Undervolting/underclocking a high end GPU for noise and efficiency

[G4md0r]

I was always fascinated by efficiency more than anything, but as a gamer I wanted to have acceptable performance as well. So after seeing the Max-Q graphics cards from Nvidia I thought to myself. If money wasn't a factor for a build, would it be worth to undervolt a very high end GPU for noise levels and efficiency reasons? Cause more cores at slightly lower clockspeeds almost always outperfom higher clock speeds with lower cores in terms of GPU power. Again it wouldn't make sense from a price/performance prospective but what are your thoughts?

[BetteBalterZen]

9 minutes ago, G4md0r said:

... would it be worth to undervolt a very high end GPU for noise levels and efficiency reasons? 

... what are your thoughts?

100%

Undervolting is beginning to become popular IMO but still VERY underrated

[Somerandomtechyboi]

You can massively reduce power consumption with undervolt and maybe slight underclock of a high end gpu so id say its pretty worth it unless you wanna run ludicrous fps

 

Same thing applies to cpus (mainly intel cpus) and undervolting cpu barely impacts performance if you are doing stuff like setting 5g static allcore on a 12900k at ~1.25v, here its also worth it

 

 

You can undervolt and maybe slightly underclock cpu and gpu but you can usually make up the performance by ocing the balls off your (v)rams

[iiNNeX]

Yes I agree. I have tested my 3090 thoroughly for the last week or so, in various benchmarks and games and basically there are two things that really matter:

 

- Temperature (this can literally be the difference of 1950mhz or 2060mhz due to how Nvidia's boost table works)

- Power Limit and Voltage

 

When doing benches I could go as far as +150 core and +1300 memory, on the likes of TimeSpy, TS Extreme, Firestrike ect. However, it would crash in most games that way.

 

Also boost clock (on paper) and game clock are very different things, as different type of load will ultimately give you different frequency. Quake RTX for example maxes out my power at around 435-450W, while only boosting to 1920 ish, yet in BF 2042 power stays around 360-380 and boost clock goes above 2k. This is all aircooled with good fans and solid airflow orientated case. Watercooling is a different story.

 

Best settings I found for better than stock while more efficient for me (daily use), was 1950mhz @0.975mv and +1000 on memory. Some people can achieve this with as low as 0.88mv but that is just silicone lottery at play there

 

There is a video that shows the benefits and how to do it here:

 

 

[james_castrello]

9 hours ago, G4md0r said:

I was always fascinated by efficiency more than anything, but as a gamer I wanted to have acceptable performance as well. So after seeing the Max-Q graphics cards from Nvidia I thought to myself. If money wasn't a factor for a build, would it be worth to undervolt a very high end GPU for noise levels and efficiency reasons? Cause more cores at slightly lower clockspeeds almost always outperfom higher clock speeds with lower cores in terms of GPU power. Again it wouldn't make sense from a price/performance prospective but what are your thoughts?

imagine having to underclock your rig because it works so good. 

jokes aside we are reaching a point where some things don't need as much power. I would say that yes, this may be worth it. Especially considering the price of electricity on the potential rise due to global events. 

[G4md0r]

Well thanks for the replies but only this one got the gist of it.

On 5/31/2022 at 11:23 PM, james_castrello said:

imagine having to underclock your rig because it works so good. 

jokes aside we are reaching a point where some things don't need as much power. I would say that yes, this may be worth it. Especially considering the price of electricity on the potential rise due to global events. 

Basically GPUs that have more cores and stuff if you underclock/undervolt them they have better performance than their lower SKUs counterparts while drawing less power. That is why I was asking if it would be worth it for the sake of efficiency.

[Guest]

Sorry, edited out a bunch of rambling posts. Basically, struggling to get decent results from this whole undervolting thing. 

 

Gigabyte 3080ti gaming OC 12gb edition. Constantly hitting power limit and down clocking. At stock settings, this is really severe.... like constant green bar power limit hit through every game and every test.

 

Undervolting seems to improve this somewhat..... but it's very very difficult to find a balance between preventing the power limit being hit, keeping decent clock speeds, and having everything stable so it doesn't crash. 

 

You can either

 

-have it where it NEVER hits power limit, but clock speeds have to be lower even than the base clock.... like 1700mhz.... at which point.... why bother, it doesn't drop that low even at stock when hitting power limit constantly.

 

-keep it stock, power limit is hit constantly and clocks vary anywhere between around 1725 and 2010, but usually hover around 1830ish.

 

-undervolt and try to find a setting that is stable, still hits the power limit sometimes (regularly, but not a continuous green block at least), but recovers and hopefully nets a higher average clock speed than stock settings.

 

In order to make any genuine power savings though, at least on this card, you really have to nuke the performance into oblivion.... so not really worth doing on that front.

 

I think undervolting is still a good thing to do, even though it's time consuming, but if you can find a good balance where it still down clocks, but not down a crazy amount, thus keeping your average clocks high.... then it's worth it? 

 

[TheDankKoosh]

10 hours ago, Glenn-Tidbury said:

Sorry, edited out a bunch of rambling posts. Basically, struggling to get decent results from this whole undervolting thing. 

 

Gigabyte 3080ti gaming OC 12gb edition. Constantly hitting power limit and down clocking. At stock settings, this is really severe.... like constant green bar power limit hit through every game and every test.

 

Undervolting seems to improve this somewhat..... but it's very very difficult to find a balance between preventing the power limit being hit, keeping decent clock speeds, and having everything stable so it doesn't crash. 

