Tech Report: Nvidia, Asus put the clamps on GTX 590 voltage

[OCGuy]

BTW OCguy, is that i7 overvolted?

Yes, that has been discussed in one of these threads. That is an apples/oranges comparison.

 

[SlowSpyder]

Yes, that has been discussed in one of these threads. That is an apples/oranges comparison.

Why is it apples/oranges? (I don't remember the answer in the other thread, I remember it being brought up but don't know if I ever read the 'why' reason)

 

[notty22]

All we have to do is go to the 6850/70 launch review threads and we'll have the same crowd pleading how nobody o/c's the gtx 460. It needs to be compared stock only. Now that AMD can't get a clean win in any segment, they want to o/c the 700 dollar card.
*AMD didn't want to win the single gpu crown /sarcasm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usGkq7tAhfc&feature=player_embedded
AMD makes fun of Nvidia.

 

[Seero]

This is the point many are completely missing. Forget about over-clocking or over-volting. If you're buying a $700 piece of equipment. Would you rather spend your money on the one that is over-engineered? Or the one that is barely able to operate at its factory specs? Who's to say that 6 months or a year from now were not going to have another bumpgate where these cards begin failing?

And the "well if it fails you have a warranty" argument shouldn't be used to excuse a shoddy product.

2 questions:
Are you saying one is over-engineered?

How do you know the other one barely able to operate at its factory specs?

Over and over reports indicated that most, if not all fried cards are due to improper overclocking. Those with electricity engineering knowledge will know how much those VRMs can handle. Others will test stability by taking baby steps + lots of testing.

Lets assume one card will die at stock, then there is nothing Nvidia's driver can do unless they underclock it. Evidences show that this is not happening.

 

[badb0y]

All we have to do is go to the 6850/70 launch review threads and we'll have the same crowd pleading how nobody o/c's the gtx 460. It needs to be compared stock only. Now that AMD can't get a clean win in any segment, they want to o/c the 700 dollar card.
*AMD didn't want to win the single gpu crown /sarcasm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usGkq7tAhfc&feature=player_embedded

You keep repeating that BS but nVidia doesn't offer warranty for their card either if OCed or OVed.

AIBs will warranty the HD 6990, I know XFX and Powercolor are confirmed.

 

[Skurge]

All we have to do is go to the 6850/70 launch review threads and we'll have the same crowd pleading how nobody o/c's the gtx 460. It needs to be compared stock only. Now that AMD can't get a clean win in any segment, they want to o/c the 700 dollar card.
*AMD didn't want to win the single gpu crown /sarcasm

I'd like to see a post where someone said that nobody OCs a 460. Please.

Also nobody is talking about benchmark practices. So I'm not sure what your post is about.

 

[f1sherman]

the amount of myths around 6990/590...LOL

just give me ur 6990 for a review and I'll show u how over-engineered it is

 

[Phynaz]

All we have to do is go to the 6850/70 launch review threads and we'll have the same crowd pleading how nobody o/c's the gtx 460. It needs to be compared stock only. Now that AMD can't get a clean win in any segment, they want to o/c the 700 dollar card.
*AMD didn't want to win the single gpu crown /sarcasm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usGkq7tAhfc&feature=player_embedded
AMD makes fun of Nvidia.

Dude, would you stop it already? You keep derailing threads.

 

[Skurge]

You keep repeating that BS but nVidia doesn't offer warranty for their card either if OCed or OVed.

AIBs will warranty the HD 6990, I know XFX and Powercolor are confirmed.

There was a 3rd AIB not sure who it was. So this is the rub, Nvidia and ASUS will not let you adjust voltage much if at all. That only leaves EVGA. AMD has 3 partners that warranty an overclocked 6990 that is the same price, faster and can be overclocked even further. Not much of a contest for someone who is looking at squeezing as much performance out of their card. Or someone who would want to keep it for a while.

 

[SirPauly]

I thought they all had to raise their volts, not insane amounts, but closer to 1V to get those increases.

At stock volts wasn't it 4-6% increase? Just curious.

