Dont understand...hd4850 10w idle @ 68c

mjw21a · Post by **mjw21a** » Fri Aug 01, 2008 12:01 am

Meh, whatever. I'm waiting for a new driver rev. My system is silent which keeps me happy and I only leave it running when in front of it or downloading something. I don't see it as something worth me worrying about.

Shemale · Post by **Shemale** » Fri Aug 01, 2008 8:39 pm

Ahma wrote:....Also worth noticing: dropping GPU frequency doesn't affect idle power consumption or temperature at all with HD 4870, so I don't know what the current "PowerPlay" is supposed to do...

Same with my His HD4850. No effect reducing the frequency from 500 to 200 or even 160. Though, if i put the frequency lower than 200mhz, i have image corruption playing some HD DVD with PowerDVD.

Reducing the memory frequency from 750 to 500 will result in ~3W power reduction from the wall . Is a modest value, and if i go under 500, i get colored dots and lines on the desktop.

nafets wrote:...my HD4870...
2D
Default 500/900 - 135W
AGCT 160/225 - 96W

Very impressive

N-K · Post by **N-K** » Sat Aug 02, 2008 4:23 am

I updated the bios of my Asus HD4850 so that the idle frequencies are now 160/500MHz.

I didn't use the MSI fixed bios because it was said it's not compatible.
The bios checksum seemed to be different. That's why I just changed the idle values of my original bios with Radeon Bios Editor and flashed it to the card with winflash.
It's good that the frequencies are as they should but the temperatures didn't change at all.

It seems strange but idle frequencies went back to 500/750 when i enabled overdrive in CCC. Could this have something to do with the drivers? (8.7)

I tried the CCC profile fix and put the idle clocks to 145MHz and 500MHz. (the memory clock isn't going any lower)
I also lowered idle core voltage to 0,99V (999 in the profile config file, 1046 was normal)
It can probably go even lower but the temperatures STILL didn't change so I'm guessing the problem is with those damn memory chips then.

MoJo · Post by **MoJo** » Sat Aug 02, 2008 9:32 am

Has anyone confirmed that they can actually alter the voltages yet? Last I heard they did not change when edited.

Getting the voltage down is going to be key to reducing power consumption and temperatures.

bas3onac1d · Post by **bas3onac1d** » Sat Aug 02, 2008 11:21 am

It doesn't work yet.

nafets · Post by **nafets** » Sat Aug 02, 2008 4:34 pm

ryboto · Post by **ryboto** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 4:57 am

Catalysts 8.8 were tested,

http://www.ati-forum.de/index.php?page= ... 6f94795bf1

That's supposedly the idle consumption of a 4850. Maybe it's actually sitting at 10W idle now?

LINK

Matija · Post by **Matija** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 6:50 am

Still needs something to exhaust the hot air out... Or half a year until the 40nm refresh becomes available

MoJo · Post by **MoJo** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 9:08 am

So anyone tried the beta 8.8 themselves yet?

drjunk · Post by **drjunk** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 10:04 am

The net is full of grief about powerplay on the hd4870. I would have thought AMD would have released a statement by now. Just to let us know were we stand on this problem...instead of leaving us in the dark.

MoJo · Post by **MoJo** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 10:35 am

A statement would be nice, but I expect they think they are better off keeping quiet. If they issue a statement, the normal press gets hold of it and reports it as a problem. If they keep quiet and just work on a fix, it doesn't get posted to Slashdot...

line · Post by **line** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 11:26 am

ryboto wrote:Catalysts 8.8 were tested,

...

That's supposedly the idle consumption of a 4850. Maybe it's actually sitting at 10W idle now?

It's worth noting that the numbers are from a CrossFire configuration so the 37W savings could be split across two cards. In that case I would say there's more throttling headroom.

FartingBob · Post by **FartingBob** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 11:43 am

MoJo wrote:If they keep quiet and just work on a fix, it doesn't get posted to Slashdot...

The internet is fully aware of the issues and there are probs alot of people who are holding off buying a 4800 card until the issue is addressed. They have the momentum now and if they ignore it for too long people will get tired of waiting. Meanwhile nvidia is slashing prices like theres no tomorrow. Already the 4850 has serious competition around the $200 mark.

Matija · Post by **Matija** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 12:17 pm

line wrote:It's worth noting that the numbers are from a CrossFire configuration so the 37W savings could be split across two cards. In that case I would say there's more throttling headroom.

That's still fine.

X-bit labs measured the 4850 at around 41W idle, so an 18.5W reduction would bring it down to 22.5W, which is very close to the 3870 (around 18W, IIRC).

Why couldn't they have come up with a reference exhaust cooler, aaargh...!

nafets · Post by **nafets** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 1:13 pm

Shemale · Post by **Shemale** » Mon Aug 04, 2008 8:04 pm

No change in power consumption at idle with 8.8 beta.
His 4850, Windows XP x64, original bios.

