What is a ULPS ?

Discussion in 'Videocards - AMD Radeon Drivers Section' started by BenchAndGames, Apr 19, 2012.

  1. BenchAndGames

    BenchAndGames Master Guru

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    What is a ULPS ? What is its function ?
    I have understood that can save energy, if you have a second card, disabling this second card when not needed.

    Having a CrossFireX, it is always recommended to disable the ULPS ?

    If so, whenever you install a new driver you have to disable it ?

    Disabling the ULPS, it really helps solve screen crashes or games, and may even decrease the microstuttering ?

    I hope your help to my questions.
    thanks
     
  2. bouuman

    bouuman Guest

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    Yes ULPS is kind a energy saving mode, but you really wand to save energy if you are playing BF3? :D I guess not.
    So go to your regeistry (run: regedit) and search for "EnableUlps" and set it to "0".
    The laggs and game-crashes will be fixed.
     
  3. Thalyn

    Thalyn Guest

    ULPS quite literally stands for Ultra-Low Power State. Think of it as a stand-by state for your graphics card(s). The idea is that when your displays are ordered into stand-by mode by the OS, the graphics card does the same and powers down everything that may be necessary to actually put a picture on the screen (presumably in conjunction with lowering its clocks). It also appears to affect secondary cards in Crossfire setups, turning them "off" when they're not in use.

    Ideally it shouldn't have any effect at all when that's not happening, but various reports exist which say that disabling it has a positive effect. If you don't use stand-by features (like myself) than there's no harm at all in disabling it. No harm disabling it otherwise, either - just be aware that the card could be drawing 10w+ (depending on model, clock speeds, voltages, etc) over what it needs to when your system is on but the screens are in stand-by. Crossfire systems will draw that much more per extra card, even with the screens active.

    This has the marketing write-up of it. Look down the bottom in the AMD ZeroCore Power Technology section.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Apr 19, 2012
  4. BenchAndGames

    BenchAndGames Master Guru

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    Thanks for the replies, I had seen before and turn it off, and I really have noticed one thing.
    When the ULPS had it on, when I was surfing the internet, always put the MSI AB temperature applications of the second GPU to 0° C.

    If running a game or application, then automatically the second GPU began to show its temperature applications, but when he stopped playing, no showed more temperature.

    It is as if the second GPU will be disabled.

    But now with the ULPS off, always shows me the temperature, though I'm not playing.
     
    Last edited: Apr 19, 2012

  5. Thalyn

    Thalyn Guest

    With ULPS enabled, the second card will turn off completely when it's not being used. Since it's not doing anything, monitoring its temperature is redundant.

    I suspect it may also require at least some of the regulation circuitry to be enabled in order to take such a reading, which means unnecessary power usage for what is effectively an irrelevant measurement. The assumption can generally be made that it's at exactly the same temperature as whatever temperature is ambient inside your case (which will likely be a couple of degrees above room temperature).

    Disabling it means the second card will never completely power off. Hence it's giving a reading.
     
  6. Extraordinary

    Extraordinary Guest

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    For CFX its advised to disable ULPS to stop some micro-stutter and other problems during gaming

    Search the registry for enableULPS and change any instance from 1 to 0, ignore the other entry I have put a X next to

    [​IMG]
     
  7. Pill Monster

    Pill Monster Banned

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  8. Extraordinary

    Extraordinary Guest

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    I know its a FP due to it altering the registry but NOD32 is a PITA to add exceptions to each time and if you move the exe the exception doesnt work anymore :)
     
  9. HonoredShadow

    HonoredShadow Ancient Guru

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    MSE won't let me download either.
     
  10. BenchAndGames

    BenchAndGames Master Guru

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    Thank you all for your help !
     

  11. John Larsen

    John Larsen Banned

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    Try that ULPS_control from Atiman.

    Enable or Disable ULPS with question and restart system automatically, very fast.

    This tool included in Atiman Uninstaller 6.3.1.
     
  12. Pill Monster

    Pill Monster Banned

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    Yeah Yeah whatever Mr ATIMAN...:rolleyes:
     
  13. IPlayNaked

    IPlayNaked Banned

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    Disabling ULPS is not advisable unless you're having problems specifically attributed to it. It allows your second card to go to sleep and consume very little power. To disable it if you're not having problems with just cause you to consume more power for no reason.
     
  14. BenchAndGames

    BenchAndGames Master Guru

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    I understand, but had read on other forums, it is advisable to disable it if you use CrossFire, because you can fix several crashes and problems of micro-stuttering.

    And I can say that after disabling the ULPS, the truth that the only game I was having problems of micro-stuttering, now you do not have this problem, I'm talking about the Battlefield 3.
     
  15. Espionage724

    Espionage724 Guest

    Is disabling ULPS worth it on single-gpu setups? I hear about it mostly dealing with Crossfire
     

  16. HonoredShadow

    HonoredShadow Ancient Guru

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    I don't get crashes or micro-stuttering. I don't disable anything. I don't customise anything.

    I just make sure I use very little 3rd party software apart from Afterburner and only use official drivers as I had a lot of problems in the past regarding the above with betas.

    Also I don't overclock to much. In fact I just let the AMD driver just overclock for me and be done. A little bit more overclock and it will probably not help fps or stability and the above issues again.

    Some of you guys 'tweak' to much. Leave the PC alone once you have installed Windows! I use to tweak but it's not worth it nowadays. For the most part I blame user error. :nerd:
     
    Last edited: Apr 20, 2012
    Kuss likes this.
  17. DavidGX

    DavidGX Active Member

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    The fabled "zero core" stuff never works for me. I have two 7970s and the second card stays activated to matter what. Once or twice right after I installed new drivers it worked, but then after a reboot no dice. I've given up on it.
     
  18. BenchAndGames

    BenchAndGames Master Guru

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    And what third-party program, you are using?
     
  19. HonoredShadow

    HonoredShadow Ancient Guru

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    :nerd:
     
  20. IPlayNaked

    IPlayNaked Banned

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    Are you using afterburner or some other monitoring software?

    HOw can you tell they aren't going to sleep?
     

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