Radeon HD 7950 Owner's Thread

[Fire&Blood]

I bet mine is louder lol. It was loud to begin with, and acoustics got even worse when I directed it at the case, sound can be easily confused with a WW2 bomber engine. It did the job though, helped idle at 32C and kept loads under 57C.

For some reason I prefer AB and despite being limited to 1100/1575, I'll keep using it. Once I get another fan, I'll revisit the issue but for the moment, don't feel compelled to push beyond that.

EDIT: With the case closed and one 120mm on the side panel, the card idles at 30C.

 

[zaydq]

Download Asus GPU tweak to unlock the core clock and mem clock maximum values to go beyong 1100/1575

 

[Homeles]

Or type -xcl at the end of the the target file path, after right clicking afterburner's icon and going to properties.

 

[Fire&Blood]

I keep getting the "target is not valid" error for the -xcl trick.

In regards to Asus solution, does it interfere with desktop clocks? If it doesn't, I'll use than one.

 

[zaydq]

Havn't noticed interference on my part. I just installed it, ran it once, unlocked the clock maximum values, and never ran it again.

I will also note that my close friend runs a n Evga GTX 670 FTW edition and he posted maximum 3dmark11 gpu score of 9300. I hit 9565 on my gpu score. So essentially I beat out a GTX 670 for $100 less. His was also OC'd to the maximum he could get (i think 1250mhz core 1700mhz mem)

 

[Fire&Blood]

I don't know, I spent quite some testing yesterday and was tired so I couldn't focus to find the best option to get past oc limits and maintain voltage control.

I don't quite see the point in pushing this card past 1200 on air but the window up to that point is interesting. This card at this price has unbeatable performance for 1080p/1200p, even at 1440p it surprised me how often it will pull into 40's FPS range, especially with a little voltage bump for the ~1150 core clock.

As for 3D mark11, I am very pleased with 8500's P scores. I just installed Crysis, it looks and plays so well maxed out at 1440p to warrant a 3rd playthrough.

Price went back up a little but buying this card for $330 and spending another $100 for aftermarket cooling will compete very well with all $500 solutions out there. On water this card should chill at 1270 or more on the core which is true for 7970 and nvidia card as well but for a lot more money.

 

[zaydq]

http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product...ab=true&Page=3

Same card is now $304.99 CDN. Consider the GTX660Ti to be extinct at this price.

I literally got ended at 1200mhz core clocks and 1600mhz mem clocks. I could not get any more out of air. I had temps in mid 70s with a loud and aggressive fan profile. If you bought from newegg recently, talk to em and get a refund of the price difference. I bought mine at 339.99 and they dropped it to 309.99, emailed em and got refunded $30.

 

[lopri]

I bought my 7950 (Gigabyte WindForce) for $320 a few weeks ago, and I've just learned that my local MC has stock HD 7970 for $360~380. (Visionteck, Diamond) What would you do?

 

[lehtv]

7950. I'd never even put a reference card in my PC, much less a Visiontek or a Diamond

 

[Fire&Blood]

I bought my 7950 (Gigabyte WindForce) for $320 a few weeks ago, and I've just learned that my local MC has stock HD 7970 for $360~380. (Visionteck, Diamond) What would you do?

If those 7970's are reference cards I would say yes if you plan to do aftermarket cooling. No if you plan to run them as is, if they have reference coolers, that is.

Clocked TF3's, even more so the ones with the 6+8 PCB's will beat a reference 7970 and while the (reference) 7970 may have the headroom, it may be too loud, too hot or both in order to reach the OC needed to edge out the custom cooled 7950.

 

[3DVagabond]

I bought my 7950 (Gigabyte WindForce) for $320 a few weeks ago, and I've just learned that my local MC has stock HD 7970 for $360~380. (Visionteck, Diamond) What would you do?

I'd stick with the 7950 unless you want to try some aftermarket cooling out for your card. Although $360 is a GREAT price for a 7970. Pair that with an Accelero cooler and for less than $450 you'd likely have the fastest single GPU setup available.

7950. I'd never even put a reference card in my PC, much less a Visiontek or a Diamond

A reference card by any company is still a reference card. Unless you know of specific RMA issues with those companies?

