Mining with 5850, boost performance?

[djex]

I got a HD 5850 and currently I am getting 248~ Mhash/s with Stream 2.1 running on Windows 7 using poclbm. Is there anything I can do to get more out my card or is this the max this card will go? I know there is the overclocking option but CCC and MSI After Burner sucks for going anything over the set maximum factory clock. I tried ATI tools but for some reason it didn't want to load the driver. Will riva tuner work?

What are some recommendations?

Also will switching to Ubuntu 10.10 have any difference?

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[yomi]

Try to add these params to poclbm:

-v -w 128

If you just use the machine for mining, you can add also -f 1

Personally I also use a 5850 for mining in ubuntu 10.10. In ubuntu you can use the aticonfig command to change the clock of the card. I think Windows allows more possibilities for over/underclocking the card and the memory clock.

I get 270 Mhashes/sec in ubuntu with the params I mentioned, I can get over 300 Mhashes/sec changing the clock with aticonfig, but temp increases too much so normally I keep it at the stock 765 Mhz clock.

Good luck!

[rezin777]

You may need to flash your BIOS to increase the overclocking potential. Afterburner will go as far as you want it to if the BIOS permits.

[koin]

http://www.sapphiretech.com/ssc/TriXX/

[djex]

Thanks yomi the -f 1 got me an extra 2Mhash. I was already using the -v -w 128. Going to give Ubuntu a try.

What is a safe temperature for a card that is mining?

[Elanzer]

Safe is more or less below 85'c for 24/7 mining.

Using MSI Afterburner you can unlock frequencies fully by editing the cfg file in the afterburner folder (should find this on google quick), so it will let you set your core clocks anywhere up to stupidly high amounts (ie: 1.3ghz). Pretty much any 40nm ATI card can expect atleast 900mhz core.

[grndzero]

Currently running at slightly below 70C at 70% fan speed and the case open.

[djex]

Currently running at slightly below 70C at 70% fan speed and the case open.

How did you get your core to 900 Mhz in Ubuntu? I can't go above 775 Mhz on my core with aticonfig. Are you using a custom program?

[yomi]

Currently running at slightly below 70C at 70% fan speed and the case open.

How did you get your core to 900 Mhz in Ubuntu? I can't go above 775 Mhz on my core with aticonfig. Are you using a custom program?

In Ubuntu when I run

Code:

DISPLAY=:0 sudo aticonfig --odgc --adapter=all

I get this:

Code:

Adapter 0 - ATI Radeon HD 5800 Series
                            Core (MHz)    Memory (MHz)
           Current Clocks :    790           1000
             Current Peak :    790           1000
  Configurable Peak Range : [765-918]     [1000-1200]
                 GPU load :    99%

Which means you can change the core clock in the 765-918 range and the memory clock in the 1000-1200 range.

So to change the core clock for instance to 800 Mhz:

Code:

DISPLAY=:0 sudo aticonfig --odsc=800,1000

[gigabytecoin]

http://www.sapphiretech.com/ssc/TriXX/

Does this bear any weight at all? Never heard of trixx, seems to be a sapphire dependent technology. Have you noticed an increased hash rate?

[grndzero]

Currently running at slightly below 70C at 70% fan speed and the case open.

How did you get your core to 900 Mhz in Ubuntu? I can't go above 775 Mhz on my core with aticonfig. Are you using a custom program?

The 5850 BIOS would lock up on mine at 875.
I actually flashed the BIOS to 5870 to get 900 Mhz from http://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/61848/ATI.HD5870.1024.091112.html
(My cards are Reference, not DirectCU. Not sure if it matters for the the BIOS)

This is my script for setting the clocks:

export DISPLAY=:0.0
aticonfig --od-enable
aticonfig --odsc 900,1000 --adapter=all

And for fans:

export DISPLAY=:0.0
aticonfig --pplib-cmd "set fanspeed 0 70" (second number is fan speed percentage)
(if using a second card then do)
export DISPLAY=:0.1
aticonfig --pplib-cmd "set fanspeed 0 70"

[bitcoindaddy]

Any reason why you chose 70 percent fan and not 100 percent? Does that add wear-and-tear?

My BIOS allows me to go up to 918 on by Gigabyte 5850, but I'm more interested in lowering the memory clock and haven't been able to do it under Ubuntu.  It won't let me go below 1000.  Oddly, under windows, I can lower the memory clock to 500 with Afterburner. Why can't I do it with aticonfig under Ubuntu?

[Raulo]

but I'm more interested in lowering the memory clock and haven't been able to do it under Ubuntu.  It won't let me go below 1000.  Oddly, under windows, I

Did you try this tool?
http://sourceforge.net/projects/amdovdrvctrl/

I was able to lower the memory clock below the limits. After using the program, you can then change the clock by aticonfig.

[Grinder]

I was able to lower the memory clock below the limits. After using the program, you can then change the clock by aticonfig.

Which card do you have? I've tried it on two different 5850 and a 5970 with no success.

[djex]

The 5850 BIOS would lock up on mine at 875.
I actually flashed the BIOS to 5870 to get 900 Mhz from http://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/61848/ATI.HD5870.1024.091112.html
(My cards are Reference, not DirectCU. Not sure if it matters for the the BIOS)

This is my script for setting the clocks:

export DISPLAY=:0.0
aticonfig --od-enable
aticonfig --odsc 900,1000 --adapter=all

And for fans:

export DISPLAY=:0.0
aticonfig --pplib-cmd "set fanspeed 0 70" (second number is fan speed percentage)
(if using a second card then do)
export DISPLAY=:0.1
aticonfig --pplib-cmd "set fanspeed 0 70"

I have a XFX 5850 and it will only go to 775MHz core. Looks like I would have to reflash BIOS. Was hoping I wouldn't have to. If I flash the 5870 BIOS to my card are there any benefits other than giving me a higher clock setting? Like say if I wanted to use the card for gaming or something a few months from now. Would it effect it's performance at all?

