5830 overclocking shortfall

[Jarredm]

I have a 5830 card that I recently installed but I can't seem to get it to overclock to the degree that I see others doing.  I can only increase the clock speed to 950 MHz where I see several reports on the mining hardware comparison that state 1040.  I haven't tried to mess with the memory clock much I have tried it at the stock 1000 MHz and 810 MHz.  Is there something I'm missing here or is it just a poor performer?

If it matters I am mining with guiminer, phoenix with the phatk kernel that is bundled with guiminer. (-k phatk VECTORS BFI_INT FASTLOOP=true WORKSIZE=128)

[pekv2]

I have a 5830 card that I recently installed but I can't seem to get it to overclock to the degree that I see others doing.  I can only increase the clock speed to 950 MHz

What brand/model number?

[mike678]

I haven't tried to mess with the memory clock much I have tried it at the stock 1000 MHz and 810 MHz.

Definitely drop the memory to 300 mhz. 300-350 mhz is standard practice for bitcoin mining.

Also what program are you using to overclock?

[ajareselde]

i have xfx 5830 and its doing its best stabile at 950/345  @ 310 MH.

it doesnt have voltage control and it only stabile to this point.

i can push it to 330MH, but it wont be stabile, and im guessing that is what those dudes did on hardware comparison page.

cheers

[minero1]

Relax, in the long run you are better off staying away from the bleeding edge. i have some 5830's and i run them at 950 exactly as you are now, they could go up to 1000 but i prefer stability, also 310Mhash/s is very good for a 5830, that's 5850 territory.

[vapourminer]

at stock volts I run 1040 core 354 mem for weeks on end and its never crashed at that speed. even at 1050 it runs for a few days before crashing. I dont like having to check it so I leave it 1040.

what are your temps? under 70? mine runs in the mid 60s. open case, with a 120v muffin fan aimed at it.

what PSU? card is on PEGs with no adapters (although adapters shouldnt make a difference)? wondering if your 12 is sagging.

mine is the sapphire 5830 xtreme, it has a non reference cooler. but from what Ive seen and read theres nothing special or "extreme" about it.

[btcmerchant]

I'm running 2 5830s so I figured I post my speeds here too - both overclocked to 960 and memory under clocked to 325 using afterburner.

I was running at 975 but I noticed it wasn't quite as stable (probably due to increased temp). I've also been running at 310mh/s whether it's at 960 or 975.

I'm using Phoenix to mine btw as I noticed for me that gives me a better speed.

[vapourminer]

huh. guess I got lucky and scored a good one. I thought all 5830s were good for an easy 1000+ on the core..

[tritium]

I have seen quite a variation in the speeds of my cards

I have 3 XFX XXX version 5830s with the rear exhausts and they can all do 1000mHz easily, I have 2 5830s that only vent into the case that are only stable at 950.

I have a 5850 that wont go beyond 900. all these are regardless of the temperature

[cicada]

I bought a batch of 5 Sapphire 5830 'Xtreme's a while back, they all clock a bit differently.

Rig 1:  ASrock Extreme3,  750W + 480W PSU, 2x 6950 in the 16x slots, 2x 5830 in the 1x slots.
The 5830s are rock solid at 1010/300 for ~320MH/s each.

Rig 2:  ASrock Extreme3,  750W + 480W PSU, 2x 6950 in the 16x slots, 2x 5830 in the 1x slots.
The 5830s lock everything up at anything > 930/300 for ~292MH/s each.

The 6950s are clocked the same in both boards, 885/760.

Another rig has two 'older' Sapphire 5830s, they're unhappy > 940/300, and yet another single-card rig has one of the Xtremes stable at 970/300.

The stable clock rates seem to be dependent on the motherboard more than anything else for me - if I swap the cards between the two ASrock boards, Rig 1 is still happy at 1010/300, and Rig 2 still locks up > 940/300.

This tells me the 5830s all probably have a bit of headroom still, but the motherboards can't push 'em that hard without getting a bit squirrely.

[mike678]

Relax, in the long run you are better off staying away from the bleeding edge. i have some 5830's and i run them at 950 exactly as you are now, they could go up to 1000 but i prefer stability, also 310Mhash/s is very good for a 5830, that's 5850 territory.

You're an idiot if you think 311 is 5850 territory. That is the low end speed for non overclocked 5850. If you do a 900/300 overclock which is very moderate that's 375 megahash. 5850's can be pushed stably to 400 megahash.

huh. guess I got lucky and scored a good one. I thought all 5830s were good for an easy 1000+ on the core..

Sapphire tends to be a very reliable brand. I have 4 5830's total and each can do exactly what you say.

[Blackout]

I have 8 and can push most of them to 330 mhash without needing to go to 1040 but at 1030 they are around there 328
bit strangely I have learned the two that are actually in the 1st agp slot and used as a display need to be clocked a little lower  around 960-970 max.

Also, another odd thing is a notice running them at max doesn't really pay... at least not on elgius where I am currently mining, when I drop the clock to about 1020 and 320 mem and aggression levels 1 number dif for each card, like 9, 8,7,6 from the furthest out card to the display card in slot one being lowest aggression I get astoundingly better hash rates from the averages reported by elgius (which is what matters) over what mhash my cards say they are doing. 

