RX Vega Owners Thread, Tests, Mods, BIOS & Tweaks ! (cont.)

Can someone explain in detail to me the behavior of vega boost algorithm?

 

Guys please check this thread (Now VLK w/Async for almost any game )

-> https://forums.guru3d.com/threads/dxvk-1-7-1-a-vulkan-based-translation-layer-for-dx-9-10-11.433720/

 

Hello. I tried on many games, be aware that some you just lower the performance, ARK is a good example.

But on most of them you really get a performance boost.

 

Hey guys! I’m having some weird issues with my Vega 64. As you may know, mine is UVed to 1050mV and HBMs OCed and UVed to 1100MHz/1030mV, and watercooled in my full custom loop. With every 2021 driver release, or at least it started there, after 30-60min of gaming I have 2 seconds of 5fps and then my PC hangs (but the audio keeps playing), at least in AC Odyssey, GTA V and Detroit Become Human. I have to click the reset button of it to restart. If I lower the frequency by 5 or 10 MHz it’s stable until I stop gaming (since I’m studying, I’m playing two stints of 2h each a day, more or less), but the next gaming session I have to do the same, since it hangs the same way. Why the hell it’s stable after the first change of clocks but the next day isn’t????
I didn’t have time to test it at stock settings, BTW, and I already wiped the drivers with DDU and reinstalled the latest version, but today I’m going to do the same but install the last 2020 drivers. I REALLY hope it isn’t a hardware issue, since there are exactly ZERO new 6800XTs available at MSRP (as I’m going to upgrade to a 6800XT only, or I’m going to keep the Vega).

 

I had an ENORMOUS success with it in AC Origins (doubled the minimums from 25 to 50, and reduced by a lot the framerate variance), but I lose around 15% performance in Odyssey.

 

Update: With 20.12.1 drivers it's stable, so that's the second time in 10 years of Radeons that AMD drivers have a bad issue for me (the first one was around a year and half ago, memory leak with Forza Horizon 3)

 

Spoke too soon. Same exact issue. SH!!!!T.

 

So I flashed a Saphire Vega 64 Nitro+ edition (non Limited edition) with a 165watt bios and my thermal & stability problems are all solved.
I should really crank the fan speed to get proper temperatures <70°C even on 210w stock bios (it has a bios switch with higher performance
240w bios too which is more thermal intensive) but now I am ok with medium fan speed. Also I had some black screens
here and there changing gaming drivers from 20.9.1 to 20.9.2 on stock bios but after flashing 165w bios and installing Radeon Pro suite 20.Q4
I am perfectly stable ever since. This 165w bios can ONLY use pro suite but I can swap to high performance bios (240watt) through the card's
switch and it instantly switches to gaming suite on first boot and it recommends a restart for changes to take place.

I did some benchmarks which I will upload soon.
Card is recognised as gfx901 instead of gfx900 at OpenCL information. I will upload more when I find some time to organize information.

Links to conversation on videocardz
Link to BIOS download file

Here have a taste:

 

So you effectively gimped a card that should (if/when operating properly) have no problem at all handling around 300watts?

What do the sensors (gpu temp, hbm temp, hotspot, vrm1/2 and so on) report?

Have you tried cleaning the card, changing the thermal grease etc? What about undervolting it (no oc)?

I find it very difficult to believe that a Nitro+ behaves so badly (power/thermal wise), if it's not ready to die.

 

You can do 150-185tW NP only by UV the Beast
Try to run it at:

1630MHz at 1.025v
HBM2 at 925MHz w 1.025v
Give 0% POW

Then try to Mem OC up to CL16....

 

I think its Sapphire only bios. Doesn't work on my Strix Vega 64

 

