Consensus on most efficient GPU in terms of hashes per kw?

[yochdog]

My farm is now nearing physical capacity, both in terms of space and power load. 

It is readily apparant that the only way to push my hash rate beyond 14,000 MH/s will be through more efficiently utilizing space/power. 

Is there a consensus on what the most efficient GPU's are in terms of hashing power per kw consumed, as well as hashing density? 

I know that 5830's are awful, and that 5970's are pretty awesome.  Beyond that I am having trouble finding information. 


Any help is greatly appreciated! 

[pirateat40]

Wait for the 7x series.

[molecular]

My farm is now nearing physical capacity, both in terms of space and power load. 

It is readily apparant that the only way to push my hash rate beyond 14,000 MH/s will be through more efficiently utilizing space/power. 

Is there a consensus on what the most efficient GPU's are in terms of hashing power per kw consumed, as well as hashing density? 

I know that 5830's are awful, and that 5970's are pretty awesome.  Beyond that I am having trouble finding information. 


Any help is greatly appreciated! 

I had a 5970 doing 799 MH/s (stably for months), while whole rig drew 385W from socket. Whenever I've seen people report similar efficiency, they used 5970.

I'm guessing other tech is excluded here, GPU only, right?

[yochdog]

My farm is now nearing physical capacity, both in terms of space and power load. 

It is readily apparant that the only way to push my hash rate beyond 14,000 MH/s will be through more efficiently utilizing space/power. 

Is there a consensus on what the most efficient GPU's are in terms of hashing power per kw consumed, as well as hashing density? 

I know that 5830's are awful, and that 5970's are pretty awesome.  Beyond that I am having trouble finding information. 


Any help is greatly appreciated! 

I had a 5970 doing 799 MH/s (stably for months), while whole rig drew 385W from socket. Whenever I've seen people report similar efficiency, they used 5970.

I'm guessing other tech is excluded here, GPU only, right?

Yes, I am not willing to take the plunge on FPGA yet.  I have access to VERY cheap electricity, so I am most concerned with getting the most hashing density within a defined amount of power. 

[RaggedMonk]

Is there a consensus on what the most efficient GPU's are in terms of hashing power per kw consumed, as well as hashing density? 

There is an answer, but definitely not a consensus.

[yochdog]

Is there a consensus on what the most efficient GPU's are in terms of hashing power per kw consumed, as well as hashing density? 

There is an answer, but definitely not a consensus.

lol.....care to take a stab? 

[jjshabadoo]

I am running two 5970's on a linux rig with an amd sempron cpu. Linux on a flash drive and all extra motherboard options turned off in bios. I have them clocked at 850/300 and the rig draws between 575 and 600 watts at the wall.

hash rate is about 800 mhash per card. so for both cards I would say 1.5 to 1.6 GH/s for 600 watts max. 2.5 mh/watt

[DeathAndTaxes]

From a MH/W basis it is hard to beat 5970.

My rigs pull about 250W per card (memory underclocked to 160Mhz).  
I run 3x5970 per rig.  
Using usb key for OS, underclocked sempron, and MB w/ everything unecessary turned off the entire system pulls ~860W at the wall.

Rigs get ~2.2GH to 2.3GH on 860W or ~2.5 to 2.7 MH/W.

I don't think it is possible to do much better than that unless you go FPGA or wait for 7800 series cards.

[yochdog]

From a MH/W basis it is hard to beat 5970.

My rigs pull about 250W per card (memory underclocked to 160Mhz).  
I run 3x5970 per rig.  
Using usb key for OS, underclocked sempron, and MB w/ everything unecessary turned off the entire system pulls ~860W at the wall.

Rigs get ~2.2GH to 2.3GH on 860W or ~2.5 to 2.7 MH/W.

I don't think it is possible to do much better than that unless you go FPGA or wait for 7800 series cards.

Do you think the efficiency would hold using 5870's?  I imagine it would be similar since the GPU's are identical.....

[DeathAndTaxes]

From a MH/W basis it is hard to beat 5970.

My rigs pull about 250W per card (memory underclocked to 160Mhz). 
I run 3x5970 per rig. 
Using usb key for OS, underclocked sempron, and MB w/ everything unecessary turned off the entire system pulls ~860W at the wall.

Rigs get ~2.2GH to 2.3GH on 860W or ~2.5 to 2.7 MH/W.

I don't think it is possible to do much better than that unless you go FPGA or wait for 7800 series cards.

Do you think the efficiency would hold using 5870's?  I imagine it would be similar since the GPU's are identical.....

It likely is very similar.  The 5970 likely is slightly ahead because there is some de-duplication of minor components.  Also to avoid thermal overload it is my understanding that AMD takes chips from the top(most efficient) bin when building 5970s.

Still although I don't have any specific stats I would figure a rig based on 5870s should get pretty close to 2.5 MH/W.

[molecular]

From a MH/W basis it is hard to beat 5970.

