normal (no OC)

£240

Is that a fact, or based on posted performance? I ended up getting; http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-xfx-radeon-r9-280x-boost-6000mhz-gddr5-gpu-850mhz-boost-1000mhz-dvi-hdmi-mdport-voltage-unlocked

Because it was the best I could find, myself.

Watercooling is cool and all, but it's hassle to set up and is quite expensive.

The XFX you chose has a custom cooling so you should be able to run it on air without any problem.

Most custom PCB's 280x can run with a nice undervolt (< 1.1V, except if you're unlucky) at 1050 to 1100 MHz for the core, and 1500Mhz for the RAM (always 1500, except if your memory can go to 1800 without crashing and you want to overclock the core too).
The biggest problem is the VRM's temp. I don't know what XFX has put on their cards, but on cheap Sapphire Dual-x (got 8 of them at ~213€ each just before Christmas), this is the main problem. I can have gpu's running at 60°C to 65°C without any problem, but VRM's can go up to 105°C. At this temp, the card starts to throttle and I can't keep them running at ~725kh/s.

But if you're putting your cards in a single PC case without big air flow, then yes you may need a water cooling. My cards are on a custom made wood frames with a fan in front of them.

Watercooling isn't cheap, no. But I could do a single GPU loop for around £200. If the VRMs do get that hot then it would probably benefit from some decent copper ramsinks. Airflow is a bit of an issue for my case, but right now I just keep the side panel off.  Got room for a fan in the bottom, side and back of the case though, so I think I'll do that for now. the side fan should really help draw the heat from the 280x.

I'll let my card settle in for now before I start tweaking it.

[LeoC]

I have heard that people get better performance by applying a downclock, you should then slowly lower the voltage and run a benchmark, if it passes, lower the voltage a bit more until it fails to pass the benchmark, then raise the voltage to where it was able to run, that should keep it from being so hot. Doesn't make sense at first, but the card will downclock itself if it reaches higher temps, moreso than if you manually did the downclock yourself. Before you invest in a water block, try this method.

User           GPU                          kH/s   Core   Memory   Volts   Watts
Screwbal   Asus 290X (reference)   850   885   1250   Default

loph-rtak     Sapphire 290X (reference)   759   962   1250   Default

[vaelrock]

I have heard that people get better performance by applying a downclock. Before you invest in a water block, try this method.

This is in fact more complicated. You need a certain core clock with a certain memory clock to have the most efficiency. Generally for 280X, memory clock is set at 1500MHz, but you have a new step of stability above 1750, depending on the card brand.

The cookie cutter clocks are memory at 1500MHz, and core clock starting at 1050. Then you raise your core clock by 5MHz steps.
Your max hashrate can be anywhere between 1050 and 1100. But for example, if I set a dual-x to 1090MHz for the core, hashrate will be ~600KH/s. If I downclock a bit to 1070, then I get > 710kh/s. If I downclock again to 1040, I get less than 600KH/s.
This is quite a strange behaviour, but common to every 280X I tested.
It's also not the same clock from card to card of the same brand (but very close), nor from brand to brand (less close).

Anything below 1040 with memory at <= 1500 cannot get you more than 700KH/s. At least, I didn't find anything.

When You've found your max hashrate clocks, try to undervolt by 100mV steps, until your driver crashes. Then try to narrow your voltage limit, and then you're up and ready to go.

Oh, and the cgminer setting is the common cookie cutter one for 280X : -I 13 -g 2 -w 256 --thread-concurrency 11200 --lookup-gap 2

[LeoC]

From my experience memoryclock makes absolutely zero difference in mining speeds, this value is mainly tweaked to increase stability when coreclock changes are made.

Then again, I have an nVidia card, they could be different. I purchased this card shortly before I discovered crypto mining *facepalm*, it wasn't cheap either.

[vaelrock]

From my experience memoryclock makes absolutely zero difference in mining speeds

It does, but it depends on the card.
It does nothing for a 7990, nor the Nvidia based cards, but it's the most important thing for 280X, and is always the most optimized at 1500MHz. That's why everyone having a good hashrate here https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison run it at 1500MHz.
Yeah, strange behavior, may have a relation to timing communication between RAM and GPU.