Always referring to 100% load scenarios (rare cases) I recorded a small session in 165w bios just to understand how much heat this thing outputs (to have a comparison I will do another one for the 240w bios when I have time).
So the stock fans are already audible over 40% load around 1610rpm(and no I am not supersensitive heck I love listening to my 15k SAS HDD working).
I set this value by hand in afterburner and I loaded a standard GPUZ benchmark. Interestingly we can see how the card is downclocking in combination to downvolting a bit trying to respect this wattage limit (which it really respects I can say). Vega has a hotspot hardlimit at 105c and this is the same for this BIOS too. Giving this is the best case scenario having fans at max non-annoying-audible speed getting a hotspot of 85c on this BIOS and you can imagine what the 210/240 stock BIOS would be. I know this is a turbo-overbuilt card and this is one reason I admire it but I am not down pushing it. I use this temp BIOS solution before moving to a Raijintek Morpheus + Noctua fans. Then I am tempted to sale it because it really goes up to 500eu in Europe and I have a 7970 for a backup so I could wait and trade it for a 3060ti /3070 when prices normalize (I hope until August kek). Another thing this has a different inferior cooling design than the Limited edition one which has a copper chamber solution.
*I repasted 3 months ago with Arctic silver 5 so thats out of the way. I also have an airblower so its turboclean 24/7/365.

Spoiler: GPUZ LOG

Code:

        Date        , GPU Clock [MHz] , Memory Clock [MHz] , GPU Temperature [°C] , GPU Temperature (Hot Spot) [°C] , Memory Temperature [°C] , SOC VRM Temperature [°C] , Mem VRM Temperature [°C] , Fan Speed (%) [%] , Fan Speed (RPM) [RPM] , GPU Load [%] , Memory Used (Dedicated) [MB] , Memory Used (Dynamic) [MB] , GPU Chip Power Draw [W] , VDDC [V] , CPU Temperature [°C] , System Memory Used [MB] ,
2021-02-11 19:15:53 ,        1588.0   ,            945.0   ,               52.0   ,                          84.0   ,                1620.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1613   ,         96   ,                        224   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 1.1000   ,               35.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:15:54 ,        1588.0   ,            945.0   ,               52.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  54.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1617   ,         96   ,                        224   ,                       32   ,                 165.0   , 1.0938   ,               35.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:15:55 ,        1590.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                 1617.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1611   ,          0   ,                        224   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 0.9875   ,               36.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:15:56 ,        1596.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          84.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1611   ,         97   ,                        226   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               35.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:15:57 ,        1600.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          84.0   ,                  52.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1613   ,         95   ,                        226   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 0.9875   ,               36.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:15:58 ,        1606.0   ,            945.0   ,               52.0   ,                          84.0   ,                  52.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1611   ,         96   ,                        226   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 0.9875   ,               38.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:15:59 ,        1605.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  52.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1612   ,         95   ,                        227   ,                       32   ,                 163.0   , 1.0938   ,               36.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:00 ,        1600.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1614   ,         95   ,                        227   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               36.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:01 ,        1594.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1612   ,         96   ,                        227   ,                       32   ,                 163.0   , 1.1000   ,               36.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:02 ,        1598.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1612   ,         95   ,                        227   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               36.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:03 ,        1605.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          84.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1610   ,         94   ,                        226   ,                       32   ,                 165.0   , 0.9875   ,               37.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:04 ,        1604.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   54.0   ,              39   ,                1609   ,         94   ,                        228   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               35.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:05 ,        1607.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          84.0   ,                  52.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1614   ,         92   ,                        228   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               36.0   ,                  3316   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:06 ,        1605.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          84.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1607   ,         94   ,                        229   ,                       32   ,                 165.0   , 1.0938   ,               37.0   ,                  3317   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:07 ,        1597.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1607   ,         95   ,                        229   ,                       32   ,                 165.0   , 1.0938   ,               36.0   ,                  3317   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:08 ,        1594.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1605   ,         95   ,                        229   ,                       32   ,                 165.0   , 1.0938   ,               35.0   ,                  3317   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:09 ,        1587.0   ,            945.0   ,               52.0   ,                          83.0   ,                  54.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1610   ,         97   ,                        227   ,                       32   ,                 165.0   , 0.9875   ,               34.0   ,                  3317   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:10 ,        1590.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  54.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1610   ,         96   ,                        225   ,                       32   ,                 164.0   , 1.1000   ,               35.0   ,                  3317   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:11 ,        1591.0   ,            945.0   ,               52.0   ,                          84.0   ,                  54.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1609   ,         96   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               34.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:12 ,        1593.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1608   ,         95   ,                        227   ,                       33   ,                 163.0   , 1.0938   ,               35.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:13 ,        1600.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1611   ,         95   ,                        227   ,                       33   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               35.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:14 ,        1599.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1610   ,         95   ,                        227   ,                       33   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               34.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:15 ,        1600.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1609   ,         94   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               36.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:16 ,        1602.0   ,            945.0   ,               52.0   ,                          84.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1614   ,         92   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               35.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:17 ,        1608.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1611   ,         95   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 165.0   , 1.0938   ,               34.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:18 ,        1594.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  54.0   ,                   53.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1613   ,         96   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 165.0   , 0.9813   ,               34.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:19 ,        1587.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  54.0   ,                   54.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1611   ,         96   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 164.0   , 1.1000   ,               35.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:20 ,        1593.0   ,            945.0   ,               52.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   54.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1615   ,         96   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 165.0   , 1.0938   ,               36.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:21 ,        1596.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   54.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1610   ,         96   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 164.0   , 1.0938   ,               35.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:22 ,        1600.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   54.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1613   ,         94   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 163.0   , 1.0938   ,               36.0   ,                  3318   ,
2021-02-11 19:16:23 ,        1604.0   ,            945.0   ,               53.0   ,                          85.0   ,                  53.0   ,                   54.0   ,                   55.0   ,              39   ,                1614   ,         95   ,                        226   ,                       33   ,                 164.0   , 0.9875   ,               35.0   ,                  3318   ,