My rigs pull about 250W per card (memory underclocked to 160Mhz).  
I run 3x5970 per rig.  
Using usb key for OS, underclocked sempron, and MB w/ everything unecessary turned off the entire system pulls ~860W at the wall.

Rigs get ~2.2GH to 2.3GH on 860W or ~2.5 to 2.7 MH/W.

I don't think it is possible to do much better than that unless you go FPGA or wait for 7800 series cards.

that's pretty awesome!

[cicada]

Do you think the efficiency would hold using 5870's?  I imagine it would be similar since the GPU's are identical.....

It likely is very similar.  The 5970 likely is slightly ahead because there is some de-duplication of minor components.  Also to avoid thermal overload it is my understanding that AMD takes chips from the top(most efficient) bin when building 5970s.

Still although I don't have any specific stats I would figure a rig based on 5870s should get pretty close to 2.5 MH/W.

I'd expect a 5870 may make up for the minor power difference with a higher per-core hashrate, at least at stock clocks.  5970's are clocked down a bit for the same thermal concerns.

Space being a concern for you, however, means 5970's are a better buy.  They're also more widely available, 5870's are a bit hard to come by these days.

[Transisto]

...
Space being a concern for you, however, means 5970's are a better buy.  They're also more widely available, 5870's are a bit hard to come by these days.

5970 being easier to find than 5870 ?
Dont' think so.

[P4man]

5850s, 5870 and 5970 will all be very very close, particularly if you tweak clocks and voltages (5970s are clocked and volted lower by default, making them more energy efficient, but you can do that with the other cards as well).
The 5970 will clearly give you the best density, but particularly if electricity is almost free, purchase price is also a big factor and I find 5850s hard to beat in that area; 1/3 the price of a 5970 for roughly half the hashrate (assuming a very mild overclock). They are also relatively easy to keep cool.

Last point, if a dual card fails, you will (usually) lose both cores, making single cards "more reliable".

In short; if density is more important than cost, or ultimate power efficiency is your goal, 5970 is the way to go. otherwise, 5850 gets my vote.

[phelix]

underclock to become more energy efficient.... I think 3MH/W for a whole rig might be possible. use a low power cpu and as many underclocked (double) GPUs as possible

my cards run at 3MH/W, whole rig at 2.7MH/W  https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=40056


it would be very interesting to see how far you can underclock a gpu... below bios limit I mean

[DeathAndTaxes]

...
Space being a concern for you, however, means 5970's are a better buy.  They're also more widely available, 5870's are a bit hard to come by these days.

5970 being easier to find than 5870 ?
Dont' think so.

If you are in the US and willing to buy used (ebay has a 30 day guarantee) there is essentially an unlimited low cost supply of 5970s.  Yeah I know some people are afraid of buying used GPU but 30 day return policy cuts the risk.  If some fail you have to factor that in compared to the higher price of new units. 

[likuidxd]

I run both;

5870~2.06 mh/w
5970~2.23 mh/w

Just about the same and with a bit more tweaking they get better but start to lose stability. I do believe if I invested more time into them, the 5870's could be the same or better than the 5970 due to the fact that I can run them cooler and harder. Stress should always be a factor in determining the 'best' overall card

[DeathAndTaxes]

underclock to become more energy efficient.... I think 3MH/W for a whole rig might be possible. use a low power cpu and as many underclocked (double) GPUs as possible

my cards run at 3MH/W, whole rig at 2.7MH/W  https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=40056


it would be very interesting to see how far you can underclock a gpu... below bios limit I mean

Just for fun I tried and got 5970 down to 120 Mhz then again the 5970 is rather adaptable I run the memory down to 160Mhz for optimal efficiency.  I didn't have kill-a-watt connected but I will check again and give you an idea of peak efficiency.

[P4man]

The chips are the same for 5870 and 5970. They might be binned differently, but every individual chip is  different in how it can clock at what voltage. Because of the binning, on average Id expect a 5970 to be able to run at slightly lower voltage for a given speed (assuming you can volt and clock each GPU independently on  a 5970?) , and therefore be a tad more efficient, but you can get un/lucky with either.

I got lucky; I  have a 5870 thats running at 1 GHz @1.05v. I dont have a kill-a-watt, but Im pretty sure thats very efficient. Stock is 825 MHz @ 1.085v.

[Syke]

From a MH/W basis it is hard to beat 5970.

My rigs pull about 250W per card (memory underclocked to 160Mhz).  
I run 3x5970 per rig.  
Using usb key for OS, underclocked sempron, and MB w/ everything unecessary turned off the entire system pulls ~860W at the wall.

Rigs get ~2.2GH to 2.3GH on 860W or ~2.5 to 2.7 MH/W.

That's pretty close to my setup. I'm getting about 2.1GH on 850W with 3x5970, but my cooling is poor. 2.5 MH/W is pretty easy to reach with 5970s.