svl7

I don't know how I would be able to flash a bios on a black screen :/

The same way you flash it usually.

Works fine, provided you have the proper vbios. See here: http://forum.techinferno.com/alienware-m15x/3911-m15x-amd-8970m.html#post55048

I wasn't able to OC the memory though, crashed at the slightest change. Might have been a dud, but some other people also seemed to have issues with ocing the memory of the 8970m, in other systems.

Ok, then I misinterpreted that graph. Kinda looks like > 90°C on your pics.

Do you have some graphs with the stock vbios? With no OC etc.

Of course it throttles, your temps are way too high for the card to sustain the set clocks. At about 92-93°C is the limit of those GK104 chips, then the driver will kick in and throttle, no matter what.

However I still don't believe that you can sustain 993MHz with the stock vbios without hitting the same temp limits.

Well i never said 3D doesnt work...3D works without problems, its just once u take out PSU its freezing but after some testing...

Running Display on 60Hz does not freeze anymore on battery.

Once Turning up the HZ on 100 - 110 - 120 its frozen.

i hope this can help us. this proves its 100% the refresh rate. That might change to the iGPU and its not able to handle 120HZ even though its disabled... so it just freeze...while the stock bios can handle this situation.

That means the vbios mod been made on a system which had iGPU enabled to switch on incase bad bios flash i believe its how u guys testing the vbios.

So the answer should be within the original vbios. If svl7 need it ill post it. Else i am stuck with the stock vbios ;(

That's odd. Will take a look at that when I get the chance. Hard to test things for me though, don't have a system like yours. Neither a 880m.

@svl7 hi,

I checked the 2nd post in this thread - but can't find the Asus G55VW hacked bios.

Can you please try to reHACK the latest version of that bios ( for the g55vw of course ) ?

Here is the direct link for the official latest bios version 217.

If I find time. Will need a dump of your bios either way.

The interesting part is that i dont have to use hwinfo to control the fan is seems working. it looks hwinfo causing more problem and heat than without it.

The card is a DELL Card (020HTK) with vbios 80.04.5B.00.02. I used someone else inf file and is recon is a MX card but actually is not.

Anyone have experience with this?

Not sure what you exactly mean.... what's the problem with HWiNFO and fan control?

Well the design of the card appears to be pushed to its limits though. Whatever they messed up on with these cards is crippling them big time. I'm starting to think they intentionally binned the 880m chips poorly so that they wouldn't hold a candle to Maxwell...

Nonsense. The 880m just has very little headroom by default. The voltage is set relatively low for the max default boost.

It occured to me that some cards might not perform properly with the settings in the modified vbios, some might need more than one volt for 993MHz...

Another issue is that many systems don't seem to be capable of running 993MHz sustained due to the temps. Re-pasting should be self-explanatory for anyone thinking about ocing, but I'm mentioning it again anyway.

Is the nvidia-gtx-870m-oc-edition-rev00.zip updated from before? I remember downloading the first 870M modded vBIOS upon release by @svl7. Is this a newer revision?

Nope, just that one version.

Where to start..

Firstly, thank you very much for the 880m vbios Slv. I really appreciate it matey.

Secondly, I've been running with the modified 880m vbios for the past week fine. Then last night, I decided to install the latest Nvidia beta driver. Boy was I an idiot for doing this. Somehow, I lost the ability to overclock my memory and voltage in EVGA and Nvidia Inspector. So anyway, I reverted back to my previous driver which worked fine alongside Slv's vbios for the 880m. This didn't fix my issue. So since then, I have flashed back to my stock vbios. This's where my problem begins. I've attempted to flash Slv's vbios back to my 880m. However, I'm now getting ID missmatch. I've tried the nvflash -6 filename.rom. My command is - nvflash -6 cus.rom. I typed YES in caps when prompted. However, Nvflash comes up with (ERROR I.D MISSMATCH) still. I never had this problem until now. Any help with this, would be highly appreciated.

That's incredibly odd to say the least. Seems like part of that issue got solved by changing secure boot related settings. As for overclocking, well that can easily be due changes made in the nvapi by nvidia. Then the oc tools need to be updated as well.

But to be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if it simply was due to the crippled nvidia drivers. Many of you might not have noticed, but ever since like 304 the nvidia drivers have some serious issues. Not just performance related, but also when it comes to overclocking. And boost. Etc.