[LeoC]

Well that sucks, I've got a 3770k @ 4.4 ghz, 4x8gb PC 16000 ram and two Corsair Force GT's in raid 0. I'd love for a coin to come out that utilizes every aspect of a rig and not just the GPU.

[SlimePuppy]

From my experience memoryclock makes absolutely zero difference in mining speeds, this value is mainly tweaked to increase stability when coreclock changes are made.

Then again, I have an nVidia card, they could be different.

I feel your pain, Leo, as I've been a long-time NVIDIA users and am new to the ATI/AMD beasties.  To add insult to injury, I started with a couple of 7870s which are cursed, I think.  It was like VooDoo trying to find the right settings for those.

I couldn't get 7870s to full speed unless I reduced the clock (engine and memory) significantly.  The R9 290 will make the same hash/WU with a slight OC (stock 947/1250; full speed 1015/1250), then they drop, then increase again when set to 1000/1499 - and the cards crash hard after 10 minutes at 1000/1500.


Always keep a rubber chicken around when tuning to wave over the GPUs - just in case.

[vaelrock]

Well that sucks, I've got a 3770k @ 4.4 ghz, 4x8gb PC 16000 ram and two Corsair Force GT's in raid 0. I'd love for a coin to come out that utilizes every aspect of a rig and not just the GPU.

There are some, Quark is one of them, and more recently particle I think. But those cpu/gpu coins are heaven for big botnet owners. So they are even more inequitable and unfair than GPU only coins.

[Nullu]

From my experience memoryclock makes absolutely zero difference in mining speeds

It does, but it depends on the card.
It does nothing for a 7990, nor the Nvidia based cards, but it's the most important thing for 280X, and is always the most optimized at 1500MHz. That's why everyone having a good hashrate here https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison run it at 1500MHz.
Yeah, strange behavior, may have a relation to timing communication between RAM and GPU.

Could you point me in the right direction to undervolting my card? Or downclocking, whatever it's called. I'm brand new to AMD cards, having always bought Nvidea, and I want the most out of my 280X

[LeoC]

Well that sucks, I've got a 3770k @ 4.4 ghz, 4x8gb PC 16000 ram and two Corsair Force GT's in raid 0. I'd love for a coin to come out that utilizes every aspect of a rig and not just the GPU.

There are some, Quark is one of them, and more recently particle I think. But those cpu/gpu coins are heaven for big botnet owners. So they are even more inequitable and unfair than GPU only coins.

Quark and Particle do not utilize the gpu unless you use some hack like Smelter to get it to work, and Smelter doesn't even work with nVidia GPUs so I'm out of luck there.

[vaelrock]

From my experience memoryclock makes absolutely zero difference in mining speeds

It does, but it depends on the card.
It does nothing for a 7990, nor the Nvidia based cards, but it's the most important thing for 280X, and is always the most optimized at 1500MHz. That's why everyone having a good hashrate here https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison run it at 1500MHz.
Yeah, strange behavior, may have a relation to timing communication between RAM and GPU.

Could you point me in the right direction to undervolting my card? I'm brand new to AMD cards, having always bought Nvidea, and I want the most out of my 280X

I'm doing everything with MSI afterburner. Make sure you check those check-boxes :
- Unlock voltage control
- Unlock voltage monitor (to make sure voltage is applied correctly)
- Force constant voltage (some card does not apply voltage changes without it checked)
Base voltage of 280X's is 1200mV. Follow the steps I've given in one of my previous posts, use the cgminer cookie cutter setting, and you should be hashing pretty easily at ~720KH/s at least, maybe more depending on the efficiency of your brand card design.

Oh, and make sure MSI afterburner always starts with windows, minimized, with the "apply overclocking at system startup".

[LeoC]

Always keep a rubber chicken around when tuning to wave over the GPUs - just in case.

Rubber? Pfft.

[Nullu]

From my experience memoryclock makes absolutely zero difference in mining speeds

It does, but it depends on the card.
It does nothing for a 7990, nor the Nvidia based cards, but it's the most important thing for 280X, and is always the most optimized at 1500MHz. That's why everyone having a good hashrate here https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison run it at 1500MHz.
Yeah, strange behavior, may have a relation to timing communication between RAM and GPU.

