Can't break 700Kh/s with 280X Dual-X OC (11221-00-20G)

[ozkraut]

Yeah it's funny. 8192 gets me high 500's early 6's. Just that one less gets it going. Same problem for even higher for higher values in the 11000 / 16000 bracket. Anything from 380 to 485. Maybe something doesn't flush properly and leaving a little scratch space free to go at all times might be it. Bute really I have no idea. 675 is still a bit low though. Windoze or linux ? I'm talking sgminer / cgminer under bamt 1.3 here. With G2 btw, I 13

I'm running Win7x64 Ultimate, using SGMiner 4.0.0. Also just so we're on the same page, you're using the same card as me, the 11221-00-20G right?

BAMT might be something I'll look in to next if I run out of options completely (headed there fast...) I'm a total linux noob though and won't know what to do if I run in to configuration issues. When you install BAMT, it's not actually overwriting anything on the hard drive right? So in theory I could just run bamt on a usb stick and then if I needed to switch back to Microsoft land I could simply reboot and remove the usb drive?

yep boot straight of usb. Pretty straight forward if you diligently follow instructions and make sure any update / install is preceded by a system update and no error messages throughout.

nope not the exact same card: R9 280X Vapor-X X 2 at my end, running 748 stable at 69 day / 53c night in Australia in Summer. Milkcrate. Well aired and separated. Sucked & blown by additional help. Just how I like it (;-)



these configs exactly:

]

,
"intensity" : "13,13",
"vectors" : "1",
"worksize" : "256",
"kernel" : "scrypt",
"lookup-gap" : "2",
"thread-concurrency" : "8191,8191",
"shaders" : "0",
"api-port" : "4028",
"expiry" : "120",
"gpu-dyninterval" : "7",
"gpu-platform" : "0",
"gpu-threads" : "2",
"gpu-engine" : "1060,1065",
"gpu-memclock" : "1500,1500",
"gpu-powertune" : "0,0",
"gpu-fan" : "70,70,100,100",
"temp-cutoff" : "90",
"temp-target" : "79",
"log" : "5",
"no-pool-disable" : true,
"queue" : "1",
"scan-time" : "60",
"scrypt" : true,
"shares" : "0",
"kernel-path" : "/usr/local/bin"
}

[mezza550]

nope not the exact same card: R9 280X Vapor-X X 2 at my end, running 748 stable at 69 day / 53c night in Australia in Summer. Milkcrate. Well aired and separated.

Ah, that might explain it. Different cards, different results. At any rate, your config has given me a solid 675 for each card over the last 24 hr period, so thanks for that.

Sucked & blown by additional help. Just how I like it (;-)

I lol'd.

[NameTaken]

I also have Sapphire 280X Dual-X OC (11221-00-20G)s and am happy with 750KH/s I'm getting out of them. 710KH/s was the limit on how much I was able to get out of them out of the box.

First thing I did was download then flash a recompiled and optimized BIOS with 1065MHz core as anything higher than 1070 reduced the hashrate.
Then I downloaded a recompiled and optimized scrypt130511.cl plus scrypt130511Tahitiglg2tc8192w256l8.bin for SGMiner.

[mezza550]

I also have Sapphire 280X Dual-X OC (11221-00-20G)s and am happy with 750KH/s I'm getting out of them. 710KH/s was the limit on how much I was able to get out of them out of the box.

First thing I did was download then flash a recompiled and optimized BIOS with 1065MHz core as anything higher than 1070 reduced the hashrate.
Then I downloaded a recompiled and optimized scrypt130511.cl plus scrypt130511Tahitiglg2tc8192w256l8.bin for SGMiner.

Your performance rates sound fantastic. Would you mind sharing those files (bios, .c and .bin files) via dropbox or similar? Also what type of memory do your cards have?

[NameTaken]

I also have Sapphire 280X Dual-X OC (11221-00-20G)s and am happy with 750KH/s I'm getting out of them. 710KH/s was the limit on how much I was able to get out of them out of the box.

First thing I did was download then flash a recompiled and optimized BIOS with 1065MHz core as anything higher than 1070 reduced the hashrate.
Then I downloaded a recompiled and optimized scrypt130511.cl plus scrypt130511Tahitiglg2tc8192w256l8.bin for SGMiner.

Your performance rates sound fantastic. Would you mind sharing those files (bios, .c and .bin files) via dropbox or similar? Also what type of memory do your cards have?

Here is where I got the files from.

https://litecointalk.org/index.php?topic=12369.90

http://www.reddit.com/r/dogemining/comments/1uj4uk/optimized_scrypt_kernel_for_hd7970_r9_280x/

http://fs1.d-h.st/download/00099/G2D/ati_winflash_2.6.7.7z

[Alexandros]

hi guys!
i have the same card and had exactly the same problem. I couldn't reached more than 660Kh/s with all different combinations in the configuration file. Then i realised that I was using 14.1 beta version of catalyst. DO NOT install it! I've downgraded to 13.11 and I got up to 720Kh/s with bios 015.041.000.000 (the default one). I had to change the conf file before, since the one I was using did not improve my hashrate. So i changed thread-concurrency from 8192 to 14336 and gpu-engine from 980 to 1065. I kept the gpu-memclock to 1500. And now I've just noticed that I got 10kh/s more just by replacing the scrypt130511.cl that NameTaken mentioned! Thanks about that mate!!!!

