Best combination of ATI Catalyst and SDK? (Ubuntu 11.04 with 5870s)

[pewpew]

Hi everyone,

I'm currently working on trying to get all 5 GPUs to mine using Ubuntu 11.04 and poclbm, the specs and installed software are as follows:

2x Rosewill CAPSTONE Series CAPSTONE-750
    ASRock 970 EXTREME4 (3 x16 PCI-E slots, 2 x1 slots)
    AMD Sempron 145
    Patriot 4GB RAM
    WD 40GB HDD
5x 5870 (mix of XFX and Sapphire)

ATI 11.12
SDK v2.1
bitcoin 0.6.2
pyopencl 0.92 (with python installed)
The mining command: python poclbm.py -v -d 1 ****@gmail.com:****@pit.deepbit.net:8332

Unfortunately this setup is not completely working; only 2/5 cards mine (may be a result of bad extenders or b/c they're not molex powered, but let's assume not for the purposes of this thread).


SO. What combination of ATI and SDK versions are people using with 5870s? Which works best and why?

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[ssateneth]

I use windows 7 and phoenix, so some or none of this may apply to you.

If you undervolt to 0.95v and run appropriate memory/core speeds, you -should- be able to support 5 5870s on a single 750W PSU. I have 2 5870's and 3 5830's running at that voltage and clocks varying from 715-880 on the core and 145-170 on the memory and draw 630W at the wall between 2 very inefficient (~70%) PSU's powering the single rig.

All 5 cards use un-powered 1x > 1x open-ended risers with PCI-E presence pins shorted on an EVGA 790i SLI Ultra.
It does a total of ~1.51 Ghash/sec.

Driver used is 11.12 and SDK used is 2.1. Phoenix Config is as follows.

Code:

[general]
verbose = True
backend = http://1CxcPP8FVktppy4PHTYJKnZFqQeyZ3jArb:x@mining.eligius.st:8337

[cl:1:1]
name = GPU 2 810 5870
kernel = phatk2
AGGRESSION = 12
VECTORS = true
BFI_INT = true
WORKSIZE = 128

[cl:1:2]
name = GPU 5 880 5870
kernel = phatk2
AGGRESSION = 12
VECTORS = true
BFI_INT = true
WORKSIZE = 128

[cl:1:3]
name = GPU 4 760 5830
kernel = phatk2
AGGRESSION = 12
VECTORS = true
BFI_INT = true
WORKSIZE = 128

[cl:1:4]
name = GPU 3 780 5830
kernel = phatk2
AGGRESSION = 12
VECTORS = true
BFI_INT = true
WORKSIZE = 128

[cl:1:5]
name = GPU 1 715 5830
kernel = phatk2
AGGRESSION = 12
VECTORS = true
BFI_INT = true
WORKSIZE = 128

[web]
disable = true

[check_status]

Unfortunately this setup is not completely working; only 2/5 cards mine (may be a result of bad extenders or b/c they're not molex powered, but let's assume not for the purposes of this thread).

This is a serious issue and I wouldn't leave it running like that indefinitely, you can be damaging something.

There are posts on this forum discussing how much power is required by the PCIe Bus feeding the cards, which I believe is, from the PCI spec, "125 watts", I think, so that means while each core is drawing 30 watts, 5 * 30 = 150,  you're trying to draw more energy than the system can supply over the PCI Bus.
Second issue with extenders/risers; You are adding more distance but adding more resistance and small wires which handle less total current, which contributes to an energy imbalance in the Graphic Cards. Once you go from 4 cores to 5 cores, you need to use powered extenders/risers unless you intend to undervolt the Graphics Cards.
With an imbalance, a card or two may get energy spikes that could damage the graphics cards. They still might hash, but lose overclocking ability.