 

You can either

 

-have it where it NEVER hits power limit, but clock speeds have to be lower even than the base clock.... like 1700mhz.... at which point.... why bother, it doesn't drop that low even at stock when hitting power limit constantly.

 

-keep it stock, power limit is hit constantly and clocks vary anywhere between around 1725 and 2010, but usually hover around 1830ish.

 

-undervolt and try to find a setting that is stable, still hits the power limit sometimes (regularly, but not a continuous green block at least), but recovers and hopefully nets a higher average clock speed than stock settings.

 

In order to make any genuine power savings though, at least on this card, you really have to nuke the performance into oblivion.... so not really worth doing on that front.

 

I think undervolting is still a good thing to do, even though it's time consuming, but if you can find a good balance where it still down clocks, but not down a crazy amount, thus keeping your average clocks high.... then it's worth it? 

 

Pascal may scale a bit differently (on a 1080 ti duke oc atm), but I find somewhere in the 1800-1850mhz range around 850-900mv should bring down power consumption considerably and still push a majority of performance. Experiment with the voltage tables in MSI afterburner and use furmark or another suitably stressful test to push it hard and ensure stability.

[Guest]

17 hours ago, TheDankKoosh said:

Pascal may scale a bit differently (on a 1080 ti duke oc atm), but I find somewhere in the 1800-1850mhz range around 850-900mv should bring down power consumption considerably and still push a majority of performance. Experiment with the voltage tables in MSI afterburner and use furmark or another suitably stressful test to push it hard and ensure stability.

Yes, that's where im finding that the effect of the power limit starts to show less often....unfortunately, this also seems to be around the place where I lose stability and things start to crash.

 

I feel like my card just doesn't like running on low power, so there's no real way to prevent the power limit being hit. So im now testing a different approach and just raising the offset and flattening the curve at a bit higher voltage.

 

Currently testing a +150 core offset and then flattening the curve at 950mv.

 

This still retains the maximum clock of 2010mhz, but at 950mv.... of course, it doesn't stay there because the power limit is still being hit, like, all the the time.

 

However, I've just started from scratch, testing stock vs this setting. At stock, using timespy bench, I get an average clock speed of around 1755Mhz.... so it does reach 2010, but often drops WELL below that, even below 1700.... with my new setting, the same bench gives an average clock of around 1905Mhz, and I didn't see it drop below around 1860mhz through the whole test. So that seems much better, even if the power limit is being hit constantly.

 

Have tested this setting with timespy, timespy extreme and port royal stress tests and so far no crashes and all passed with higher than 98% frame rate stability. Currently testing nightraider, which is less demanding, but sometimes these older tests can reveal instabilities that the new tests don't... fingers crossed. Also to note that, so far in this night raider test, clock is at a solid 2025mhz.... so, higher than stock.....oooops.

 

:: edit::

 

yup, crashed. I guess +150 was too much.

 

now testing +135.

 

I mean, in theory.... if 150 didn't crash port royal and timespy, 135 shouldn't either, right? So I'll start the tests with night raid..... but will probably still repeat the others after. 

 

this is the worst part of trying to find a good setting..... just when you think you have it nailed..... crash. 

 

:: eddit 2::

 

update.....+135 was absolutely perfect. Passed every stress test, clocks remained high, frame rates and frame times were steady and higher than stock.... most games were fine..... load up flight simulator, crash.

 

I have heard that flight sim doesn't like any kind of OC.... but I guess that means UV too... so it's a no go for me.... stock settings from now on.

[alphatessi]

I can tell so far undervolting makes a huge difference with AMD-Cards.

Tested 6900 XT Liquid Devil and now the 6950 XT Liquid Devil.

You can get away with nearly the same Performance as stock if you tweak Powerlimit and Voltage downwards and lun like 30-50W lower in Power.

Or the Other Way, more Performance with the same Power. Either way, now with AMD it really is a thing.

Had a 2080 non ti before, that card did not like it as much.

[ewitte]

I undervolted my 3080 to get the fan noise down.  It still gets stock performance (for a ftw3).  I can't remember the numbers as I did this a long time ago I believe it is at least 50w.

 

In a 2nd machine I just setup a 3060 undervolted to cut about 20w with higher than stock performance.

[varrys]

I undervolted my Aorus Xtreme 3080 to try to help with power consumption and heat output.

 

Superposition Factory Settings, Shaders/Textures High, Windowed

Highest temp: 70

Score: 18672

Min FPS: 86.30

Max FPS: 157.11

Avg FPS: 139.66

HWMonitor TDP Max: 353.65W, (saw 372 in MSI Afterburner monitoring)

 

Undervolt: 900mV, 1900 MHz, -250 core clock to set curve

Highest temp: 62

Score: 18647

Min FPS: 104.25

Max FPS: 144.97

Avg FPS: 139.47

HWMonitor TDP Max: 273.99 (saw 288 in MSI Afterburner monitoring)

Performance Change: -0.24% Score, -0.24% FPS, 20.7% improvement in min frames

Power difference: -29%

Temperature difference: -8 degrees

[Guest]

Tried once more today, just for fun..... even with only +15mhz offset and allowing voltage to still be over 1V.... flight sim still crashes. Stock runs absolutely fine, but literally ANY manual adjustment to the curve causes flight sim to crash. Definitely 100% done trying to undervolt this gpu.... just doesn't work with flight sim at all.