Not necessarily, sites were from anywhere from 10 to more than 15 percent with default voltage.

 

[SirPauly]

I think that some are in denial, the HD 6990 seems better engineered to me than the GTX 590 which barely overclocks. That won't change doesn't matter if the vendor gives you warranty or not.

How is a 10-15 percent over-clock -- barely over-clocks?

 

[f1sherman]

Your arguing with someone who has his i7 clocked at nearly 4ghz and his arguing that its not a con for a card to have extremely limited overclocking and no overvolting.

BTW OCguy, is that i7 overvolted?

And would you have still bought it if a Phenom2 X4 performed the same, cost the same, but overclocked a lot better and didn't fail if you did overclock it?

yeah but truth be told 590 OCs better then 6990. just have to keep ur head under OCP.

did u see article on [H] -> 20% OC without barely touching the voltage.
6990 would need 1.3V for 20% and it's noise would be OSHA regulated by then

 

[Skurge]

yeah but truth be told 590 OCs better then 6990. just have to keep ur head under OCP.

did u see article on [H] -> 20% OC without barely touching the voltage.
6990 would need 1.3V for 20% and it's noise would be OSHA regulated by then

Well thats another thing. Different 590s are going to need different amounts of voltage to overclock. What happens when you get one that need a lot of voltage to OC? Well the 6990 is guaranteed to run at atleast 880mhz and 1.75v

 

[3DVagabond]

Yes when you overcome the thermal operating limit of the electronic device like CPUs, Graphics Cards, VRMs etc (Overheating protection) and there is also the OCP (OverCurrent Protection).

HD5970 did the same thing and i believe most of the graphics cards do that, nothing new

No AMD card, or any other AFAIK, throttled like the 590 does. While they have OCP, it's not comparable.

Besides, it doesn't really matter, these cards are too rare to matter. I haven't seen them in stock @ Newegg ever.

 

[f1sherman]

Well thats another thing. Different 590s are going to need different amounts of voltage to overclock. What happens when you get one that need a lot of voltage to OC? Well the 6990 is guaranteed to run at atleast 880mhz and 1.75v

nah.. really pretty much any can do 670MHz w/o ANY volts

but ppl are foolz. they kept on benching 900MHz overclocks w/o bothering to check wheteher OCP kicks in. and as it is ATM (BIOS+driver+circutory) OCP kicks in MUCH sooner.

 

[Seero]

You keep repeating that BS but nVidia doesn't offer warranty for their card either if OCed or OVed.

AIBs will warranty the HD 6990, I know XFX and Powercolor are confirmed.

Correct me if I am wrong. So it is BS repeating AMD doesn't offers warranty OC and it is not BS for Nvidia not offering warranty on OC, right?

So will a 6990 fries if I am to force 1000Watt into it? Don't say I am dumb because you are saying that those who overvolt beyond specification isn't.

Don't even start with the "standard overclock" either, there is no such things. Lots of people fried their SB CPU because they thought it can take as much juice as i7. The suggested maximum voltage on 590 is under 1v.

 

[f1sherman]

http://techreport.com/discussions.x/20711 ...uhmmm soz

 

[badb0y]

Correct me if I am wrong. So it is BS repeating AMD doesn't offers warranty OC and it is not BS for Nvidia not offering warranty on OC, right? It's BS because both AMD and nVidia don't offer warranties for overclocking or overvolting, it's the AIBs who offer the warranties to consumers.

So will a 6990 fries if I am to force 1000Watt into it? Don't say I am dumb because you are saying that those who overvolt beyond specification isn't.
Does not compute?

Don't even start with the "standard overclock" either, there is no such things. Lots of people fried their SB CPU because they thought it can take as much juice as i7. The suggested maximum voltage on 590 is under 1v.
Wrong the suggested maximum is stock, that's why they locked the card down.

Besides that, every time someone talks about fried GTX 590s, notty22 comes in with AMD warranty nonsense to divert attention away from the subject. Make your own thread, don't derail other people's threads.

