Radeon HD 5970 with LN2 + 6GHz Phenom II X4 CPU

[[NH]Woxxman]

NordicHardware just published a review of Hemlock and during testing we did some extreme overclocking on the card and to give it a bit of an "AMD" touch we used the complete Dragon platform.

Both the graphics card and CPU was LN2 cooled:
Radeon HD 5970 @ 975/1250 (-50C)
Phenom II X4 965 C3 @ 6GHz (-181C)

We where mostly after getting some nice frequencies but the 3DMark Vantage Extreme score was rather nice, for an AMD system that is.

The GPU clock is limited by ATI Overvolt tools 1,165V as we didnt have time to get past this limitation. Hopefully we can come back soon with some updated results.

Review is in Swedish but here are some pictures and a translation.

[Chickenfeed]

Very nice!



... and it was bound to happen eventually

[[NH]Woxxman]

It was a lot of fun, but to bad we didn't have the time to get some more voltage to the GPUs. Then 2 x 1GHz+ would have been a walk in the park probably.

The card really needs some more voltage, question is when the 300W limit kicks in. :P

[okorop]

It was a lot of fun, but to bad we didn't have the time to get some more voltage to the GPUs. Then 2 x 1GHz+ would have been a walk in the park probably.

The card really needs some more voltage, question is when the 300W limit kicks in. :P

that is the real big problem of the card, push it to the limit

[ViViD]

Great Resualt
Make Fast Test With LN2 ATI 5970 Not Be Long Coming Out

[[XC] gomeler]

Use MSI Afterburner v1.4 to manipulate HD5970 core voltages. I assume you guys did this testing before the Afterburner v1.4 release? Hope you can test it again, 1.1GHz to 1.2GHz should be cake

[Monstru]

First HD5970 under LN2, good work guys. However, you should up the voltages a bit, 1000MHz Core Vantage is doable with proper volts, so LN2 should go 1,2k for sure.

[[NH]Woxxman]

As said, we wanted to get some more voltage into the card but we didnt have time to search for other softwares that would give us more voltage. Is that Afterburner working on AMDs reference card btw?
Really nice GPU clock, dont even wanna know what our card would have managed with that voltage and LN2 cooling :P

[Monstru]

Yup, Afterburner 1.4.0 works with AMD reference card. It's tricky, but you can make it work, if you use a combination of ATI OV, CCC, AfterBurner and AMD GPU Clock Tool

[Mean Machine]

We had all that, except the Afterburner app, which is sort of annoying, now when you think about it. If the card is still around here in the weekend, I'll put some more LN2 on it and use the Afterburner tool and see where it gets us.

[dinos22]

Yup, Afterburner 1.4.0 works with AMD reference card. It's tricky, but you can make it work, if you use a combination of ATI OV, CCC, AfterBurner and AMD GPU Clock Tool

[Monstru]

Ok guys, I worked like this.

- raise voltage up to 1.162/1.15 with ATI OV
- raise vGPU up to 1.262 with Afterburner
- close Afterburner
- raise clocks up to 1000/1200 with CCC
- raise fan up to 100% with CCC
- close CCC
- open Afterburner again and set fan to 100% (otherwise it goes down after a while).
- bench

No, in order to get 1025MHz core (past CCC limits), you set 1.29v in Afterburner, and after you close CCC you have to open AMD GPU Clock Tool and set the clocks there, then open Afterburner and set the fan to 100%). How does this itsy bitsy Vantage score look? Damn I need some LN2 for the CPU and VGA :p

[Florinmocanu]

It looks... well.... Monstruous :P

[[NH]Woxxman]

Haha nice workaround Monstru, and indeed some really nice overclocking scores. Now AMD/third party only need to get us a tool where we can make this magic happen without going through this painful procedure =)

[Monstru]

Yes sir, one ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them ... aaa....I mean one app (most likely MSI Afterburner) that allows us to change the clocks past CCC limits, and increase the voltage for both vGPU and vDDR to decent levels. Eh, you know how it is, in a few days we'll have what we need, this is how it allways happens prior to launch

[jaredpace]

Nice work OP! Good to see some LN2 action, looking forward to your overvolting.

@Monstru - This card has the Hynix GDDR5 which is on the HD5700 series. It is known to clock much higher than the Samsung IC's found on the HD5800 series, even though both brands are rated at 1250(5000)mhz. Many people claim the limits on their 5850/5870's memory is around 1200-1300mhz, while many clock the 5770/5750's memory anywhere from 1300-1450mhz.

Do you think your 5970 can handle any more than 1200mhz on the GDDR5, or is > ~1200 produce poorer performance?

[Monstru]

Yes, you are right, but proper volts have to be fed to those Hynix in order for them to reach >1300 clocks.

[Solus Corvus]

Are those temps correct? 76c max for 1025mhz core with 100% fan?

That's impressive, uh, cooler scaling.

[[NH]Woxxman]

So true Monstru, its just a bit sad that you have like a few days to do everything from testing to writing a complete article when your not in US and get all the stuff 2 weeks earlier :P

[Astennu]

It was a lot of fun, but to bad we didn't have the time to get some more voltage to the GPUs. Then 2 x 1GHz+ would have been a walk in the park probably.

The card really needs some more voltage, question is when the 300W limit kicks in. :P

Use the MSI Afterburner software. It will let you put the GPU's up to 1.3v. 9xx core is way to low. If you see the results with the HD5870 cards that can do up to 13xx. But becarefull that your PSU is able to handle that kind of power draw. Because you only have two connectors for 2 GPU's.

[Monstru]

I still do not feel that the temp monitoring is accurate, but we'll see about that when a new Afterburner releases.

[Sgt.McRuff]

I still do not feel that the temp monitoring is accurate, but we'll see about that when a new Afterburner releases.

I bet with a jet engine pushing your pc around.