Trouble Overclocking 5850 to 900MHz shader

[fpgaminer]

I recently bought a Sapphire HD 5850 ($150 after taxes) ... so I can race it against my FPGAs 

I have Ubuntu 10.10 32-bit, fglrx 8.801, 2.1 SDK. Using aticonfig I can overclock up to 900MHz, which is good enough for me, except that at that speed it freezes within a few seconds (screen no longer responds; have to REISUB). It ran overnight at 765MHz just fine. In Windows it could run at 900MHz for about an hour, and then Windows restarts the driver because it stops responding.

Is my card just a weak batch and won't ever get to 900MHz stable, or is there something else I can do?

Thank you!

[rezin777]

This could be a possible BIOS limitation.

If it is a reference board, you can easily flash the BIOS to allow for higher overclocking limits. Simply pick a BIOS from a different reference board that allows for higher overclocking.

If it is a non-reference board, you should download RBE from http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/1962/TechPowerUp_Radeon_Bios_Editor_v1.28.html and modify your BIOS to the limits you prefer.

[grndzero]

I recently bought a Sapphire HD 5850 ($150 after taxes) ... so I can race it against my FPGAs 

I have Ubuntu 10.10 32-bit, fglrx 8.801, 2.1 SDK. Using aticonfig I can overclock up to 900MHz, which is good enough for me, except that at that speed it freezes within a few seconds (screen no longer responds; have to REISUB). It ran overnight at 765MHz just fine. In Windows it could run at 900MHz for about an hour, and then Windows restarts the driver because it stops responding.

Is my card just a weak batch and won't ever get to 900MHz stable, or is there something else I can do?

Thank you!

The highest I could get my 5850's to before freezing was 875. I got them up to 900 by flashing them with 5870 BIOS.
http://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/61848/ATI.HD5870.1024.091112.html

[fpgaminer]

The highest I could get my 5850's to before freezing was 875. I got them up to 900 by flashing them with 5870 BIOS.

Just to be clear, you had to flash your BIOS to make it stable, or to even set it to 900?

I can set my card to 900 MHz no problem. It's just that the display freezes and I have to do a restart (REISUB).

What does that BIOS do that would prevent the card from failing at higher clock speeds?

[rezin777]

Just to be clear, you had to flash your BIOS to make it stable, or to even set it to 900?

I can set my card to 900 MHz no problem. It's just that the display freezes and I have to do a restart (REISUB).

What does that BIOS do that would prevent the card from failing at higher clock speeds?

The BIOS has clock speed limits.

[grndzero]

The highest I could get my 5850's to before freezing was 875. I got them up to 900 by flashing them with 5870 BIOS.

Just to be clear, you had to flash your BIOS to make it stable, or to even set it to 900?

I can set my card to 900 MHz no problem. It's just that the display freezes and I have to do a restart (REISUB).

What does that BIOS do that would prevent the card from failing at higher clock speeds?

Just to be able to get to 900 core speed. Mine wouldn't go past 875.

The 5870 bios ups the voltage allowing it to run at higher clock speeds.

On the Reference boards most of the PCB's are the same, the 5850 just has less stream processors.

[fpgaminer]

The BIOS has clock speed limits.

I know. This board lets me go up to 900 without any mods, in all the overclock tools I've tried. So that isn't the issue. The issue is that going to 900 makes the card go KERBLEWIE.

The 5870 bios ups the voltage allowing it to run at higher clock speeds.

Thank you for clarifying what you meant. I remember that AMDOverdriveCtrl let me adjust the voltages. If that's true, would that be the same as BIOS flashing? And what kind of voltage is appropriate for 900MHz?

I'm a bit wary of BIOS flashing the card, since I don't have a spare PCI card to help fix it if things go awry (only one PCI-E slot on that machine )

Thank you for the suggestions and help so far!

[grndzero]

The BIOS has clock speed limits.