MoJo · Post by **MoJo** » Tue Aug 05, 2008 9:19 am

I agree about the BIOS being an issue, but it should be possible to change memory speeds without problems. Perhaps that is what is required to be updated in the driver.

drjunk · Post by **drjunk** » Tue Aug 05, 2008 10:04 am

So its not looking too promising then. Chances of seeing the hd4870 idle at 10w is virtually zero.I was planning on a major overhaul of my rig by the end of the year and chances are the rv870 (40nm) cards will only be available by feb/march time. I suppose i can wait a few extra months.

nafets · Post by **nafets** » Tue Aug 05, 2008 4:08 pm

N-K · Post by **N-K** » Wed Aug 06, 2008 5:48 am

8.8 beta didn't even work for me. (Vista 64)

I flashed my 4850 bios to use 145MHz@1,00V/ 500MHz on idle.
Still no change in temperatures. Can't say anything about the power consumption...

Do the shaders clock down with the core? There has to be something to blame...

thejamppa · Post by **thejamppa** » Wed Aug 06, 2008 5:52 am

HD 4850 just has extremely poor cooler. Its quiet alright but can't hold much reasonable temperatures while being quiet... In order HD 48x0's coolers to be reasonable cool, Ati should have rise default fan speed 10%

Temperatures were sacrficed for the silence. Perhaps not best way especially when it comes to stock cooler but its still nice to know Ati/AMD is worried about sound levels.

I am not that worried of high peak temperatures but the high idles worries me more. My HD 3850 peaks at 85ish C's in load with reference cooler but it idles 45 to 47 degree's...

Sure GPU's can withstand high temperatures but I am worried what will happend to the GPU's life cycle if it idles between 70 and 80 degree's C.

Matija · Post by **Matija** » Wed Aug 06, 2008 6:47 am

GPU? Nothing. Memory and VRMs, on the other hand...

MoJo · Post by **MoJo** » Wed Aug 06, 2008 9:27 am

nafets wrote:Memory speeds can be changed in the BIOS and utilized as such. The only problem is you get the on-screen flashing whenever the video card moves from 2D to 3DLP/HP states, and vice versa. This has nothing to do with the drivers, but rather the GDDR5 memory, which is picky about changing speeds on the fly.

That's what I mean. It is probably possible to fix with a driver update.

ATI were probably just in a rush to get the cards out in time for summer, ahead of nVidia and bringing in some cash. Considering they have been pushing low power as a major feature (Japanese shops often have demo displays with watt meters on ATI systems) it seems unlikely they would just abandon it.

nutball · Post by **nutball** » Wed Aug 06, 2008 10:01 am

thejamppa wrote:Sure GPU's can withstand high temperatures but I am worried what will happend to the GPU's life cycle if it idles between 70 and 80 degree's C.

Here is ATIs viewpoint on this issue:

http://forum.beyond3d.com/showpost.php? ... tcount=203

thejamppa · Post by **thejamppa** » Wed Aug 06, 2008 10:58 am

nutball wrote:
thejamppa wrote:Sure GPU's can withstand high temperatures but I am worried what will happend to the GPU's life cycle if it idles between 70 and 80 degree's C.
Here is ATIs viewpoint on this issue:

http://forum.beyond3d.com/showpost.php? ... tcount=203

Yes, and Soviet Union model of economics and agriculture were huge successes...

I still don't like card that idles over 60 degrees...

Kaleid · Post by **Kaleid** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:53 am

Alright, the upgrade devil got a hold on me too.

So, I bought a Sapphire 4850 and run it with S1 rev1 with Nexus fan @ 7v 120mm placed so that some of the airflow cools the VRMs.

Zalman heatsinks on the RAM and on the VRM. Chips cleaned with chemically clean aceton before mounting Zalman ramsinks which didn't really stick very well otherwise.

Here is a load temp in a quite a hot room (atitool 5min, seems stable):

The card squels like a pig when Atitool artifact or 3dmode is on. GeCube 3870 was almost completely quiet when it came to coil whining.

Overclocks very poorly, artifact even at 1020. Core won't go over 645Mhz even with 1.2v bios mod.

Disappointing. Well, atleast the card stays quiet when gaming. I guess I have a good reason to replace it again next year.

wdekler · Post by **wdekler** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 11:22 pm

thejamppa wrote:
nutball wrote:
thejamppa wrote:Sure GPU's can withstand high temperatures but I am worried what will happend to the GPU's life cycle if it idles between 70 and 80 degree's C.
Here is ATIs viewpoint on this issue:

http://forum.beyond3d.com/showpost.php? ... tcount=203

I home that ATI means that the cards are designed to be able to run 24/7 in 3D mode if the user requires this.

I also think that high idle consumption is unacceptable. If only we knew how the upcoming 40nm cards will handle this...

nutball · Post by **nutball** » Fri Aug 08, 2008 12:06 am

wdekler wrote:I home that ATI means that the cards are designed to be able to run 24/7 in 3D mode if the user requires this.

Yes they are saying that the cards are designed to cope with the worst-case scenario of being run like that without failing.

nafets · Post by **nafets** » Fri Aug 08, 2008 12:57 am