[jjiimm_64]

Relax, in the long run you are better off staying away from the bleeding edge. i have some 5830's and i run them at 950 exactly as you are now, they could go up to 1000 but i prefer stability, also 310Mhash/s is very good for a 5830, that's 5850 territory.

I couldn't agree more..  I run my 5830's at 920.  I get about 280Mhash. 
I don't push any of my cards above 950. I would rather have the stability.

the most I get is 420Mhash from the 5870's at 940

[Jarredm]

Wow a lot of replies!

So to answer the questions.  I am using MSI Afterburner to do the overclocking and I do have the unofficial OC enabled.

The Brand is Sapphire and the model I believe is 100297-2L  Let me know if that doesn't make sense. (this one does vent into the case)

This is in a machine that my wife has to use daily so it has to be stable and usable.  If I underclock the mem to 300-325 will it be noticeable when using the windows areo?  My temps aren't bad the case is an NZXT PanzerBox case with 2 300mm fans plus one 120 in the back. I'm currently running around 66C with an ambient room temp of ~72F.

I don't think it's a PSU issue,  the supply is an XFX XXX 650W it has two dedicated 6-pins and is only powering the system and this card. Core 2 Duo 3.016 GHz

I am only getting around 287 Mhashs which I think is a little low.  For reference here are the CL options copied directly from the phoenix guiminer.  -k phatk VECTORS BFI_INT AGRESSION=9 FASTLOOP=TRUE

[stryker]

0. ATI Radeon HD 5700 Series (:0.0)
    engine clock 950MHz, memory clock 325MHz, core voltage 1.2VDC, performance level 2, utilization 98%
    unable to get fan speed
    temperature 39 C
1. ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series   (:0.1)
    engine clock 995MHz, memory clock 325MHz, core voltage 1.163VDC, performance level 2, utilization 99%
    fan speed 65% (2649 RPM) (user-defined)
    temperature 46 C
2. ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series   (:0.2)
    engine clock 925MHz, memory clock 325MHz, core voltage 1.163VDC, performance level 2, utilization 99%
    fan speed 65% (2179 RPM) (user-defined)
    temperature 45.5 C

0 = 209 Mh/s
1 = 318 Mh/s
2 = 295 Mh/s

Number 0 (5770)
Number 1 (5830), is a sapphire, I could push it faster.
Number 2 (5830), forget what it is... xfd maybe.... very disappointing 925 is as fast as it will go and remain stable.

[Jarredm]

2. ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series   (:0.2)
    engine clock 925MHz, memory clock 325MHz, core voltage 1.163VDC, performance level 2, utilization 99%
    fan speed 65% (2179 RPM) (user-defined)
    temperature 45.5 C

2 = 295 Mh/s

Number 2 (5830), forget what it is... xfd maybe.... very disappointing 925 is as fast as it will go and remain stable.

Hey stryker, looks like your #2 5800 is outperforming mine by quite a bit despite being clocked 25MHz lower.  Could you elaborate on your miners setup?  I'm on phoenix and posted the options I'm using in the post directly before yours.


Also, a general question for all who may read.  I have been decreasing the mem clock on this card and now that I am down to 550 from 800 previously my mhash rate is up from 287 to around 293.  Is this a benefit of the lower memory clock rate?  I was under the impression that a lower memory rate was just a measure to save wattage.

[vapourminer]

So to answer the questions.  I am using MSI Afterburner to do the overclocking and I do have the unofficial OC enabled.

The Brand is Sapphire and the model I believe is 100297-2L  Let me know if that doesn't make sense. (this one does vent into the case)

VGA SAPPHIRE|100297-2L HD5830 1G

same as I have.. above is the part number from my newegg invoice.

mine is in a dedicated mining rig with XP Pro so cant comment on aero with low mem clocks. I use trixx for overclocking. PSU is an Antec Basiq 500. not a high end PSU by any means, just a decent no nonsense one. using GUIMiner with "-v -w 256 -f 5" flags

[cicada]

I would bump the mem clocks up for general usability, 300mhz is a bit slow for graphics performance.  The only loss is slightly higher power usage, maybe 10W or so.

[hdfxst]

I have that same card and i run it at 1025/300 1.175 volts. -v    -f1 give me the best hash rate(320-325),if i put -w128 the rate goes down

[Jarredm]

I have that same card and i run it at 1025/300 1.175 volts. -v    -f1 give me the best hash rate(320-325),if i put -w128 the rate goes down

I discovered that I am losing around 2-4 Mhps by using the WORKSIZE=128.  I stopped that.  I am convinced that dropping the mem clock does increase the hash rate for some reason.  I have tried it on two machines and am getting a better rate 2-3 mhps by dropping from 1000 Mhz to 500 Mhz.  I don't know why.  I am using MSI Afterburner to set clocks and apparently it won't let me go below 500, I may not want to for usability as others have said.  I am using phoenix not poclbm so my options are a bit different from yours.