I really love tweaking but I am a purist too and I believe the default factory values are there for a reason and should be respected if one is to hold onto a product for a X amount of time. I really never OV/OCed anything over/under 15% because I believe and follow this mentality. I would prefer a card that draws 20% less power and is considerably cooler/quiter/relaxed to an hard overclocked one that gives me even 25% above its specs and running to its limit any day. Same goes for a lot of other products e.g cars. I really am intersted to know how the card's BIOS is working to respect the power draw limit and how is this compared to manual adjustments. Thx you very much for the recommendation by the way! I just have peace of mind to know this thing came from factory (=somewhat deadsafe cuz rma feedback too(?)).

I had to force it because It gave me a missmatch ID but thats normal cuz it really changes ID after flashing this BIOS! Whats not working with yours?
I searched around and found that this BIOS' specs are close to VEGA Nano BIOS specs but modded/hardlocked to be working as a Pro card (lmao).
Another thing that I found is that I can not boot without CSM enabled in my bios (X79 ASUS Rampage IV formula).

 

UV can/will extend the "lifespan" of a GPU IMhO
Less V = Less Heat & strain....

 

I already selected UEFI+LEGACY (I don't have anything else related to CSM so this must be it) and can't boot at all. Just black screen. But seems like windows is running at background because my keyboard got lights and stuff. I don't know it could be only happening to Strix versions or my GPU only.

Edit: I remembered that I formatted my windows with GPT and with only UEFI (non CSM) settings. I don't think that my 'not booting' problem is related to this settings I use but I'm going to try format again with MBR partition.

Edit2: Just as expected it doesn't change anything. Black screen problem persists.

 

Of course thats exactly my point! The only thing that is a hustle when you UV is the stability and this magic BIOS just puts away all the testing and does everything automatically "out of the box".
I ran 1hr of furmark and another half hr of Unigine benchmarks (Valley, Superposition, Heaven) each and had 0 hick ups 0. I stood there watching everybenchmark looping boring my life to death to just make sure nothing happends behind my back

I dont know how is VGA BIOS related to motherboard BIOS but from what I have searched on a bit it seems that some new cards can not boot into legacy BIOS (non CSM) mode (like old motherboards that are pure BIOS and do not support UEFI at all). If someone knows more about it please give input!

 

Well, something's definitely wrong with your card.

I have a V56 Pulse (inferior to every aspect regarding cooling capacity), on a 64 BIOS, and every single test I've made screams that the stock voltages are outrageous (99.9% of times).

I don't get the "default values are there for a reason" logic, but of course it's your choice.

Still, since you were willing to experiment with BIOS flashing, cross flashing actually, I think that you could sacrifice 1 hour (less, even) of your time to see where core uv will get you.

You don't have to use any 3rd party software or anything, just the driver's Wattman. Risk is minimal (non-existent, actually) and you'll find that just by reducing P6/7 voltages you will have a card that clocks better/higher, generates less heat, works (way) better.

