Topic: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 performance (+ 6x GPU in Windows 7 guide) (Read 7935 times)

I'm asking this for a OCN member.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1398219/official-bitcoin-litecoin-digitalcoin-and-all-crypto-currencies-club-and-general-information-thread/21470#post_26159113

Can you run 7 gpus by converting the M2 slot that can to PCIE ?

Tried the guide above with a AsRock BTC Pro H81 board and 6x Radeon 270 cards (not 270x). It doesn't work. When I select any of the three .inf files in the directory and then 7800 series (or any other series), it just says "The driver selected for this device does not support this version of Windows".

I have also tried modded drivers for v13.1 and also 13.12, however both never work in win7 OR win8.1 (I've been at this for a while now). This is because the modded files are not digitally signed. Disabling driver signing doesn't work after a restart or two even if you force the system to always operate in 'test mode'. Eventually the 6 GPU will show up all with yellow ! marks next to them because windows realises the drivers are not signed. Yes I have tried all 3-4 methods of disabling driver signing on all these OS. Signing the drivers using DSEO is supposed to be the #1 option in this situation, but in this case it is not practical because there are hundreds of files in the AMD driver package and it can only do one at a time via providing a direct link to the file... arduous.

Is that with 6 cards?

I've been trying BAMT out, unfortunately all my rigs took a performance hit using it regardless of board revision, so i'm back on Windows 7.

Teamviewer is bad to tweak with settings.

I have a Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3 Rev.4.0 with Sempron 145 and Gigabyte r9 280x (Rev2.0) too. I managed to get 730kh/s. Unfortunately, I've no Rev1.0 to do the comparison.

Does this method really work? I heard Win 7 can run 6x gpu, but its normally drivers and compatibility issues with hardware and such? So Yes to Win 7 6x gpu?

You aren't running Windows 7 then?

No, i have not. No need for that?

Modified drivers.

I run 6x 280x on win 7 too.

The issue may be the Sempron 145 while you use Teamviewer and CGwatcher. Shutdown both and plug the rig to a monitor.

Get http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx and check CPU usage of System, Interrupts and the rest. Then change the priority of cgminer to "High" or "Realtime"

But of course, a single-core CPU is asking for trouble. The Sempron 190 is preferable, even more when one is using plenty of addon software on the rig

Out of interest, have you tried unlocking the second core?

We can both have a beer then Let me know if you run into any problems!

1JdAeyeKuWiVfc6yEs2vQjc6ppfuGqWE7Y

No issues here.

I have the Rev 4.0 board in two machines running six Gigabyte 270s in each. The cards get 480-490khs/s.

I am also using a Sempron 145.

dude if your method works,when i attempt it sometime next week, il be sure to tip you for that. Txt me ur address .

I think I'm onto something in regards to my original problem.

I noticed that my best performing machines (revision 1.0) both have Sempron 145's that have unlocked to Athlon II X2 4450e's thanks to the default BIOS config. I disabled the extra core (making them Sempron 145's again) and their hashrates dropped from ~755 per card down to ~700 per card.

Unfortunately the Sempron 145's in my revision 4.0 machines won't let me unlock the extra core. Most likely this is because of the CPUs themselves, as it's down to luck whether a Sempron 145 can have the extra core unlocked or not.

I'm going to try swapping the CPUs around when I get a chance to see if this is the cause.

Sure, let me know if you have any problems following my instructions:

How to run six Radeon 280X cards in Windows 7

STEP 1:

Start with a clean install of Windows 7 (I use Pro), install the ethernet driver, then get it up to date with Windows Update.

DON'T install any other drivers.

STEP 2:

Download the 13.1 driver from TechPowerUp:

13-1_vista_win7_win8_64_dd_ccc_whql.exe

@ http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/2196/amd-catalyst-13-1-software-suite-vista-7-64-bit/mirrors

STEP 3:

Run 13-1_vista_win7_win8_64_dd_ccc_whql.exe.

Click 'Install'.

'AMD Catalyst Install Manager' will appear -- DON'T progress with the installation, click 'Cancel' instead.

'Exit Catalyst Install Manager?' -- click 'Yes'.

STEP 4:

Go to Start Menu > Control Panel > System > Device Manager > and expand 'Display adapters'.

Right click the display adapter that corresponds to a Radeon 280X and click 'Update Driver Software...'

Click 'Browse my computer for driver software'.

Click 'Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer'.

Click 'Have Disk...'.

Paste the following path into the 'Copy manufacturer's files from:' box:

C:\AMD\Support\13-1_vista_win7_win8_64_dd_ccc_whql\Packages\Drivers\Display\W86A_INF

Click 'OK'.

Select 'AMD Radeon HD 7800 Series'.

Click 'Next'.

Your screen will flicker while the driver is installed. This may take a while.

Eventually you will see 'Windows has successfully updated your driver software'.

Click 'Close'.

STEP 5:

Go to Start Menu > Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Services

Locate the following three services:

'AMD External Events Utility'
'Desktop Window Manager Session Manager'
'Themes'

Right-click each of these and click 'Properties'.

Click 'Stop' if it is not already greyed out.

Open the 'Startup' drop-down list and select 'Disabled'.

Click 'Apply', and then 'OK'.

Repeat for each of the three services.

STEP 6:

REBOOT YOUR SYSTEM.

STEP 7:

Go to C:\AMD\Support\13-1_vista_win7_win8_64_dd_ccc_whql\Packages\Apps\OpenCL64

Run 'OpenCL.msi' and click 'Next >', 'Next >', agree to the terms, then 'Install'.

STEP 8:

Run CGMiner 3.7.2 (or Kalroth, SGMiner, etc).

Grab a beer 

Please do. I have revision 4 of the board and i can't get more than 4 running. The other two are detected by windows but is being shut down with error code 43

Thanks

6x 280x on Windows 7? Do tell how you accomplished that. The most tahiti cores I could squeak out on W7 was 5.

Nah, it is the same for 1 GPU and teamviewer doesn't effect that much of performance..

Motherboard shouldn't effect that much..

There has to be the same amount of GPUs on both rigs to get an accurate comparison of performance.  especially on windows systems and especially with teamviewer running.