Topic: SAVE money - undervolting 7970 XFX, self made VBE7 bios = TABLE OF CONTENTS = - page 8. (Read 56601 times)

Finally someone with the same card as me (the V6 version) achieving undervolting!
Going to read this very carefully and try it out myself if confident enough

Thank you so much for sharing. Let's see if I can get this 27$ct/kWh snorting machine to work more efficient

I'll report.

Regards,

Hertog.

Has anyone checked (indirectly) measured power consumption against what hardware sensors are showing? (input amps * input volts on VRM 1&2)

Wondering how accurate they are.

Now that it's freezing outside, some of my 7970s got down to 25C GPU and 18°C VRM temps  In fact I slowed down the fans till they went up to 45C or so, less noise from the mining room.
I always run them efficiently (700 kh/s with 1.025V set 0.965 actual) but with temps going down power draw is showing very very low in GPU-z. 135-140W input (DC)

Go for it, you will already save A LOT OF energy with undervolting only. If all this here inspires you to undervolt, that's brilliant already.
 

If you want to keep your 773khs, but still want to save at least some juice, then you can go for what I called "optimum (B)" in posting #28 = just undervolting, no sweet-spot-underclocking.

Then you are a very lucky person.

Perhaps your government doesn't care about the environment so much, or it affords a massive army to secure low energy costs?

There is a huge difference between 0.12$ and 0.35$ per kWh.



Oh, just look at what we achieved here. I am down by 119Watts compared to the factory settings, 7970+7850.
Marcje speaks about now only 400 Watt from the wall, for two 7970! And before the same system was using 600Watts.

When I started, I was shocked how much money I lost on electricity, it was actually more than 40% of my total coinvalue. Since then, I have been sometimes more clever or lucky with more coins per day, but on average at the moment GPU mining is not very lucrative. Especially in countries which want to implement renewables, and take the whole population to pay for the transition.


Have a look at the principle that I am using in my thinking, and prove me wrong, please:

Kilowatthours (1kWh = 1000W running for 1hour, or 42W running for 24 hours ) are a way to speak about the total energy consumption, usually measured in Joule.  Watt is Joule per second.

The hashing GAIN is per second (measured in coins per second), and the Joule LOSS is per second (measured in Watt).

So the calculation we need to do is

GAIN: The hashing GAIN per time (measured in average BTC that I make per month)
MINUS
LOSS: The wattpower, that is the energy per time that we use up to do it (measured on your monthly electricity bill)
GIVES the
PROFIT per time

Doesn't it?


But I agree, if you are in a country with cheap energy ...
OR if I am in those lucky days of very high profitability, e.g. during a coinstart ...

... then it makes sense to loosen all breaks, and just go fullpower into earning as much as possible per time.
Just forget about the electricity, on those days or in those countries, then ... the electricity costs (or pollution) are ... negligible.

We do, have another look - in posting #68 you can find our values for WattTotal (including motherboard, CPU, etc.).

Always mention the khash please.

Very true. I lack the comparison, but I also went for a Gold level. And to drive them at slightly above the middle of their max wattage is the most economic spot, actually. Go to page three here, top left diagram.


That's very efficient. My (7970+7850) system is now optimized at 2.95 khash/totalWatt, too. 911khash with 309 Watt total from the wall.


But to subtract the baseline makes sense for optimization. I have only one 7970, but if someone with more GPUs wants to relate to my measurements, she can just multiply the values. Subtracting 81W for all (g)pu (d)isable baseline consumption, my 7970+7850 GPU combination is hashing 911khash/s with only 228Watt for the GPUs now - so I have reached an average GPU efficiency of 4.00 khash / Watt!

Yiehah!


EDIT: More about the Watt measurement process in posting #25

k, thx I'll check on of these days when I have the time again.
729 isn't very high though, my other 280x cards go @ 773kHs on stock voltages. I havent tried lowering the voltages yet, I probably can a bit.
Here is my question though: As long as I make near 3x as much money with my mining than what I am spending on electricity, I have to lower power consumption at least 30% for every 10% of hashing power I lose for underclocking and undervolting. Right? That sounds hard to do, that would mean that my powerconsumption needs to come down more than 100W, I find that hard to believe that it will...

I wish you guys would use your total system draw :/ When I saw the figures of > 3 I was amazed but then realised how you are assuming a base-line.

So far mine are not very optimal at all. One test bench rig with 2 x Gigabyte 280X's is drawing 545W total system. Another with 4 x XFX @ stock (2 x standard edition, 2 x black ed) is drawing about 1300W total system.

These are both with Gold level PSU's.. another important thing to remember when quoting power draw figures!