 

[formulav8]

I don't recall in recent history where nvidia has literally put a lock on a video card after release to limit ocing potential. So somethings going on with the card. Did they do it with the 580? Nope and people are overvolting/clocking those. Did they put a clamp on ocing with the 460? Nope, and people are overvolting/clocking those. So why the overclocking excuses for the 590? Did nvidia simply over-engineer those other cards? I guess so... I'm pretty much done with this thread now anyways. :whiste:

 

[AtenRa]

No AMD card, or any other AFAIK, throttled like the 590 does. While they have OCP, it's not comparable.

Besides, it doesn't really matter, these cards are too rare to matter. I haven't seen them in stock @ Newegg ever.

http://www.legionhardware.com/articles_pages/ati_radeon_hd_5970_overclocking_problems,2.html

HD5970

However in order to reach this frequency we were forced to use a special voltage tool which was provided by AMD. This tool increased the voltage of both the core and memory to provide greater headroom. The side effect to this was increased heat, while the operating volume became unbearable. Having achieved a core frequency of 900MHz and a memory frequency of 5000MHz, we were expecting serious performance gains and in some games we got them.

Having said that, not all games provided us with impressive or even note worthy gains, and we wanted to know why. It first appeared that the more demanding games were receiving the smallest gains, and to be honest we were expecting them to show the greatest. Furthermore, the longer we ran certain tests, the less impact the overclock had, and scores would slowly decrease. After further testing we think we have an answer as to why this was happening...

Guess what ......

Please note we are only using FurMark as a tool to show the overclocking problem that we encountered.

However, the problem was first noticed when benchmarking the overclocked Radeon HD 5970 in long stressful benchmarks such as S.T.A.L.K.E.R Clear Sky. In such games the overclocked Radeon HD 5970 failed to provide strong performance gains and if we looped the tests several times the results often ended up being lower than before any overclocking took place and this was because the card would throttle down to 550MHz.

AMD did make it clear that the Radeon HD 5970 does throttle down to avoid any damage when operating at high temperatures. However they also portrayed the Radeon HD 5970 as a stellar overclocker that could and would hit Radeon HD 5870 speeds. While this is true to a certain extent as the Radeon HD 5970 will reach Radeon HD 5870 frequencies, it will also throttle back after a few minutes in certain stressful games such as S.T.A.L.K.E.R.

I know because i had one

 

[Seero]

Besides that, every time someone talks about fried GTX 590s, notty22 comes in with AMD warranty nonsense to divert attention away from the subject. Make your own thread, don't derail other people's threads.

Lets talk about derailing.

Performance crown denied.
That pretty much seals the deal right there if you can't overvolt the GTX 590 to get max overclocks the HD 6990 will simply hold the top spot because of the AUSUM switch.

It appears you were trying to derail the issue from Overvolt protection to HD 6990 rocks.

Again, feel free to correct me.

I don't recall in recent history where nvidia has literally put a lock on a video card after release to limit ocing potential. So somethings going on with the card. Did they do it with the 580? Nope and people are overvolting/clocking those. Did they put a clamp on ocing with the 460? Nope, and people are overvolting/clocking those. So why the overclocking excuses for the 590? Did nvidia simply over-engineer those other cards? I guess so... I'm pretty much done with this thread now anyways. :whiste:

Programmable voltage adjustment is something new in video cards. It doesn't exists until Fermi or Cypress arrives I believe. Back then, we need to replace the fix resistor with a variable resistor to allow OC. Yes, the removal of the original resisitor voids its warranty. Hardware modification still works.

 

[Silverforce11]

So it's only a matter of a difference in our opinions then? I'm ok with that.

Yeah ultimately here on forums, it's only a matter of opinion. The final analysis will be in sales numbers. Both these cards occupy the same price segment and are in direct competition. Whichever sells better and generates more profit is the winner, that's the only fact that matters.