 

[Attic]

Proud to say I've got these two in a HTPC case which was a bit of a gamble. Decided to get as much oomph as I could while remaining possible in my case and with current PSU. Goal is 60fps minimums at 1080P60 extreme settings (ultra ingame settings w/ 4xAdaptiveMSAA) . As a part of that goal I was expecting nice OC's to come into play on the cards to reach it.

After installing I initially I ran into serious heat issues and thought I might have been better off with a single 680 or 7970, but after some case mods I think the 7950 in xfire was the right call here for $640. Before modding I was hitting 87c on top card at stock clocks. I added a 120mm intake that hits both cards and it dropped temps to 75c/73c. I also added a 100mm fan to drive air to the bottom card only. I'm able to get 1100c/1400m w/1100mv and 82c Top/76c bottom load temps. With vsync (the way I always game those temps drop 4-5c). I'm going to upgrade the 120mm that I tossed in to This and I expect that will drop temps 2-4c. The noise barrier on these MSI cards for me is 72c. Anything above that they are too noisy so i'm still toying around.

Witcher 2 on Uber i'm close to maintaining 60fps mins @1100c. This is best looking game for my tastes.

Disappointed with some audio issues due to driver, but otherwise very glad I went here over the 670x2, 7970, or 680.

To make bitcoining tolerable temp/noise wise I have to drop clocks and volts, but currenty doing ~800Mhash/s with the cards set to 800c 1000mv

 

[Fire&Blood]

Fully stock, 880/1250/1031v run 57C load:

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4107388

+20 power control, 1000/1350/1031v 59C load:

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4107415

1100/1575/1075v 68C load:

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4107460

1150/1850/1149v 77C load:

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4107514

1200/1865/1162v 71C load, fans were set to 100% before and during load:

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4107624

1252/1851/1193v 74C load:

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4108168

That's the limit on this one, anything beyond will artifact, crash or both.

 

[zaydq]

Wow! Looks like i've got room to go on memory! Very nice almost 10,000 gpu score!

 

[Attic]

Wow!!! nice clocks.

 

[Silverforce11]

Amazing scaling and overclock on these cards. Nicely done Rick.

@Attic: You got pics of your HTPC rig?

 

[3DVagabond]

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm11/4108168

That's the limit on this one, anything beyond will artifact, crash or both.

26% improvement over stock. ~gtx 580 stock speeds. Consider price and power usage and that's nice performance.

 

[Silverforce11]

26% improvement over stock. ~gtx 580 stock speeds. Consider price and power usage and that's nice performance.

Thats because his cpu is holding the overall score back: compare the GPU score only = 39.4% improvement over stock.

Or faster than gtx680 with turbo up to 1.2ghz.

 

[3DVagabond]

Thats because his cpu is holding the overall score back: compare the GPU score only = 39.4% improvement over stock.

Or faster than gtx680 with turbo up to 1.2ghz.

Well, so it is!

 

[zaydq]

300 dollars never felt so well spent.

 

[thilanliyan]

Does the 7950 benefit from higher memory clocks? I run my memory at 1125MHz (underclocked actually).

 

[Alusan]

Does the 7950 benefit from higher memory clocks? I run my memory at 1125MHz (underclocked actually).

I ran some tests in Metro that showed that it did, especially once you start raising the core clock. You can see the results here. Not hugely significant, but I did notice it also raised fps a bit in other games, although I didn't document those.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Atpt9vZWXf9HdGZMZmp6LVhLVGtKcGlmUVpKZkwxSVE

 

[thilanliyan]

I ran some tests in Metro that showed that it did, especially once you start raising the core clock. You can see the results here. Not hugely significant, but I did notice it also raised fps a bit in other games, although I didn't document those.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Atpt9vZWXf9HdGZMZmp6LVhLVGtKcGlmUVpKZkwxSVE

Thanks for the info. Much appreciated.

 

[Zargon]

mine hashes great but im getting bad artifacing in bf3 on 12.7 betas

i went down to 950 with PT +20%

when I can hash at 1050 and PT -5%

 

[3DVagabond]

mine hashes great but im getting bad artifacing in bf3 on 12.7 betas

i went down to 950 with PT +20%

when I can hash at 1050 and PT -5%

Do you lower your mem speed when BC mining? If so, that might be what's making the card stable @ 1050.

You might know this already, but you should always O/C the GPU and then raise the mem clocks.