I hope that will work for you too,
happy mining to all!
 

[mezza550]

Here is where I got the files from.

https://litecointalk.org/index.php?topic=12369.90

http://www.reddit.com/r/dogemining/comments/1uj4uk/optimized_scrypt_kernel_for_hd7970_r9_280x/

http://fs1.d-h.st/download/00099/G2D/ati_winflash_2.6.7.7z

Awesome, I'll try this tonight and report back here. Just to be clear, you used the bios that The_Stilt posted in reply #102, correct? This one: https://www.dropbox.com/s/jfmog1a8inexrvy/Sapphire_E24900-O46_AGR.zip

Asking because I flashed one of my gpus with some bios from his thread about a week ago and it bricked it until I used the physical bios switch on top of the card. Trying to be more cautious.

thanks!

[12gaFacelift]

My card:

2x Gigabyte Radeon R9 280X 3GB GDDR5 (Windforce x3) OC GURU II
2x Sapphire Radeon R9 280X 3GB GDDR5 Vapor-X

My Setting:

"intensity" : "13,13",
"vectors" : "1",
"worksize" : "256",
"kernel" : "scrypt",
"lookup-gap" : "2",
"thread-concurrency" : "8191",
"shaders" : "2048",
"gpu-dyninterval" : "7",
"gpu-platform" : "0",
"gpu-threads" : "2",
"gpu-engine" : "1060,1065",
"gpu-memclock" : "1500,1500",
"gpu-powertune" : "-20",
"gpu-fan" : "80",
"drink-refill" : true,

742Kh/s and stable.

[ozkraut]

My card:

2x Gigabyte Radeon R9 280X 3GB GDDR5 (Windforce x3) OC GURU II
2x Sapphire Radeon R9 280X 3GB GDDR5 Vapor-X

My Setting:

"intensity" : "13,13",
"vectors" : "1",
"worksize" : "256",
"kernel" : "scrypt",
"lookup-gap" : "2",
"thread-concurrency" : "8191",
"shaders" : "2048",
"gpu-dyninterval" : "7",
"gpu-platform" : "0",
"gpu-threads" : "2",
"gpu-engine" : "1060,1065",
"gpu-memclock" : "1500,1500",
"gpu-powertune" : "-20",
"gpu-fan" : "80",
"drink-refill" : true,

742Kh/s and stable.

" Drink-refill" : true,   eh? Must put that in my config now and see what happens. If it works I shall patch a '"hard-suck" : true,
just in case (;-)

[uranian]

I did try crazyates suggestion, but it didn't make any difference as far as I'm aware. Not sure exactly what powertune does still- it's like wiggle room for the miner to increase or decrease the gpu-engine setting right?

ha if you do find out exactly what powertune does, let me know, i'm still wondering 

[mezza550]

I applied the modified .BIN and .CL files last night, and my hash rate improved marginally by about 5-10Kh. Haven't had a chance yet to flash the bios, but will try soon.

Interestingly not all of my cards are performing at the same level, GPU0 consistently beats out the rest at an avg 690 now. GPU1 and 2 are around 675 and GPU3 doing the worst at 665.

[NameTaken]

On a side note, the 280Xs that I ordered 3 weeks ago finally just got in stock today

http://www.vuugo.com/sapphire-video-cards-11221-00-20G.html

[mezza550]

Hey everyone, I wanted to share some good results. Thanks to NameTaken I've been able to bump things up:

https://i.imgur.com/XnSNkDF.jpg?1

Just to reiterate, what I did exactly was first switch over to the optimized .BIN files with SGMiner (since I'm running 64bit windows I had to change the last digit in the file name from an "8" to a "4" for sgminer to use the bin). Then I loaded in the optimized .CL file (backed up old .cl file first). I let that run for a few days because I got busy, noticed about a 5-10Kh bump overall, up to an average 675-680Kh per card. Then as of last night I went ahead and flashed my cards with the bios that NameTaken pointed me to, and that finally allowed me to break the 700 barrier. The screenshot above is from this morning after the rig had been running for about 7 hours. (links for all files below)

It's interesting but my GPU 2 card has now become the best performer whereas before it was GPU 0. I'm getting a very reliable 720Kh out of it. Meanwhile GPU 3 is doing the worst at 685ish. I didn't have much time because I was getting really tired, but I did mess around a little with the gpu-engine settings and right now I have it set as "--gpu-engine 1065,1075,1080,1030". Yup, doesn't look like a good config does it? But that seems to be my sweet spot (so far). GPU 2 loves the extra engine speed, it jumps 10Kh when I move from 1065 to 1080. And it's the reverse for GPU 3, which either does nothing or goes down when I go over 1030. But I do need to play around with it a bit more, maybe next week.