But for some of you to claim enthusiasts place no value on overclocking performance is disingenuous and flat out false. Looking at all of your sigs, almost all overclock and some heavily whether it be low end, mid range or top end, CF/SLI configs. Find enthusiast rigs and its always heavily OC, from CPU to ram and especially GPUs. There's no point denying that this is a big factor. Why do people pay a lot more for brand named ram which advertise massive overclocking? Similarly, when buying CPUs everybody (who builds their own rigs) not just enthusiasts factor in OC performance. Even looking at NV's release slides, they claimed; "Built for enthusiasts" with 10 layer PCB, 2oz copper, beefy components (lie) etc etc, all hinting at its durability and ability to OC.

 

[Silverforce11]

Programmable voltage adjustment is something new in video cards. It doesn't exists until Fermi or Cypress arrives I believe. Back then, we need to replace the fix resistor with a variable resistor to allow OC. Yes, the removal of the original resisitor voids its warranty. Hardware modification still works.

No. It's been around since my Rendition Diamond 3D Stealth (during the voodoo1 days). I overvolted to OC the core/mem to get faster Quake 2 and Jedi Knight fps. If memory serves me right, my previous Radeon 4870 was also overvolted to OC core/mem.

 

[badb0y]

Lets talk about derailing.

It appears you were trying to derail the issue from Overvolt protection to HD 6990 rocks.

Again, feel free to correct me.


Programmable voltage adjustment is something new in video cards. It doesn't exists until Fermi or Cypress arrives I believe. Back then, we need to replace the fix resistor with a variable resistor to allow OC. Yes, the removal of the original resisitor voids its warranty. Hardware modification still works.

What I said is true what he said is false.

Overvolting lockdown kills any room for performance improvement from the GTX 590(you may get 50-100 mhz) while the HD 6990 is left to go high as it can (1000+ on core).

By him repeatedly stating that AMD doesn't warrant graphics cards he is spreading fud because AMD never has and probably never will warranty graphics cards, its the AIBs that provide warranty.

 

[Seero]

No. It's been around since my Rendition Diamond 3D Stealth (during the voodoo1 days). I overvolted to OC the core/mem to get faster Quake 2 and Jedi Knight fps. If memory serves me right, my previous Radeon 4870 was also overvolted to OC core/mem.

I don't exactly know when programmable VRM was first introduced on video card, but it wasn't until Fermi/Cypress that it becomes well known. MSI afterburner is probably the most known software used to adjust voltage on video cards.

Somehow people nowadays tend to believe that a video card should not be allowed to go beyond its capability but should allow it to go beyond factory settings. Well why don't they simply set their factory setting to its maximum capabilities? Nay sayers are not complaining about no headrooms. There won't be a perfect solution.

It isn't hard to see what people want are video cards that comes with a factory setting which only unleash 50% of its full potential and the rest via OC. That is several step back from what we have several years ago, where things ain't engineered to its full potential due to its complexity. As elites, they know what they are doing and may choose to take risks. They love tools that help them, knowing that warranties are out of reach shall they choose to Overclock. It isn't about the slider, it is about the margin of tolerance. Knowing that they mass produce those chips, some must be better than others. If we are lucky, we will get better ones and those are the ones that can be OCed. Having said that, we still needs to know what can handle more stresses and what can't as video card is actually a mini computer all together. It isn't about bottlenecks, it is about how to overcome bottlenecks. If VRM is the bottleneck, then we add a sisterboard on top of it, big deal. However, when more electricity, there are more problems. Heat, frequency, timing and all other things can become complicated, but that is why overclocking is about. Without knowing the cards limitation, overclocking it = attempt to fry it.

Look at motherboard. You can get one under 100 bucks with everything you need, or you can get one that is over 300 bucks with many things you don't need. We don't have this kind of options on video cards, which is why we can't overclock a GPU the same way we overclock our CPU.

I say, however brought the idea "It is okay to OC without knowledge" is dumb. I am not talking about users, I am talking about manufacturers. It is seriously dumb. You either have to under clock factory settings or risk user killing their cards, or even the entire setup. We now see a few poker faces with a died 590. Later we will see other poker faces with a died computer because they attempt to draw 450Watt out of something that should only give 375Watt at max. Hey doing so once or twice is probably okay if you are lucky, but then there are lots who believe that it is perfectly safe to go all the way 24/7, else it shouldn't be possible.