The Radeon 7850 is an overclocking beast

[SickBeast]

Did you guys click the unlock button on the Asus tweak so you could set the voltage manually?

When I click on the "lock" icon nothing happens.

It says it's only compatible with Asus cards.

 

[xatmax]

Did you guys click the unlock button on the Asus tweak so you could set the voltage manually?

Yeah I can tweak the voltage with no issue. I just found it odd it defaults to 920/5000 @ 1.21v. I'll mess with lowering the voltage when I get back.

 

[songokussm]

Just received my 7850 yesterday. Here's my 0.02:

Card: Sapphire ATI Radeon HD7850 standard edition
OC : 1200core/1187volts/5596mem

GUIMiner Mhash/s:
350.8 - no flags

cgminer Mhash/s:
303.2 - no flags

DiabloMiner Mhash/s:
359.1 w/ -v 1 -w 256 flags
360.9 /w NO FLAGS

Watts whole system:
Idle: 176
Load: 305 - with overclock

Temps:
Idle: 35
Load: 71

Gaming:
Rift on ultra settings w/ edge sampling AA :60-70 fps.
Tera on Ultra settings: 80-90 fps. (the graphics quality blows me away)
Heaven Benchmark: FPS 55.7, Score 1403, Min 36.7, Max 114.

Comments:
Previous setup was dual 460gtx. This is about a 20% upgrade in gaming, 3x improvement on mhash, 40% savings in power at load. I was able to sell 460s for 125 each. So the upgrade was free. Overall the performance increase is pretty noticeable.

Kinda sad I'm topping out at 1200.

Sadly, It seems like bitcoin is no longer profitable, so i may or may not switch back to Nvidia. I forgot how many things I used cuda for. I havent owned an ati/amd card since the 4850. They really have some some nice improvements. Now if only they could get their cpu line in order.

 

[flexy]

1200 is good!

Is this the OC model or the normal one?

 

[songokussm]

1200 is good!

Is this the OC model or the normal one?

the normal. model number (11200-00-20G)

 

[SickBeast]

1200mhz is an average overclock for the 7850. I'm hoping to reach 1250mhz once I install my beefed up cooling on mine. I can only hit 1150mhz using the terrible Powercolor heatsink and then I hit 85C under load.

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Good to hear a 7850 avg oc is at least 20% faster than a 460 sli which means that it is at least as fast as a gtx 580 as well

 

[tuffluck]

When I click on the "lock" icon nothing happens.

It says it's only compatible with Asus cards.

on the bottom left portion of the screen there are 3 little icons. you click the middle one for advanced settings, then go into the setting and select allow overclocking. it works fine with my sapphire.

1200mhz is an average overclock for the 7850. I'm hoping to reach 1250mhz once I install my beefed up cooling on mine. I can only hit 1150mhz using the terrible Powercolor heatsink and then I hit 85C under load.

1200 is doable, but i wouldn't say average. also no one has really comfortably monitored voltage module or VRAM temps at any increase, so once you go past 1.15v it seems like you could be slowly cooking your card, in a bad way.

So I got my Sapphire OC 7850 last week and my stock voltage is 1.21v. Should I be concerned? Right now I am clocked at 1125/5400 @ 1.21v using the ASUS Tweak Tool. I tried to hit 1200/5400 @ 1.21v but benchmarking fails.

I don't mind increasing the volts but am concerned about lifespan of the card. Any thoughts? Thanks.

while 1.21v is probably not going to kill anything, i don't think i personally would want it to run at that level. however, if that truly is stock voltage, that may provide some fantastic insight on what our cards are capable of. you can also try running gpu-z with asus tweak off, play a game and check in-game what the voltage sensor is reading (hw monitor does this also). this will also tell you if stock, unadulterated signal (meaning no CCC or Asus GPU Tweak that can adjust your stock settings) is really 1.21v.

additionally, if it were me, i would call sapphire and ask them if that is the stock voltage. if they say yes, you may have found a phenomenal discovery, and i may just go home and up my voltage and clock speeds accordingly

 

[SickBeast]

A lot of people are running their Radeons at 1.3v. I don't think it's wise, personally. If anything I might go up to 1.25v but that's all.

 

[blastingcap]

A lot of people are running their Radeons at 1.3v. I don't think it's wise, personally. If anything I might go up to 1.25v but that's all.

This is an article about how overvolting affects product lifespan for CPUs and not GPUs, which have have different tolerances, but I still find it interesting: http://www.anandtech.com/show/2468/6

 

[xatmax]

while 1.21v is probably not going to kill anything, i don't think i personally would want it to run at that level. however, if that truly is stock voltage, that may provide some fantastic insight on what our cards are capable of. you can also try running gpu-z with asus tweak off, play a game and check in-game what the voltage sensor is reading (hw monitor does this also). this will also tell you if stock, unadulterated signal (meaning no CCC or Asus GPU Tweak that can adjust your stock settings) is really 1.21v.

additionally, if it were me, i would call sapphire and ask them if that is the stock voltage. if they say yes, you may have found a phenomenal discovery, and i may just go home and up my voltage and clock speeds accordingly

Thanks for the reply. So I actually did email Sapphire Tech on this. They got back to me today and said the following:

This is standard for the card, you can clock down the voltage if you like.

Tech

I did lower my voltage down to 1.175 and was stable at 1125/5000 with Unigine. I'll have to game to really make sure. In addition, I did ask the tech what would be the highest (safest) voltage this card could go to. I'll post when they reply back to this. I've heard 1.25v but we'll see.