Yeah never had secure boot on and don't use it. I did have legacy on as well but turned it off because I don't like to see the credits screen on boot up that came with the modded vbios. I really do appreciate the modded vbios but wish there was a donation option for leaving out an extra screen on bootup with these credits, hint hint.

It's there for a reason, hint hint.

So I got the modded vbios installed on my 780M, and it works fine and has fixed the throttling issue I was having, so thanks very much for that!

I have one problem though in that it seems to have modified the thermal targets for the fans on my machine. They seem to currently bit kiking up to high-speed at 87'c, which is a bit warm if you ask me. With the stock bios they come on to full blast around 75. I don't seem to have any option to set a manual fan speed profile through NVidia Inspector or MSI Afterburner. Is this something casued by the bios? Can anyone recommend a speed controller program which works with the Clevo P170SM chassis?

With the modified vbios your card runs effectively faster than with the stock version, therefore you have to expect higher temps. New thermal paste would be a first approach to this issue.

OK... it's time for NVIDIA fans, 880M owners and others to act... if you're pissed about what you're seeing and experiencing, head on over here (link below) to make some noise and show your support for comrades that are being screwed over with an expensive GPU that runs like crap!

Since Nvidia doesn't give a shit about this forum anyway I'd recommend everyone to file a driver bug report. They get read at least. The more the better.

Well... I figured out the culprit for my high temperatures and complete and total system instability. It was the modded vbios.

I also discovered that my cards aren't throttling out of the box when gaming. I just did a 3 hour Watch Dogs session and I was boosting the whole time.

Temps dropped massively going back to the stock vbios. I would say there are probably some kinks in the modded bios that need to be worked out. I was about to RMA my machine and now I'm very happy.

If your 880M is having issues, flash it back to stock and wait for svl7 to come out with a new revision, something isn't working properly in the mod from what I and others using it have seen.

Instability might have happened because the voltage of the modified vbios was too low for your card. I however don't believe that you run 3 hours at full boost with the stock vbios while having lower temps, that's simply not possible, unless you increased the voltage when using the modified vbios.

Yes i have with no problems, until i restored windows 7 back onto my computer. now i cant update my graphics card drivers and also I would get a white screen on start up unless i disabled intergrated HD Audio in the bios. so yeah

For the driver installation see the post of @J95 above.

About the white screen issue - that's just a matter of drivers. Nvidia still didn't fix that, I recommend you send them a bug report.

The issue can be resolved by installing the drivers in the proper order, I got it working on my M15x with the 780m.

There is some thermalpaste thats gotten a bit over the card, could that have an effect?

No. Unless you used liquid ultra or similar and smeared it all over the components

Im gonna look into blind flashing it, but the hardware issue should be regarding the GPU right? Considering everything works fine when im using the 260m? I have contacted Upgrademonkey the ones i bought it from on ebay, so im not sure where to go from here :/ and thanks for the reply guys!

Yeah, for me it sounds like a defective GPU. As I said, if you have the wrong vbios it should boot fine, but black screen only.

I wish i could bake it again. I think it is good try to re-ball the card soon. I'm using oven toaster for about 10 minutes with difference temps (180 - 240c) Can see the solder is melting while doing the process so i assume its hot enough. The frustration is this card suddenly *dead* while i am doing my work, not in gaming. After the baking session, the card looks great, no weird pixel and can boot normally to Windows. But when the card is under load and reach 55-60c it went black / freezing screen. Reboot the laptop and it will appears like the video i show above. But..if i re-seat the card + power drain again, it will boot normally and when the card is under load and reach 55-60c, went black again. Hopefully re-balling with revive the card, any opinion @svl7 ?

PS : I thought you are away @svl7 for some fun? Lol

Huh, that's odd. Another guy recently PMd me and seems to have a very similar issue... no idea what's the problem, really.

Yeah, well, I was away. Ski tour Will be away again soon

Hey guys, so ive read the entire thread but still havnt found a way to get it working :/ i have the dell 7970, and when i plug it in and start up the laptop it just goes to black screen and caps+scroll icons just blinks. Though sometimes i can get it to the bios menu, but then it often crashes :/ i have uninstalled the drivers and such, anyone have an idea about what to do? And i read earlier in the thread about a similiar problem, where flashing the vbios fixed it, but the problem is, my comp cant stay on long enough for me to flash with the new gpu in... it still works when i plug in the 260m though, some help and fast reply would be immensly appriciated! Like extremly much! Ive hasseled with this for some time now @svl7

I agree with Genetics, sounds like a hardware issue. The only thing you can check is whether the pins of the card are clean and not damaged or similar. The 7970m works with all vbios version in the M15x, except for the P1x0EM and MSI version, with those you only get a black screen.