The best I've seen so far is 3khash/W total system from a 3 x ASUS 280X TOP rig drawing 702W with each card about 705-708khash/s

My only idea now is ... to measure longer. Watts can be fluctuating about 15-20 W, so I always watch the Wattmeter for a minute or two, and then guess an average. If you do that, you might notice that there actually is a small difference in Watts between 1.094V and 1.025V?

1.256V stock voltage sounds to me, as if the card was perhaps intended to be overclocked?

729kh/s is impressively high. If you don't pay for electricity, that is.
Please measure the Watts in two situations: at 729kh/s, and at "OFF" when you (g)pu (d)isable the cards in cgminer. Please report back both values.


And then try out, if you can find a khash/Watt optimizing sweet spot like the (C) that I describe in posting #28. Please come back to us with details if you can find such a sweet spot for your card.

It's actually 1500/(575-165) = 3.66 for the GPUs only ... which is indeed very very good, considering that you run your cards at the khash limit.

That's not bad. But you should have a look how you can save some of those 165W.

My new rig with two cards (7970 & 7850) at optimal SweetSpot settings takes 309 Watts, for 911 khash, that's 2.95 khash/WattTotal.
And marcje with his two 7970 seems to get even: 2*586 / 370 = 3.17 khash/WattTotal:

Yes, please do that. Or let your rig run for me for a while (see bottom of post #50)


Very much. Thanks.  Watercooling is another way, I can see that now. And low temperature is paramount; 85 or 90 degrees Celsius - and I read that quite often here - is just crazy.

Thanks a lot, Aaroenz0r.  What are you taking away from this?  Have you tried any of the settings?  

New alltimehigh khash! TheStilt BIOS + PSW kernel

1) I got a TheStilt optimized BIOS, and tried it out;
2) then modified it myself to enable undervolting (like in posting #45), and flashed that into my card with atiflash.
3) upped the thread-concurrency from 8192 to the supposedly magical 8193,
4) replaced the scrypt130511.cl by a modified Scrypt kernel by psw, and
5) tried out many, and found the undervolted settings ... CC=1054, MC=1500, V=1.065V ... to give the highest khash, stable at lowest voltage.
6) System has been running loud but well for more than 27 hours.
7) So now I report back :-)

GOOD news: I could get up to beforehand unreachable 720 khash/s. That is 28 khash more than with my best unvervolted-overclocked settings (B) - very nice gain of 4% hashpower = that's like a bonus of 9 euros on the 229 euros purchase price of the 7970 GPU.

BUT:

• The fan is faster. No more silence :-)
• Temperature is higher, at ~74C
• Electricity consumption is 275W (that is 275W more than with (g)pu (d)isable)

And most importantly, the resulting 720/275 = 2.62 khash/Watt are less optimal than my settings (B), and much worse than at my so far best sweet spot (C) with 3.78 khash/Watt.

So:
Unfortunately, all these changes did not give more khash or less Watt for that sweet spot (C) underclocked undervolted  CC=854, MC=799, V=0.893 settings. So TheStilt-BIOS (plus 18khash) and the PSW-kernel (plus 10khash) ... which help to push up the upper limit of khash/s ... at the expense of more juice ... are good news for (miners who steal electricity or) miners in countries like Egypt, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Bhutan, Iran, Pakistan, Russia, Nigeria, Ukraine, Venezuela, Argentina, Myanmar, Surinam, Serbia, Macedonia, Thailand, Uzbekistan, Jordan, Canada, Korea South, Vietnam, Dubai, Taiwan, Malaysia, Nepal, China, Paraguay, India, South Africa, or ... United States.

For the rest of us, especially in the the cleaner countries, the old optimum (C) "undervolted underclocked sweet spot" is still the best.

Keep on optimizing!



P.S.: Let's spread the word, imagine the altcoin network starts saving 1/4, 1/3 or even 1/2 of electricity.

Hey guys.
I have a Gigabyte 280x OC and had to lower the voltages otherwise it would crash my pc even on stock speeds.
I currently run it @ 1050/1500 @ 1.025V but tbh I don't see a difference in powerdraw between 1.094V and my current 1.025V, I might even be able to get it lower that 1.025, haven't tried yet. I get about 729kh/s. Am sure I can change the voltages because before I changed it, it instantly shuts down my pc. And when I looked at the voltage meter when it was on stock voltage (1.256V crazy huh?) it gets up to 500W!

Any ideas why both voltage settings draw about the same from the wall?

Thx. It's a very interesting task :-) If only I could persuade myself to day trade more often, or how do you guys make money?  I am still hoping, this work here is appreciated and thus brings tips, or even some patronage of a bitcoin millionaire :-).  Let's save energy!

sounds like a lot of electricity ... for average khash.