Could you point me in the right direction to undervolting my card? I'm brand new to AMD cards, having always bought Nvidea, and I want the most out of my 280X

I'm doing everything with MSI afterburner. Make sure you check those check-boxes :
- Unlock voltage control
- Unlock voltage monitor (to make sure voltage is applied correctly)
- Force constant voltage (some card does not apply voltage changes without it checked)
Base voltage of 280X's is 1200mV. Follow the steps I've given in one of my previous posts, use the cgminer cookie cutter setting, and you should be hashing pretty easily at ~720KH/s at least, maybe more depending on the efficiency of your brand card design.

Oh, and make sure MSI afterburner always starts with windows, minimized, with the "apply overclocking at system startup".

Ok, I'll give it a go tomorrow. 

I'll post my results after I've experimented with it.

[Nullu]

From my experience memoryclock makes absolutely zero difference in mining speeds

It does, but it depends on the card.
It does nothing for a 7990, nor the Nvidia based cards, but it's the most important thing for 280X, and is always the most optimized at 1500MHz. That's why everyone having a good hashrate here https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison run it at 1500MHz.
Yeah, strange behavior, may have a relation to timing communication between RAM and GPU.

Could you point me in the right direction to undervolting my card? Or downclocking, whatever it's called. I'm brand new to AMD cards, having always bought Nvidea, and I want the most out of my 280X

what is exact card model type number?

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/3gb-xfx-radeon-r9-280x-boost-6000mhz-gddr5-gpu-850mhz-boost-1000mhz-dvi-hdmi-mdport-voltage-unlocked

[Nullu]

-g 2 --thread-concurrency 8192 --shaders 2048 -I 13 -w 256 --gpu-engine 1035,1080 --gpu-memclock 1500,1500 --gpu-powertune -20,-20
i use these to similar
gpu clock is differnt to every card, you must find it between 1030-1100

This is what I'm currently using;

I 13 -g 2 -w 256 --thread-concurrency 8192 --gpu-powertune 20

I'll try your settings and change the memory clock, see if I get better performance.

[Nullu]

-g 2 --thread-concurrency 8192 --shaders 2048 -I 13 -w 256 --gpu-engine 1035,1080 --gpu-memclock 1500,1500 --gpu-powertune -20,-20
i use these to similar
gpu clock is differnt to every card, you must find it between 1030-1100

This is what I'm currently using;

I 13 -g 2 -w 256 --thread-concurrency 8192 --gpu-powertune 20

I'll try your settings and change the memory clock, see if I get better performance.

you use powertune +20? not -20

I was using the settings posted in https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison

Does powertune change the voltage?

[vaelrock]

-g 2 --thread-concurrency 8192 --shaders 2048 -I 13 -w 256 --gpu-engine 1035,1080 --gpu-memclock 1500,1500 --gpu-powertune -20,-20
i use these to similar
gpu clock is differnt to every card, you must find it between 1030-1100

--thread-concurrency 8192 and --shaders 2048 are mutually exclusive.
If you set thread-concurrency, shaders is ignored. Also, every 280X I've seen works better with a multiple of shaders >=5 and <6, so you should have better results with at least a thread-concurrency of 2048*5 = 10240.
In my case and on 3 different brands, 11200 was 0.5% better than 10240, which was already 1 to 2% better than 8192.

[Maverickthenoob]

TC 11200, G2, PT +20, 1080 core, 1500 Mem. gets me 750KH on my 280x

[vaelrock]

-g 2 --thread-concurrency 8192 --shaders 2048 -I 13 -w 256 --gpu-engine 1035,1080 --gpu-memclock 1500,1500 --gpu-powertune -20,-20
i use these to similar
gpu clock is differnt to every card, you must find it between 1030-1100

This is what I'm currently using;

I 13 -g 2 -w 256 --thread-concurrency 8192 --gpu-powertune 20

I'll try your settings and change the memory clock, see if I get better performance.

you use powertune +20? not -20

I was using the settings posted in https://litecoin.info/Mining_hardware_comparison

Does powertune change the voltage?

No, it allows the card to use more power to sustain the demand (if powertune > 0). But in case of undervolting, it may let you use less power (powertune < 0). Don't really know why. With the same voltage/core/memory, my 7990 uses 50W less with powerturne -20 instead of 0.