Stability wise, you don't have to tune it down to the last mVolt. Set P7 to 1120mV, P6 to 1080mV and run TimeSpy Extreme (or any such bench, Superposition 1080X is also very sensitive). You'll probably be absolutely stable. Take the voltages down another 20mV and repeat the test...you'll probably be stable again. Repeat, you should be stable, but it's a 50% chance. If you don't want to tinker any more, go back to the previous settings, try some more benches/stability tests. You could use 10mV increments and see where this gets you.

That's it...you don't have to mess with Vram tuning (though Vegas are heavily memory b/w starved), you don't have to mess with anything else.

Give it a try.

By the way, are you absolutely sure that when you repasted the card every last screw got as tight as it should be? I had to do the whole process 5 or 6 times myself (but I changed the pads as well, and it was tricky) before I got it right. Core was fine, mem was fine, but hotspot was a nightmare.

edit: You can even use the auto undervolt feature that comes with the driver and see if it gives any satisfactory results.

 

yea i don't think hardly anybody uses afterburner to mess with vega....use overdriveNtool or similar, i have the same card i believe and have had very few problems with it outside of me trying to oc/uv to the limit which would understandably create stability issues

 

Stock values to anything are there for a reason and sometimes this reason is well documented in a white paper provided by the design team. Now this design team holds onto knowledge why this value is there holding onto very expensive,complicated testing methologies behind it. As example your car's engine has a piston wall of certain X .mm because the acclaimed/certified designer put this piston in a CAD simulation under certain variables in controled enviroment for X amount of turns then he represented this in real world scenarios and extensive tests so he finally figured WHY this X number needs to be used so your engine does not die (or if it dies he is the one to control when and how aka planned obsolescence.) This is the same with our scenario its just a VGA (an overbuilt one) not a car engine (relevant). There are almost always 4 ways to use a product but this extra robustness enables some more headroom to take advantage of.

1. This product gets modded to work above its specifications providing more performance because it handle it but you get less lifespan vs stock. How much less needs time, samples and experience to figure. (Or just OC it 30% then 2 years later and after a poor reflow some poor guy buys it on eBay listed as "office work never O/C." = I hate this.)
2. This product stays at default specs providing default performance but respecting the factory values and holding on that extra robustness/built quality you are allowed to use this product for a longer period of time.
3. The product gets modded to work under its specs so it underperforms but it sometimes worth the trade (mining comes to mind in our example).
4. Combination of the above. (UV/OC in this case)

Now I am into the no.2 mentality of the above but this card's cooling design does not allow it to work within specs. I have repasted this card 3 times with same paste (AS5) and having done tests from 2 of these times I got the same temps all around. I have pc built experience over 15 years and owned 3 heat intensive cards dual gpu vgas (ASUS ARES 2, EVGA GTX 295 CO OP, NVIDIA 590) so my mounting and repasting skills are out of question. This Vega is a kid's toy to me. Another thing (does not account that much though) is that my motherboard is oriented downwards so the Vega heatsink is actually pulled onto the actual chip helped by gravity a bit (yea this does not compare to the bracket clamping force but still +5newtons (around 500+gramms i guess)).

On the card UV process or any process altering factory values,
I would only do it if I could mod the BIOS but since it is digitally signed, any attempt to boot a vega card with the vbios modified will result in a failed checksum of which the vega gpu's integrated security processor will shut down the card. OverdriveNtool /powerplay methods are a workaround to me and their stability/effectiveness solely depends on the driver/OS and its services(.NET). Every serious modder having stability and effectiveness in mind would only trust BIOS modding heck even actual hardware hardmodding. Everything else is an inferior alternative workaround and this is known for ages.
Now I am given a BIOS from factory that can be stable 100% on my card and draw considerably less power (30% vs 240w|20% vs 210w) having around 7% less performance. That both sovles my heat problems and is probably tested more that you or me or anyone can ever test. Thank for your recommendations but I would rather stay on this BIOS side solution till I upgrade my cooling solution.

Kinda irrelevant but the Pro drivers may enable extra features that gaming ones lack.
Most important ones is 10bit color support (not 10bit pixel format) system wide (though I do not have a 10bit monitor to actually test it) and also extensively tested drivers on professional software.