 

[tuffluck]

Thanks for the reply. So I actually did email Sapphire Tech on this. They got back to me today and said the following:

I did lower my voltage down to 1.175 and was stable at 1125/5000 with Unigine. I'll have to game to really make sure. In addition, I did ask the tech what would be the highest (safest) voltage this card could go to. I'll post when they reply back to this. I've heard 1.25v but we'll see.

good stuff. let us know what they say for sure. FYI, i think you can put even more mhz on that clock with that voltage. i have the same card and run comfortably stable 1150/5800 @ 1.135v.

 

[xatmax]

good stuff. let us know what they say for sure. FYI, i think you can put even more mhz on that clock with that voltage. i have the same card and run comfortably stable 1150/5800 @ 1.135v.

Ah cool. Yeah I'll try out that when I get home today. And I'll also try gpu-z/HWmonitor to really see if 1.21v is the default voltage on my card or it's just what ASUS wants to set it at. Thanks.

 

[SickBeast]

My Powercolor 7850 defaults to 1.21v as well.

I wish that I could adjust my voltage but none of the overclocking tools are allowing me to do it.

 

[EJP]

GPU: ASUS 7850 (REGULAR EDITION)

Great card so far, I currently have it at 1200 core / 5800 memory / 60C Full Load / 45% FAN

I can run the card all the way to 1300mhz but i don't get as much performance boost, plus i get the added 10C heat. It may be due to my GIMPED 720BE @ 3.2 giving me a bottleneck, we will find out if I can push this card more once I slap on the FX8350.

Memory can go as high @ 6000, At 6200, it gives me the grey lines of death screen. Too bad Asus 7850 memory chips doesn't have any cooling at all.

Here's my system specs BTW:

CPU: 720BE 2800 @ 3200
CPU Cooling: H60 w/ Kingwin CF-012LB push/pull
MOBO: Asrock 970 Extreme3
MEM: Mushkin Radioactive 8GB 1600
MEM Cooling: Arctic Cooling RC Turbo Module PWM Fans
BOOT DRIVE: Mushkin Chronos 120GB SSD
OPTICAL: LG BD-R
PSU: OCZ 750ZT
CASE: Corsair White 500R
MONITOR: Viewsonic 23" IPS Panel
OS: Windows 7 x64 Ultimate
Drivers: 12.3 with CAP1

 

[bxcloud]

The Asus cards are killer 7850s but I'm thinking about returning mine. I need a 7970 to play games at 1440p. Don't know if I want to deal with Crossfire.


Thought: Still debating, the only games that interests me right now are Diablo 3 and Guild Wars 2, I think the 7850 is overkill for both. Well see this weekend with GW2 beta. I just play the nice eye candy games on the side but maybe I'll just turn it down a bit. Decisions, decisions, I should stop reading Don's posts, =þ.

 

[EJP]

The Asus cards are killer 7850s but I'm thinking about returning mine. I need a 7970 to play games at 1440p. Don't know if I want to deal with Crossfire.

Yep, 7850 are only good for casual gamers who plays at 1080.. above that 7900 are your next best bet. I bought the 7850 due to tigerdirect 1 day sale and score one for $235 shipped and no tax

 

[bxcloud]

This looks so tempting:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814102982

Damn if GTX 680 was in-stock I would buy in a heart beat(original plan). I've been red all these years, now to row Intel and Nvidia ROFL =þ

 

[aaksheytalwar]

There is no difference btw 680 and 7970 once overclocked. In fact 7970 is faster by a very small extent in games where it really counts like crisis 1 crisis 2 metro Alan wake etc

 

[songokussm]

my friends are so impressed I may have talked them into ordering some. Just for kicks though, I may want to try out a 4 way crossfire. It looks like I would just need 1000 watt psu. Is that correct?

200 system, 150x4 = 800 watts.

 

[T_Yamamoto]

my friends are so impressed I may have talked them into ordering some. Just for kicks though, I may want to try out a 4 way crossfire. It looks like I would just need 1000 watt psu. Is that correct?

200 system, 150x4 = 800 watts.

More than that is needed

 

[aaksheytalwar]

200 for the system is too less if you overclock and have lots of hdds and again a 40% oc 7850 may need more than 150watts. Since money isn't a problem just go for a Seasonic x1250 barely $300 compared to your $1000+ gpus. To use 4 gpus you also need eyefinity, 1440p doesn't require than much power. Honestly I would rather buy 7970 cf instead

 

[3DVagabond]

my friends are so impressed I may have talked them into ordering some. Just for kicks though, I may want to try out a 4 way crossfire. It looks like I would just need 1000 watt psu. Is that correct?

200 system, 150x4 = 800 watts.

Can't quadfire the 7850. It only has a single crossfire connector.

 

[flexy]

Yep, 7850 are only good for casual gamers who plays at 1080.. above that 7900 are your next best bet. I bought the 7850 due to tigerdirect 1 day sale and score one for $235 shipped and no tax

A little sad to call a card which beats (when overclocked) a GTX 580 "for the casual gamer".

Please know that likely only an extremely small percentage of people even have a display capable of the resolutions you are talking about. My understanding of "casual gaming" is entirely different.

The 7850 is a "fine" card in any aspect, unless you you are one of the very few people having a monster display with 1440p.

 

[Silverforce11]

Yeh thought it was a bit strange, gtx580+ performance for casual gamers...

This thread is the reason I jumped for a 7850, I didn't realize you could OC them that high, 1.2ghz or above is like having an OCed gtx580 performance, for prolly 1/3 the power use.