I know. This board lets me go up to 900 without any mods, in all the overclock tools I've tried. So that isn't the issue. The issue is that going to 900 makes the card go KERBLEWIE.

The 5870 bios ups the voltage allowing it to run at higher clock speeds.

Thank you for clarifying what you meant. I remember that AMDOverdriveCtrl let me adjust the voltages. If that's true, would that be the same as BIOS flashing? And what kind of voltage is appropriate for 900MHz?

I'm a bit wary of BIOS flashing the card, since I don't have a spare PCI card to help fix it if things go awry (only one PCI-E slot on that machine )

Thank you for the suggestions and help so far!

Understandable. I have 4-5 crappy PCI cards laying around, so I didn't have a problem trying out all the tweaked BIOS that were posted. I think I've had to recover 3 times now. lol

I didn't try AMDOverdriveCtl until I had already flashed the BIOS. Upping the voltage with AMDOverdriveCtl could work, but you may run into a hard limit with the BIOS.

If aticonfig --odgc says that the BIOS supports up to 900 then try AMDOverdriveCtl .. my overdrive file:

Code:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<OVERDRIVE_PROFILE>
  <PERFORMANCE_LEVEL level="2" gpu="90000" 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="80"/>
  <FAN_CTRL enabled="no"/>
</OVERDRIVE_PROFILE>

If the BIOS doesn't say 900 then try changing the 90000 to your current running speed, etc 87500 with the 1088 voltage and reassess with aticonfig --odgc and see if it raises the limit to 900. If so then try to step it up with either aticonfig or overdrivectl.

If that doesn't work then you're probably hitting a hard BIOS limit.

[rezin777]

The issue is that going to 900 makes the card go KERBLEWIE.

I am under the assumption that this is what happens when you hit the BIOS limit. I could be wrong.

[fpgaminer]

my overdrive file:

Thank you for that.

So I checked, and at 900MHz the chip receives 1.088V, the same as yours. 

I was able to run the card at 850MHz all through last night. So it's just 900 MHz specifically that's giving me unhappy times. Maybe I should try 899 ...

I am under the assumption that this is what happens when you hit the BIOS limit. I could be wrong.

Perhaps. The odd thing is that, under Windows, it can run 900MHz for a while. About an hour. And then it goes KERBLEWIE. If it were a hard limit in the BIOS I assume it would just go KERBLEWIE immediately.

Also, in Windows it resets the driver when things go awry, instead of locking up like Ubuntu does. From there, it's back to normal (at 900MHz), except the miner (phoenix) has stopped because of the driver reset.

[CoinMan]

I have purchased this same card a couple of days ago and am experiencing the same issue with Ubuntu 10.10 64bit.  I tried simply flashing my board with it's most recent bios but that didn't help.  I'm at 850,1200 right now get 300 M/hs and it seems to be "holding".

I ran in for the first day just fine at 875,1000 but then realized today that it locked up at midnight ...lost about 10 hours of mining before I noticed the problem.

Hopefully these settings keep me stable.  I think I'll skip the 11.04 upgrade and any others that come along.  It seems any update just causes me pain and sorrow!

I'll report back if this continues to be stable with these settings and good luck!

CoinMan

[marcus_of_augustus]

X server is not so happy to share GPU resources as windows with OClocking tools enabled... i'm pretty sure it is the Xorg process that is hanging but if you could ssh or otherwise remotely login you may find the OS is still up ... at least I did ... othertimes it really is the OS (kernel) that has crashed.

It is a real mess in linux because the x server is taking care of hardware control of the GPU's that are acting as compute nodes in this application but it is a different philosophy than what the x server was built todo  (graphics display management) ...

[djex]

I have a XFX 5850 running at 900Mhz core and 1000Mhz Memory using unlocked MSI Afterburner. Works fine with no problems and I've run it a full day with out any issues.

