Problems Overclocking R9 280x

[Ntouchable]

I brought a new r9 280x recently as an upgrade to 2x HD7870's in Crossfire (if you can call that an upgrade) and long story short the sodding thing is proving a bitch to overlclock past stock voltages. I have a reasonable amount of overclocking experience now, going through at least 3 generations of Amd cards my self and overclocking multipul different cards for friends.

 

Here is the list of things I am using:-

 

• Asus Radeon R9 280X DirectCU II TOP
• VBIOS 015.041.000.000.000000
• Catalyst 14.4 RC1 (Driver Packaging Version 14.10.1006-140417a-171099C)

 

My goals or ideal overclock for this card would be something like the following:

 

• Core Clock 1175-1200 Mhz
• Memory Clock 1675-1700 Mhz
• Core Voltage 1.3v

For comparison stock is:

 

• Core Clock 1070 Mhz
• Memory Clock 1600 Mhz
• Core Voltage 1.2v

The first problem I am having with this card is getting the Core Voltage to actually get to and stay at 1.3V. Asus's GPU tweak manages to get it to about 1.25V, which I am reading in Asus Tweak's monitor thing and in GPU-z. I managed to get about 1.285 when using MSI Afterburner and setting voltage to be forced constant. I also tried 1.550V on the Memory as well, however none of these seem to be very stable and jump anywhere from their stock setting, halfway to the Voltages I set.

 

The second problem, which is related to the first one is that the auto fan curve is the most stupid thing in the world, not even budging past 40% fan speed at 85 Degrees Celsius. My guess is this problem is being caused by the VBIOS or Driver, but I'm not 100% sure. There is LOADS of space around the card and it is inside a HAF X case with 1000000 Fans, so .... yeah.

 

The way these problems are related is with throttling, if I set and relative high OC and leave the fan at auto, the Voltages will start relatively close to what I set them to be, as the card gets hotter (Testing in Furmark, to ensure no BSOD when gaming), artefacts start to appear then eventually a the black lines of death, everything else on the PC is running the the graphics are fucked, so I have to turn the PC off at the case. 

 

The magic temperature that is appears to crash at every time is about 70-75 degrees, with heavy voltage drop down to bellow stock sometimes at about 72 degrees. I have tried manual fan settings of 80 degrees flat, but eventually it reaches the magic 70-75 degrees area and *poof*. I realise that Furmark exaggerates temperatures immensely, so I am not really that bothered if the card reaches 95 degrees in Furmark because it will never reach about 65-75 in games.

 

The way I see what is happening is that the card is throttling itself at 70-75 degrees and reducing voltage to reduce the temperature, therefore making the clock speeds unsustainable. (IT IS DEFINITELY NOT A POWER PROBLEM AS THE CARD HAS A 1000W POWER SUPPLY ALL TO ITS SELF.)

 

The only solutions I see are to set the Core Voltage at a constant 1.3V in the VBIOS somehow (don't really know what I am doing with that yet, but I can work it out) or to try different VBIOS versions and versions of Catalyst.

 

 

I don't really know where to start and would greatly appreciate some advice

 

 

[xAcid9]

I brought a new r9 280x recently as an upgrade to 2x HD7870's in Crossfire (if you can call that an upgrade) and long story short the sodding thing is proving a bitch to overlclock past stock voltages. I have a reasonable amount of overclocking experience now, going through at least 3 generations of Amd cards my self and overclocking multipul different cards for friends.

 

Here is the list of things I am using:-

 

• Asus Radeon R9 280X DirectCU II TOP
• VBIOS 015.041.000.000.000000
• Catalyst 14.4 RC1 (Driver Packaging Version 14.10.1006-140417a-171099C)

 

My goals or ideal overclock for this card would be something like the following:

 

• Core Clock 1175-1200 Mhz
• Memory Clock 1675-1700 Mhz
• Core Voltage 1.3v

For comparison stock is:

 

• Core Clock 1070 Mhz
• Memory Clock 1600 Mhz
• Core Voltage 1.2v

The first problem I am having with this card is getting the Core Voltage to actually get to and stay at 1.3V. Asus's GPU tweak manages to get it to about 1.25V, which I am reading in Asus Tweak's monitor thing and in GPU-z. I managed to get about 1.285 when using MSI Afterburner and setting voltage to be forced constant. I also tried 1.550V on the Memory as well, however none of these seem to be very stable and jump anywhere from their stock setting, halfway to the Voltages I set.

 

I don't really know where to start and would greatly appreciate some advice

 

Did you increase the Power Limit/Power Tune? If not the clock will not stay on load.

[Ntouchable]

Did you increase the Power Limit/Power Tune? If not the clock will not stay on load.

Yes, its at 120%.

[Ntouchable]

Could it just be that the card is fucked somehow?