There is no "mod" that makes 1.21V work. All reference boards go up to 1.21V but it is not reported by software, software merely reports what the BIOS tells it to - which is the max offset voltage of 1175mV. So seeing people go crazy over this BIOS is pretty hilarious IMO because 680s have been doing 1.2V for a long time now, people just didn't realize it because nobody tested their cards with multimeters.
I had EVGA ref cards that would do 1.21 at 100% GPU load, ages ago - verified with a multimeter. But because overclocking is retarded with the kepler, people take the misreported voltage by software and think it means something. By the way, all kepler cards throttle at 70C, they will lower in 1 bin increments (13 mhz / 10mV) which you can see if you watch the monitor in precision x or whatever monitoring software you have.
Hey cmdr, do you ever notice that your voltage is actually at 1.162v even under 70C and under the power cap? My 670FTW runs like that, and I'm wondering if that's a glitch (the original 670SC cards, which you had, exhibited similar behavior, as documented in the Anandtech review).
Also, what do you do to test memory clocks? Just getting something to run isn't enough - it also has to show an actual improvement, and I haven't been able to see a noticeable improvement (or a decrease for that matter) above 6400 or so. That's in BF3 singleplayer, but perhaps there's a better test that's more memory-limited.
It's strange that before using the "modded" bios that my max oc when looping heaven was 1276mhz. I figure if my card was already reaching 1.21v it would have been stable at 1310Mhz like it is now, and not 1276mhz like it was. I don't know maybe I missed some math classes, but not that many.
Oh and I get all the info I need sent to my keyboard lcd screen, and my eyes work great. 20/20 vision
some only run at 1.162 and I have seen that mentioned in reviews. mine always ran at 1.175 though.I'll give a test and let you know, I never noticed or looked for that.
I'll also see if I can find a test for memory clock scaling.
some only run at 1.162 and I have seen that mentioned in reviews. mine always ran at 1.175 though.
I'll give a test and let you know, I never noticed or looked for that.
I'll also see if I can find a test for memory clock scaling.
some only run at 1.162 and I have seen that mentioned in reviews. mine always ran at 1.175 though.
I was following a thread where a guy was getting ready to volt mod his Asus Top 680. He did a multimeter check on his voltage before modding, and it showed that it went to 1.2v. Maybe the increase in the voltage that we get from modding our bios adds to the 1.2v that was already there, making it 1.3v. I don't know, but there is that increase if your card has the chip that can handle atleast 1293mhz. So strange though because like I said my max was 1276mhz, and it handles the new stock boost of 1293mhz easily. If they remove the jump right to 1293mhz it would be better.There's really no need to get upset here. I'm not saying you're lying or have bad vision. I'm saying there are a lot of other power related parameters in the BIOS other than just voltage - ref boards have been tested to go up to 1.21V months ago. Of course, there are also vDroop settings, max Power %, overcurrent protection, the list goes on. The thing about voltage though, is that GPU-Z only reports what the BIOS lists as voltage offset max. Typically, most reference BIOS' report 1175 as that max even though they may go higher (and they have been tested to go higher with multimeters...FYI).
Like I said...there's a bunch of other stuff in the BIOS that affects OC ability so there's no need for you to get upset or defensive here. Nobody said you're lying or have bad vision. Good for you for getting a better OC :thumbsup:
And nvidia is still stupid to make OC'ing this much of a hassle. I hope you agree that we shouldn't have to be dealing with this, I miss the GTX 580 days of just setting it and forgetting it.
Had to say it, because kepler owns BF3.
Termie I have a few results for you. It's obvious that 300Mhz on the memory isn't going to give a very big gain. There is some fps increase but it's so small as to not be worth mentioning. I don't know if my resolution of 2560x1440 is impacting the gains or not. If you would like I can re test at 1920x1080 later on tonight.
First a screenshot of both cards reporting 1.175v and both well under 70c. Whether this is actual or incorrect reporting as blackened mentioned I don't know.
Next is two runs from Heaven with different memory clocks and the same core clock. You can see there is little difference here and only a few fps increase with 300Mhz+ faster memory. If I could get past 7Ghz it would probably make a bigger impact.
6412Mhz Memory clock
6772Mhz Memory clock
Lastly, two links to 3DMark11 scores. Again very little increase in performance. I still believe 7Ghz+ memory clocks would net a higher increase.
6412Mhz
http://3dmark.com/3dm11/4036199
6772Mhz
http://3dmark.com/3dm11/4036246
Not anymore. It's very close now actually with with Cats 12.7 beta
HardOCP
Xbitlabs
TechPowerUp
Sweclockers
At 1080P, maybe.
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I have a feeling the reason overclocks go up is because this new BIOS raises the core voltage and thus the effective GPU Boost voltage that Kepler adds dynamically in the background (that GPU-Z, MSI Afterburner and other software programs can't detect). Let's say the stock card goes from 1.175V to 1.20V with GPU Boost active in the game as blackened23 mentioned. The new BIOS puts the core at 1.21V and suddenly Kepler dynamic GPU voltage boost might be pushing the card to 1.23-1.24V in the real world. The problem is without a multi-meter this is undetected and people think their card is only using 1.21V. This is why overvolting Kepler can be so dangerous on air. You might apply 1.23-1.24 and end up with 1.25-1.27V.
For example, HardOCP's MSI Lightning had a default voltage of 1206 mV and they applied a GPU voltage offset of +93mV. That means at most this card should be using up 1299mV, but in games with a volt-meter that went to 1318mV. It seems Kepler is adding a little bit of extra GPU voltage for GPU boost but it's just not showing up in software.
Half the links you provided show a GTX 680 winning lol. close...yeah i'll say that. much better than before
He said "owns". By that I am expecting 20-30% difference. The 4 links I showed have it more like 5% difference against a 1050-1290mhz HD7970 vs. a 1130-1390mhz GTX680s! An overclocked 680 is faster, but that's not owning when a 1390mhz 680 is winning by 2-3 fps against a 1280mhz 7970. Before the delta was more like 15-20 fps.
It's stupid easy to do and it certainly does work. I flashed my 670 Windforce and went from 1237 to 1283 stable using this BIOS. Some people start at the area I ended up at, so, it's easy to see them getting higher clocks that that. Is it safe? Seems to be, I've had no issues yet. Not sure I'll keep it, but I imagine it will probably catch on with 670 owners soon assuming no early adopters self destruct. It's an easy way to gain.
I don't think 46MHz gain is worth the hassle at all. But thanks for the confirmation.
Understandable, but the interesting thing is how easy it was. I used the zotac firestorm utility, save my current bios, flashed the new one and rebooted. Less than 5 minutes. Then you just increase or decrease (it STARTS at 1293 core, I had to do a -10 on my GPU offset) and then run haven. Done. For the time involved, it's actually a good gain. Of course, for me I'm at 1680x1050 so it's pretty much all excess at this point anyway..