My card has a BIOS limit of 775Mhz on the core. With MSI Afterburner I'm able to go beyond that. I'm not sure why this is or how MSI Afterburner does it without having to flash the BIOS to a 5870. Of course this only works in Windows and I am unaware of any program that will do this in Linux.

[grndzero]

I was able to run the card at 850MHz all through last night. So it's just 900 MHz specifically that's giving me unhappy times. Maybe I should try 899 ...

I don't know if you can do increments other than 25, but you can try it.

Also, in Windows it resets the driver when things go awry, instead of locking up like Ubuntu does. From there, it's back to normal (at 900MHz), except the miner (phoenix) has stopped because of the driver reset.

I came at it from the BIOS perspective since I set out to run it on Linux and hadn't seen anything about power management (and didn't really expect anything).

They have had a lot more time to perfect the ungodly things they can do to the cards in Windows, especially since Vista/7 managed to separate the kernel and video drivers a bit so it's more stable (relatively) and can reload the drivers without rebooting.

[fpgaminer]

I'm at 850,1200 right now get 300 M/hs and it seems to be "holding".

300 seems low. Are you using phoenix with BFI_INT?

I'm getting 320 MH/s on Windows at 850, SDK 2.3, phoenix 1.3. Linux was getting slightly better figures (when it wasn't crashing ...).

I haven't tried SDK 2.1 on Windows yet. That might bring me closer to grndzero's glorious 360 MH/s.  

i'm pretty sure it is the Xorg process

Maybe. I tried ctrl+alt+backspace to no avail. Had to REISUB every time it locked up. The miner also stopped. I did not try SSH though. I might take another stab at getting Linux stable later.

[CoinMan]

I'm at 850,1200 right now get 300 M/hs and it seems to be "holding".

300 seems low. Are you using phoenix with BFI_INT?

I'm getting 320 MH/s on Windows at 850, SDK 2.3, phoenix 1.3. Linux was getting slightly better figures (when it wasn't crashing ...).

I haven't tried SDK 2.1 on Windows yet. That might bring me closer to grndzero's glorious 360 MH/s.  

i'm pretty sure it is the Xorg process

Maybe. I tried ctrl+alt+backspace to no avail. Had to REISUB every time it locked up. The miner also stopped. I did not try SSH though. I might take another stab at getting Linux stable later.

What is phoenix 1.3?  Obviously I'm not using that...maybe I should.

[grndzero]

What is phoenix 1.3?  Obviously I'm not using that...maybe I should.

A new OpenCL miner.

http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=6458.msg94376#msg94376

[CoinMan]

What is phoenix 1.3?  Obviously I'm not using that...maybe I should.

A new OpenCL miner.

http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=6458.msg94376#msg94376

Thanks! Getting it now.

[grndzero]

I'm at 850,1200 right now get 300 M/hs and it seems to be "holding".

300 seems low. Are you using phoenix with BFI_INT?

I'm getting 320 MH/s on Windows at 850, SDK 2.3, phoenix 1.3. Linux was getting slightly better figures (when it wasn't crashing ...).

I haven't tried SDK 2.1 on Windows yet. That might bring me closer to grndzero's glorious 360 MH/s.  

i'm pretty sure it is the Xorg process

Maybe. I tried ctrl+alt+backspace to no avail. Had to REISUB every time it locked up. The miner also stopped. I did not try SSH though. I might take another stab at getting Linux stable later.

Wow, then it's a trade off because before overclocking and lowering the mem clock I had to go to 875/1000 to get 300 Mh/s and at 900/1000 I was getting 317Mh/s with poclbm. phoenix and BFI_INT brought that up to 343.5Mh/s then once I added lowering the mem clock to 300 I got to 361Mh/s.

[Grinder]

I was able to run the card at 850MHz all through last night. So it's just 900 MHz specifically that's giving me unhappy times. Maybe I should try 899 ...

50 MHz is a *huge* difference for stability. For instance, the last GPU I optimised will run just fine at 850 MHz, crash after a while at 860, and crash immediately at 870.