I had problem with my 7970M as well. I think the card is f*cked up. Re-flash also cannot help to revive my card. I believe there is nothing to do with drivers as the card is spoiled on startup. I attached the video here so everyone can enjoy the beautiful of it lol

Bake again? Temps and time you baked it?

how do i use the tool

1 - read post nr. 1

2 - download tools

3 - follow instructions in post nr 1

What serial number do you need I have y510p i can help

Thank you, appreciate it. Already got what I needed from a different user.

I can't mod anything if I don't have a bios dump. And some additional information. E.g. a dump of this tool run in DOS.

Nice improvement!

Also, don't use furmark if you want to have your card in a working condition.

Sorry for my absence in this thread, I'll try to catch up on things.

I'm looking for a y410p / y510p serial nr, if anyone wants to help me please send a PM.

The new Alienware 17 is limited on power ive got a 240W and mr fox suggest me to get a 330W will that help ? i mean the mobo has the limit, but even tho i run my 4910m @ 1.155v i am not able to overclock the card stable its flickerin at +100mv and shutdown after 5-10 seconds.. and restarts... i am really confused.

I doubt it will help, the 240W PSU is sufficient for your setup unless you would want to push it to the limits, which is not possible anyways.

unfortunatly as of today i had to revert to the original vBios for my 880M.

no game/benchmark i tried (dota2 / watchdogs / 3Dmark11 / 3Dmark13) ran for more than a few seconds without either constant throttling (read: erradic switching between 993/836/614mhz core) or a complete video-driver crash.

however i did not try to use an older v-driver (327.xx is what has been suggested i believe) since i don´t see a reason using an old driver just so the standard clocks keep stable.

using v337.88 + original vbios at least i was able to play games with (although it still throttles the core some times).

kinda sad right now, coming from an 680M with a modifed vbios, i really hoped for more. but i guess nivdia fuc*ed it up this time around -.-

What's your system?

I have a hunch that the default voltage of the vbios mod might be too low for some cards. Try a run with like 25-37mv more.

Try increasing the voltage of your card by like 25mv and run again.

I wouldn't know about the cooling since I never had an MSI, but I guess if you have proper die contact it will be possible to cool it well enough.

240W should be sufficient unless you head for benchmark world records.

The vbios works on the msi board, that being said, MSI has sometimes some special stuff in their bios... if it doesn't perform properly then it might needs some adjustment for the MSIs.

btw i just got a problem when i plugout my PSU and start the laptop it crashes in windows and asking me to change to my iGPU which i dont have due to 120HZ Display...and after 5 sec and some flickers to black screeen it just freeze... i can see the mouse only but nothing works.. i shutdown and put the psu and all work again.

That's odd... did it switch to 3d clocks? I'm not sure how the current driver handles battery mode, if it switches to 3d then it's possible that your system has a very strict current limit for the battery that would cause issues when the gpu switches to the 3d state in battery mode, at least with the modified vbios.

i save the original bios with gpu z am i able to flash it back or will that brick the card

Yes.

Hello, I have some questions. I have a Sager NP9370 (Clevo P370EM) with a Dual GTX 680M SLi 4GB and want to "flash" it, my questions are:

1. If I flash the GPUs, will I be able to normally update it using the Drivers from Nvidia site?

2. The only way to go back to normal is doing a backup of the default files and putting it in a secure local? I mean, if I lose it, I'm in serious problems, right?

1 - Yes, since your system officially supports the 680m.

2 - Not sure what you mean... Restoring the vbios? Yeah, make a backup and then you can flash it back anytime. If you loose it... well, you'll find a copy of the vbios on the web. Or here, if you ask.

Why is your score with single gtx880m so much higher then mine?

I've also the modded vbios from svl, is this because I only got 8GB Ram and I7 4710MQ ?

Maybe the Intel GFX slows my Graphiccard down?

If you're referring to the post two above this, then it's because your system run at stock and the other was overclocked.

Hey, so I have an ASUS G75VX and I've seen on multiple posts that the vBIOS has been unlocked, but all the links are dead / removed cause apparently the poster would rather not provide the link instead of just posting a disclaimer warning people to not use it if they don't know how to use it properly.

