*** NVIDIA 470/480 Series Thread ***

[Sam_oslo]

A few of my local retailer are selling MSI GTX 480 for ~20% less than MRP (and other mnf.), what does it mean? I'm wondering if I should hit on it

[turtletrax]

A few of my local retailer are selling MSI GTX 480 for ~20% less than MRP (and other mnf.), what does it mean? I'm wondering if I should hit on it

Same thing happened to me. Seen a EVGA GTX 480 for a great deal with a good MIR and thought I should give it a shot with that price. While it is true they are hot as hell, thing is surprisingly fast even on air, but cannot wait to get it on WCing

[Malik]

Second try and new score

[revenant]

^^ nice.. what voltage?

[Malik]

^^ nice.. what voltage?

1.150V

New score:

[OC Nub]

MSI GTX470 269.00 after promo code, buy or not? never owned anything msi before, dont know how they are to deal with.

[Ket]

MSI graphics cards are fairly good AFAIK, its just their mobos you need to watch.

[OC Nub]

thanks, looks like a good price, will probably go ahead and order.

[luke997]

New Vantage PBs with more volts (no PhysX).

3rd rad is doing great job with water and core temps, all benches with CPU @ 4.74 GHz

47951 with 3x GTX480 @ 910 core / 985 mem @ 1.188v
ORB P 47951

26405 with single GTX 480 @ 915 core / 1050 mem @ 1.200v
ORB P 26405

Finally broken 40K barrier in High - 908 core / 985 mem @ 1.188v
ORB H 40245

And a fun run with PhysX ON - 55141 3x GTX 480 @ 908 core / 985 mem @ 1.188v
ORB P 55141 PhysX ON

[GTi-6]

I am thinking of getting two GTX 480s as an upgrade from my single GTX 285. Should I go and buy them or wait for new cards?

Also it will be on air. Probably on water in 2-3 months.

[turtletrax]

I am thinking of getting two GTX 480s as an upgrade from my single GTX 285. Should I go and buy them or wait for new cards?

Also it will be on air. Probably on water in 2-3 months.

We all know what the wait game gets you... Waiting

I guess it boils down to the res you play at and what games. I play 1900x1200 and the 480 does excellent at that res with fantastic min frame rates. I would say you would need 2560x1600 to see any benefit to SLI 480's unless you bench.

I had my 480 on air for a week before I pulled it and ordered a waterblock. Suckers run extremely hot. Having temp OCD I couldn't even look at temps after playing a game LOL. Got my block but havent booted it up to see what my overclock or new temps are until I finish my rig. Hope a heavy OC comes along with water

[hlonipha]

Best run so far underwater. My cards are limited to 1.138v. GPU 1 default voltage is 1.025 and GPU 2 1.113. This run was done with GPU 1@1.113v and gpu 2@1.138v. Any way to make the cards go above 1.138v ?


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[p2501]

... Any way to make the cards go above 1.138v ?
[/URL]

Yup, get yourself a copy of Nibitor and nvflash. Dump cards BIOS via GPU-Z, remove limit via Nibitor (new limit will be 1.213v). Put the changed BIOSes and Nibitor on a bootable USB stick and flash the unlocked BIOS via

nvflash -iX -5 -6 BIOS.ROM

(X being the cards index, can be found by using nvflash --list)

Bench!

[luke997]

Yup, get yourself a copy of Nibitor and nvflash. Dump cards BIOS via GPU-Z, remove limit via Nibitor (new limit will be 1.213v). Put the changed BIOSes and Nibitor on a bootable USB stick and flash the unlocked BIOS via

nvflash -iX -5 -6 BIOS.ROM

(X being the cards index, can be found by using nvflash --list)

Bench!

+1
You also need to remove BIOS write protection with nvflash when flashing first time.

[p2501]

You also need to remove BIOS write protection with nvflash when flashing first time.

Nope, that line for flashing works as it is. In my experience there no need for disabling any write protection.

[luke997]

Nope, that line for flashing works as it is. In my experience there no need for disabling any write protection.

I've had to remove write protect on all of my ASUS cards, if I remember well the switch is -r or something.

I guess though it depends on the manufacturer if you didn't have to do it.

[p2501]

I guess though it depends on the manufacturer if you didn't have to do it.

Hmh, I guess you're right then to just put it also in the command for flashing, thanks for your input.

Let's see if it works for him.

[hlonipha]

could someone post the right commands step by step. I dont want to have 2 expensive paper weight around.

Thanks

[p2501]

Sure.

Open GPU-Z, on the right side of the line with the BIOS string there's a button to dump your BIOS. Do that. Compare both EVGA cards. Do they have the same BIOS string? If not, take the higher numbered one, it's newer. Now you only need to change one BIOS and flash that on both cards.

Open your BIOS in Nibitor, after it checked that the BIOS is aok navigate to Fermi voltage (for fermi there are two possibilities added: Fermi volts and clocks). In the upper section of the window that opens you can raise the upper volt limit to 1.213.

Now save that BIOS and put it together with nvflash on a bootable USB stick.

Reboot.

Since you have two identical cards the whole process of finding out what to flash were is redundant.

Now just type

nvflash -i0 -5 -6 yourbios.ROM

for the first card and

nvflash -i1 -5 -6 yourbios.ROM

for the second one. Should you get a warning about write protection you just issue a

nvflash -i0 -r
nvflash -i1 -r

and retry with the flashing commands.

[hlonipha]

Sure.

Open GPU-Z, on the right side of the line with the BIOS string there's a button to dump your BIOS. Do that. Compare both EVGA cards. Do they have the same BIOS string? If not, take the higher numbered one, it's newer. Now you only need to change one BIOS and flash that on both cards.

Open your BIOS in Nibitor, after it checked that the BIOS is aok navigate to Fermi voltage (for fermi there are two possibilities added: Fermi volts and clocks). In the upper section of the window that opens you can raise the upper volt limit to 1.213.

Now save that BIOS and put it together with nvflash on a bootable USB stick.

Reboot.

Since you have two identical cards the whole process of finding out what to flash were is redundant.

Now just type

nvflash -i0 -5 -6 yourbios.ROM

for the first card and

nvflash -i1 -5 -6 yourbios.ROM

for the second one. Should you get a warning about write protection you just issue a

nvflash -i0 -r
nvflash -i1 -r

and retry with the flashing commands.

cool thanks a lot will try now.

[hlonipha]

cool thanks a lot will try now.

ok it worked!!!
Now, next question.
GPU 1 default voltage is 1.025
GPU 2 default voltage is 1.113

How can I make both the same voltage I guess the lesser of the two? I will find out if GPU 2 can operate at stock speeds with 1.025v. Mind you the cards are the SC from evga, will it make sense to do this ?

[p2501]

The default voltage for fermi is the same as the VID on your CPU. It's just the result of brief factory binning, just try to find your max volt/clock combination and forget about default volts.

[hlonipha]

ok it worked!!!
Now, next question.
GPU 1 default voltage is 1.025
GPU 2 default voltage is 1.113

How can I make both the same voltage I guess the lesser of the two? I will find out if GPU 2 can operate at stock speeds with 1.025v. Mind you the cards are the SC from evga, will it make sense to do this ?

spoke too soon, now my overclock dont pass vantage!!! vantage freezes and crash

[p2501]

The same oc as before the flash now fails?


Edit: Wait, did you try to run the second card with less volts now and it crashes? You can't make both cards accept the same volts, they're two different chips with two different VIDs! You just need to find a stable setting for each.

[demo23019]

new score with my new 980X