Is overclocking Xfire HD4870's possible? if so...how?

[Adam Noble]

Hi Guys/Gal's

I am planning on upgrading from my Xfire 48702's to some Xfire 6x series but i don't have the funds yet, in the mean time i want to try playing with overcloking them, i already have the modded A10 BIOS chilling at 3% overclock, 5% if i know i am going to be doing some modeling.

Anyway is there any way to overclock the 4870's? or is it only the 5x series that can be overclocked?

[svl7]

Should work just as fine as with the 5xxx series. I've never worked with 4870ms, but I'd say get TriXX and see whether it works. You might also be able to increase the voltage a little bit and push the card even further, just try whether it works.

Once you've found a nice stable overclock you can still edit the vbios and flash it to the cards, so you don't have to use software for overclocking.

[Adam Noble]

Should work just as fine as with the 5xxx series. I've never worked with 4870ms, but I'd say get TriXX and see whether it works. You might also be able to increase the voltage a little bit and push the card even further, just try whether it works.

Once you've found a nice stable overclock you can still edit the vbios and flash it to the cards, so you don't have to use software for overclocking.

Wow looks like a nice bit of software, i shall download have a have a play with it

Thanks svl7

[Brian]

Here are some additional overclocking tutorials found on our main site: Miscellaneous Tutorials | Tech|Inferno

[Adam Noble]

Thanks for the reply's guys, downloaded the programs and have bookmarked the web pages ready for the weekend, got a few assignments due so going to get them done before i start messing with the deadly stuff lol

[svl7]

Cool, let us know when you start benching

[Adam Noble]

Right i have found a few worrying things while getting ready for some benches, i will put down what i have done first just in case it was something i did that is causing the problems;

Installed Modded A10 bios and set an overclock of 5% nothing else changed.

Installed TRIXX and made all changed needed for it to run.

Installed RivaTuner and made all changes needed to run.

Right the problems....

When increasing voltages at bios level (both med and high increase) for RAM i think the computer wont boot correctly, when i power on the fans go into overdrive but no sign of life, no display and no USB power but strange enough i get AlienFX lighting :S

When overclocking the GPU i get a BSOD during gaming, lower the lvl of OC the longer i get, the higher the lvl the short i get before a "display adapter timeout failed to recover" BSOD, whether its TRIXX or Rivatuner, monitoring tempts shows no temp rising problem as they stay cool. so anything above normal clock speed or voltage ends in BSOD

I noticed this when i started playing the new ANNO 2070 and Skyrim, i will get a nice 120 FPS on ultra (with tweaks) for about 8 mins followed by 2 mins of around 10-20 FPS slowdown that kills combat I have been trying to find out what is causing this problem but using programs to monitor processor speed, RAM voltage and GPU stats shows no fluctuations so i can quite find out what is the problem.

I already have my new GPU's on back order so if it turns out to be my existing cards then i am sort of ready but if it is a CPU problem i am stuffed

Any suggestions?

[StamatisX]

Try to OC only the GPUs first, check if you get any BSOD, if not then proceed with the CPU OC

[Adam Noble]

I will try that now, would CPU OC cause problems for GPU OC? or is it more of a power problem when OC everything?

[mw86]

I will try that now, would CPU OC cause problems for GPU OC? or is it more of a power problem when OC everything?

if overclocking baseclock 133mhz on first gen i7 or 100mhz second gen... you are overclocking PCI express on Second gen Sandybridge so that can hinder things a little... but first gen had it better since much less was linked to baseclock.. so i think your first gen so no worries about pci clocks... just keep in mind it still raises ram speed at same time. Yes if the cpu overclock is slightly unstable it causes whole system instability even in games... usually its either cpu runs fine everythings good, or the cpu throttles causing stuttering or bsod because 1.voltage not high enough or too high, ram overclock too high, or cpu speed too high.

[Adam Noble]

Right i tried reverting back to stock speeds and voltages and i still think it is having a problem but i am more suspicious towards some kind of throttling now as that seems to be the kind of behavior, game runs fine for some time before it slows down followed by another speed up ect.... it does sound a lot like it is cutting back then maxing out again, it cant be a GPU problem as it is on the lowest settings possible and i still get the stuttering at the same times :/

[Blitz]

throttling for sure i had the same issue with bf3 then i repasted with stock clocks on my 5870's now i'm running 900 mhz and 1200 mhz on memory on the gpus and its running nice and cool download this play the game and then check you temps after

HWiNFO64 Download

hwinfo64 for 64 bit windows

or hwinfo32 for 32 bit..

[Adam Noble]

Hi Blitz, downloaded that software and it looks awesome, very nice build and very helpful..........but what do i do with it? simply run the game and check the stats reported?

[Adam Noble]

Right i have run some monitors and the thing went crazy sitting idle

EDIT: Right i am not happy with those temps at idle, going to open it op over the weekend and replace all the thermal pads/paste and clean it all out....on a better note i seem to have gained 30 mins battery life from somewhere :S and back to a more depressing note it seems the place i ordered the new 6x cards does not have anymore in stock and emailed me to inform me that they have no plans in replenishing the stock :/ so back onto the interwebz for another scrounge.

Edited November 24, 2011 by Adam Noble

[Adam Noble]

Right i decided to open my R2 up today and clean out the heat sinks on the GPU's and the CPU along with the fans, other than cracking my touch controls and breaking a bracket that holds the right hand side down all went well....only took 7 disassemblies, two prying tools and a can of air laptop is running quite smooth and cool for now but i am recording temps as i speak to compare with yesterdays recording still need to test some games but a new version of CCC has been released so i need to make sure it was the cleaning and not the upgrade that solved the FPS drops, will update when i have done a day or so of recording.