I consider my Avalon batch#3 unit a nice done product. It came with a 850 W PS. It's an Enermax Gold able to put 840W on 12V. Out the box Avalon unit can run much higher then specifications.
But I'm not so sure that it will be able to pay itself, even overclocked like this
So I'm willing to try to push it more. I believe there are two problems which need to be solved:
- Cooling is less then optimal. The modules (heatsinks) are much hotter at the end. But the exhausted air it's only warm. I have some ideas of how cooling can be improved.
- Voltage on the chips must be raised a little. It's now around 1150mV (both from schematics and measurements). Specification of the chip is 1200mV. I believe it will be no problem to push it around 1240mV, which I hope it will allow it to run at 375MHz. But this will mean ~25% more power, so cooling has to be solved first. And this would be a hardware mod, 40 resistors to solder.
Can a voltage increase be safely done w/o drawing to much current through the power circuitry? Cuz they are only rated for something like 20 amps, and I thought at default voltage / clocks we are pushing pretty close to that....