I've been trying to find the optimal GPU temperature also. I notice that at 75C the cards definitely throttle back a bit. I have it set to 68C as a target right now but I may be going to far and wasting energy on fans (any thoughts?)

I'd still like to see if I can inch things up a bit faster than this. But I am very pleased with the results (and thanks to everyone who helped!). Later on I'm going to try and trouble shoot GPU 3 and also see if GPU 0 & 1 can't do more. Then I'd like to do some voltage experiments to decrease the power. I also have an average rejected share rate at about 3-4% which I think I could lower too (although I have no clue where to start).

• BIN file thread: http://www.reddit.com/r/dogemining/comments/1uj4uk/optimized_scrypt_kernel_for_hd7970_r9_280x/
• BIN file direct link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_EJYw4JvsnvazdqQW5DWTVzcFU/edit?usp=sharing
• .CL file (it's inside the zip in a folder called "files"): http://fs1.d-h.st/download/00099/G2D/ati_winflash_2.6.7.7z
• BIOS file direct link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/jfmog1a8inexrvy/Sapphire_E24900-O46_AGR.zip (don't use atiwinflash, use atiflash at DOS prompt (need to make usb DOS boot drive))
• ATIFLASH 3.99 (I was advised to use this version of the app, not the latest one): http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/2166/atiflash-3-99/

Here is my current config that results in the screenshot above:

Code:

--lookup-gap 2 --thread-concurrency 8192,8192,8192,8192 -g 2 -I 13 -w 256 --auto-fan --temp-cutoff 90,90,90,90 --temp-overheat 85,85,85,85 --temp-target 68,68,68,68 --gpu-memclock 1500,1500,1500,1500 --gpu-engine 1065,1075,1080,1030 --expiry 1 --scan-time 1 --queue 0

I left out Powertune for now although I'm going to experiment and see if it changes anything. Also might experiment again with thread concurrency in the 11200 range. Will post back with results. Oh, and one last thing- I noticed that CGWatcher does some damage to my hashrate because it is always pinging the GPU's for information. I was able to solve this by changing the monitor from checking in every 10 seconds to every 180 seconds (every 3 minutes). This seems like a good fit because I still have the benefits of CGWatcher being able to reboot the miner if something goes wrong.

Comments / critique / whatever welcome.

[NameTaken]

I added another 11221-00-20G which seems to be the most stable at 1045MHz core for 730-735KH/s which I'm content with.

http://oi57.tinypic.com/j9yflv.jpg

[mezza550]

Quick update, I noticed today that my high performing card (GPU 2) has SK-Hynix based RAM, the other three lower performers use Elpida. Not sure what this means for me going forward, but it's a clue. Starting to feel like a detective over here Input welcomed!

[tolich94]

Quick update, I noticed today that my high performing card (GPU 2) has SK-Hynix based RAM, the other three lower performers use Elpida. Not sure what this means for me going forward, but it's a clue. Starting to feel like a detective over here Input welcomed!

I think the Elpida RAM is lower quality than Hynix, at least that's what I've read somewhere on some forum. And lucky me (sarcastic) ofc I got the Eplida RAM in my GPU.

[CryptoMer]

I've got some Sapphire 280X Dual-X cards as well, though I don't recall if they're from the 20G batch or 25...

In any event, as you're already on Windows, download GPU-Z and check the VRM1 temperature (it's at the very bottom of the graphs). This run of card has a throttles itself as soon as the VRM hits 110C, which it will do on stock settings, even if it's all alone in an open-air case...

My fix: Undervolt the stupid things to 1085mv, run at 900 mem clock, space them out at least three inches from each other, and push air over them via a box fan. I have NO idea how these cards are going to perform in the summer, but I'm fearful.

My steady KH per card: 730

[crazyates]

Quick update, I noticed today that my high performing card (GPU 2) has SK-Hynix based RAM, the other three lower performers use Elpida. Not sure what this means for me going forward, but it's a clue. Starting to feel like a detective over here Input welcomed!

I think the Elpida RAM is lower quality than Hynix, at least that's what I've read somewhere on some forum. And lucky me (sarcastic) ofc I got the Eplida RAM in my GPU.

I have a BUNCH of Elpida 280x. They're Gigabyte, not Sapphire, tho. We have them hashing at 740-755kh/s. Granted the Hynix ones do 775+, but you should be able to do more than an even 700.

[FortuneSeeker]

Where did you get sgminer from?  I keep reading about 'building' it and feel out of my depth.  I think i've downloaded it but it doesn't have as many files in the directoy as cgminer does making me think i've missed something, even though the program opens at least. Also did the .cl files just get copied into the sgminer directory?

finding this very helpful if a little over whelming for such a newbie!

[ozkraut]

Where did you get sgminer from?  I keep reading about 'building' it and feel out of my depth.  I think i've downloaded it but it doesn't have as many files in the directoy as cgminer does making me think i've missed something, even though the program opens at least. Also did the .cl files just get copied into the sgminer directory?

finding this very helpful if a little over whelming for such a newbie!

try this one. Has scrypt-jane support patched in as well:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=463076.msg5114275#msg5114275