[Raulo]

Which card do you have? I've tried it on two different 5850 and a 5970 with no success.

Standard 5850 with 725 MHz core and 1000 memory stock clocks. Before using this program, the available memclocks were 900-1300. Now, they are 300-1300. What kind of "no success" did you have? Any error message? You must set clockspeed for Level 2 not lower than for Level 1.

[Grinder]

What kind of "no success" did you have? Any error message? You must set clockspeed for Level 2 not lower than for Level 1.

If I set a GPU speed above the ones allowed by AMD (ie 775 for 5850), the program just hangs when it's supposed to set the speed. I have only tried batch mode as I don't have a full X installation.

[Raulo]

If I set a GPU speed above the ones allowed by AMD (ie 775 for 5850), the program just hangs when it's supposed to set the speed. I have only tried batch mode as I don't have a full X installation.

This is different because I could set GPU frequency up to 900 with aticonfig. There must be some BIOS variances.

I used the following config:

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<OVERDRIVE_PROFILE>
  <PERFORMANCE_LEVEL level="2" gpu="85000" mem="30000" voltage="1088"/>
  <PERFORMANCE_LEVEL level="1" gpu="55000" mem="30000" voltage="1038"/>
  <PERFORMANCE_LEVEL level="0" gpu="15700" mem="30000" voltage="1000"/>
  <FAN_SETTING percentage="AUTO"/>
  <FAN_CTRL enabled="yes"/>
  <FAN_CTRL_CURVE type="0"/>
  <FAN_CTRL_POINT nr="0" temperature="2000" percentage="0"/>
  <FAN_CTRL_POINT nr="1" temperature="4000" percentage="2500"/>
  <FAN_CTRL_POINT nr="2" temperature="6000" percentage="5000"/>
  <FAN_CTRL_POINT nr="3" temperature="8000" percentage="7500"/>
  <FAN_CTRL_POINT nr="4" temperature="10000" percentage="10000"/>
  <MONITOR_SAMPLE_TIME interval="10"/>
  <COLOR_PROFILE enabled="no" longitude="-13.000000" latitude="52.000000" color_temp_day="130000" color_temp_night="68000" transition="30"/>
</OVERDRIVE_PROFILE>

I ran it without -b mode, just

Code:

export DISPLAY=:0
./AMDOverdriveCtrl ConfigFile

I could then Ctrl-C the program and the frequencies were set.  It works even via ssh session. However, if you have no X screen, you will not see if there is an error message so if you want to diagnose the problem, I'm afraid you'll need console access. I couldn't first run a different version of this config in the remote mode and only after I logged in console, I saw an error message complaining about lower frequency at level 2 than level 1.

[grndzero]

Any reason why you chose 70 percent fan and not 100 percent? Does that add wear-and-tear?

My BIOS allows me to go up to 918 on by Gigabyte 5850, but I'm more interested in lowering the memory clock and haven't been able to do it under Ubuntu.  It won't let me go below 1000.  Oddly, under windows, I can lower the memory clock to 500 with Afterburner. Why can't I do it with aticonfig under Ubuntu?

Because 100% from 2 cards and an open case are very loud! At the settings I'm at the cards both hover around 70C more than a safe temp.

I don't think you can mix high power and low power states in linux (at least yet). I never saw any has speed changes or temp changes from my cards when tweaking the memory speed within the boundaries that linux would let me.

EDIT: I have seen Raulo's link before. I haven't tried it yet.

[grndzero]

The 5850 BIOS would lock up on mine at 875.
I actually flashed the BIOS to 5870 to get 900 Mhz from http://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/61848/ATI.HD5870.1024.091112.html
(My cards are Reference, not DirectCU. Not sure if it matters for the the BIOS)

This is my script for setting the clocks:

export DISPLAY=:0.0
aticonfig --od-enable
aticonfig --odsc 900,1000 --adapter=all

And for fans:

export DISPLAY=:0.0
aticonfig --pplib-cmd "set fanspeed 0 70" (second number is fan speed percentage)
(if using a second card then do)
export DISPLAY=:0.1
aticonfig --pplib-cmd "set fanspeed 0 70"

I have a XFX 5850 and it will only go to 775MHz core. Looks like I would have to reflash BIOS. Was hoping I wouldn't have to. If I flash the 5870 BIOS to my card are there any benefits other than giving me a higher clock setting? Like say if I wanted to use the card for gaming or something a few months from now. Would it effect it's performance at all?

As far as I can tell the only thing the 5870 BIOS does is up the voltage to get higher clock speeds, but creates some extra heat. The only real difference between the 50 and the 70 is the number of stream processors, most of the time it's the same logic board. I read quite a few articles before doing this and the reviews were positive, except for the people who bricked their card. I don't think you should notice any major differences in Windows, but I haven't tried it personally.

If you are going to flash the BIOS then make sure you have another video card accessible that you can use as a primary in case the flash goes bad. I had a few BIOS's from techpowerup that either didn't get along with the card or didn't get along with Linux and I had to save them with an extra card once or twice.