The good aspect of this approach here is that you take your original ROM, and then you tweak only 1, or 3 values in it. So the "couldn't find a rom that even worked" thing should be solved.

Please share your ROMs with us (before & after). Or post at least your original ROM, then I can create you an undervolted one.
For use of others, please give us 1) the exact name (white sticker on the box) - might be "11197-03-40G", and 2) the ASIC quality.  

Yes. And I sleep in the same room. Quiet.
And they remaining heat full replaces heating, good in winter.  

Keep us updated about your progress.

Let's try.

You have a wattmeter? Observe it also during booting up your system.

Ok,

so cards idle everything cooled down.

primary card 35 degrees celcius, secondary card 28 (msi afterburner)

power consumption 165 watts idle


at full load , fans full blast the cards reach 52 degrees, drawing 575 watts of power.

575-165 = 400 watts from the gpu's, resulting in 1500/400 = 3.75 khash per watt correct? Or do you guys include the whole system, in that case 1500/575 = 2.61 khash/watt.

I hope this data was usefull.

I got a great deal, 2 7970 + full cover waterblocks for only 430 euro!

My point wasn't watercooling per se, but in general to keeping your videocards cool. Something that isn't generally spoken about on this forum, especially about the amazing impact it has on power usage!

For me personally, it was worth it. I sleep in the same room as the pc, and the pc is virtually silent. the loudest noise comes from the HDD...

Thx :-)


You did that? How?


With the stock BIOS, the voltage is not adjustable at all.
And in VBE7, there is only one VDDC that can be edited.


Amazing initiative, thank you very much for that link.
I am queuing with my BIOSes, let's see what magic the man can do.

Yes, the table on his first page made me think, if that is the reason for the abrupt loss of khash at the threshold 799/801 memory clock:

 ? ? ? ? If that is the case, then that table might lead us to find new sweet spots.


I am so much looking forward to that.

Thanks, Grim - another cool name :-)

because it sounds messy :-)  No, perhaps you are right, it's really a thing to consider. How much extra costs is it per rig, per card?

Comparing that to what marcje has posted:
is difficult, because your rig-consumption baseline might just be higher.

Can you please do one quick experiment for us, both of you, Aaroenz0r and marcje:
cgminer: (g)pu (d)isable   ... both cards, then wait 5-10 minutes for cooling down, slowing down of fan. Then measure the Watts.
that way we can actually compare your khash/Watt for the GPUs.

Wow. That is ... cool.


And 75 watt would be 14 euros per month for us over here. However, I see only about 15-20W less for 55C vs 65C when the card is heating up (difficult to measure as it is a rather fast transition) But for sure more heat equals more Watts.

You can use 5 of these cards with a 1200W PSU Easily when undervolted, maybe even with a 1000W PSU

Very interesting read.
Mine are currently at 1.087 vddc, 1000 core and 1700 mem for 650kh/s (and top card is ~78c both with 100% fan).

I'm using Sapphire 7970s Dual-X OC with Boost.
I flashed them both and for ages couldn't find a rom that even worked, let alone gave me > 700 as everyone suggested was possible.

This looks really good for reducing wear on the cards and saving energy bills! Will take a longer look into this.

Do you think it'd be possible with these settings to have 4 cards on one power supply? Maybe even 5?
e.g. Get a 1200W/1500W? Platinum/Gold and it would be able to power all 5 + cpu/mobo etc?

Nice thread!

Why dont you guys also lower your MEMORY voltage?
With only 799 mhz this should be easily possible and reduce wattage even more.

Or is the memory voltage not adjustable with these xfx models?


Besides that I assume that at memory clock of 800+mhz the TIMINGS of the memory go up.
See Stilts thread here for more info: https://litecointalk.org/index.php?topic=12369.0

Stilt can also tighten the memory timings so that you could maybe even go lower with your memory clock.
Tighter timings use less wattage than higher clocks so another factor you could reduce wattage with.

Why don't you guys just switch to watercooling?

My 2 xfx (reference design) @ 1060/1760 do 750 khash each. 1050mv core voltge, 1550mv mem voltage

system pulls 570 watt, and de card won't go above 52 degrees.

Increase of 10 degrees results in ~75 watt more power out of the socket, so keep you cards cool people!

Im running the cc=854 mc=799 config and its just working smooth, 1 card does the job with .955v and cant go any lower while the other is stable at .895v. The cards only get to 65C with 55% fanspeed so its really great!

The power consumption on the system before was like 600W, now its at 370W so thats a 230W decrease which is just alot! Thankyou for that!:)

I am gonna send you some doge's when i get home!:)