Right, I never uploaded a version for the Asus. Need a copy of your vbios for this.

BIOS stuff is kinda off-topic here.

Flashed my 880m's to SVL7's vbios last night.

Thanks for all the work. It's greatly appreciated.

I feel there's something still hindering me though. Even very minor adjustments to core/memory are resulting in full system crashes when I try to OC. I thought even with stock bios you should be able to do Core +135/Memory +500, no? My performance is still very good stock, but I thought I could at least get some more oomph with the unlocked vbios.

Depends on the card... some might not be able to go much above the stock settings with the voltage set in the mod vbios. Also the new AWs are limited when it comes to overvolting. The mobo doesn't allow much more than the stock voltage. It simply won't provide the required power to the card.

what has this driver that is better than the new one? i got the AW 17 new model can i use it aswell ?

ive got the 880m

Nvidia has quite a mess with the more recent drivers. The newest one is certainly not recommendable imo. The suggested driver above is one that works pretty well, but of course it lacks support for the most recent games, so you might just want to try different drivers and find one that fits your needs best.

Tried to run 3DMark Firestrike today.

System-Specs as follows:

M17xR4 i7-3720QM GTX880M 240W PSU

im using the modified vBios + stock clocks (993mhz core, 2500mhz ram), video-driver v337.88 (latest)

no change in any setting whatsoever

as soon as i start the benchmark (about 5s) the card starts to throttle for 2-3sec, than goes back to normal for about 10-15sec, starts to throttle for 2-3sec and so on...

its basically the same behaviour as with the standard-bios, except the throttle-time is a bit shorter (id say up to 6-8sec with standard-bios).

max temperature according to nvidainspector is 71°C

during firestrikes tests, the video-driver crashed and restartet itself about 2-3 times (basicially after each test except physics ofc)

question is obvious: what could be the problem here? video-driver, not enough power, problem with the vbios?

Drivers. That would be my first guess. Try an older one, e.g. 327.23 if you want to bench.

60°C is a lot for idling, unless you live in a desert. Or wait, do you mean that's the max temp if you play games? That would be super low...

If you really didn't change anything and didn't overclock... it almost seems like a hardware issue. But software is more likely to be causing things like this. Hardware failure would be very unlucky.

150€ for that setup? Someone must have been lucky... 750€ sounds fine for that kind of hardware, not too expensive imo.

The first one, "CPU-->Thermal paste-->Copper shim-->Thermal paste-->Heat sink".

well...on +100mv the screen on 3dmark flickers and stutter... on +50mv its fine... maybe cause of my 120Hz Display..

i wasnt able to get higher than 1050 stable... if i do 1100 i need +75mv and its crashing also but sometimes on 3d mark my gpu score is 9700 but my cpu score drop from 10400 to like 8000 lol..i believe thats something with the power options... cause if i dont overclock the 880 my cpu stay 4 GHZ on all 4x cores all time. I am not sure if my psu is the problem because i run the 4910mq @ 1.155mv stable 4 GHZ

Yeah, that's kinda what I'd expect. Sorry... that's simply your motherboard limiting you. Dell really implemented some strict limits on all voltage rails I'm afraid. The card itself is capable of much more, I benched it at 1200MHz+ in my ancient M15x with not throttling at all...

Turn off secure boot, allow legacy boot, try again.

Hmm, maybe there's just not enough pressure between the die and the heatsink for this paste... not easy to fix though. You could bend the mounting clips up a bit... anything else would require a hardware modification.

I'm not sure what a good temperature is for your system, but you certainly shouldn't be higher than with the stock paste.

ICD is a more viscous paste, doesn't "bake out" as fast in my experience, but a fresh repaste with MX-4 and ICD always got me about the same results. Also the last time I was messing with a Clevo I used MX-4 as well and got good results.

That looks excellent to me. You did plug in the fan, right?

You say the temps are ok, how high are they actually? After gaming a while and during idle?

It's odd that this behavior appears apparently out of nothing. You didn't update the drivers before this started happening? Or any other changes at the system? Do you overclock the GPU?

The black tape around the die is something certain vendors put their to prevent the thermal paste getting all over the tiny capacitors around the die, it doesn't have any other functionality and is not required.

All you need for a proper re-paste is cleaning the die as well as the heatsink, apply a relatively small dot of paste on the middle of the die and then mount the heatsink. I don't have pics just now, but if you search the forum you'll find several repaste guides with pics I think.

Which notebook are you using?