Questions about GPU boost 2.0 OVERCLOCKING, Power limit and core voltage:

[i_build_nanosuits]

So, i moved to a 1440p Gsync monitor recently and can't upgrade the GTX 780 right now and i'd rather wait for next gen GPU's if possible...so i'm left with overclocking my GTX780 as much as possible.

My problem is GPU boost 2.0 and the way that it works...my GPU has a power limit of only 103% which i think is REDICULOUSLY low...core voltage offset goes up to 62mv though (no idea if thats good or bad)

So that power limit seem to be the main limiting factor to my overclock even if i put the priority to temps and set this to 90c i CAN'T reach higher clocks...right now i'm running +160mhz on the core and in games it translate to around 1170mhz...and the higher the load on the GPU the lower this number goes...making me think i'm hitting the power limit.

QUESTION:
-Is there any other way than flashing a new bios on my card in order to raise that power limit to 115% or something?
-If i'm facing bios flash for my card...how risky that could be? (no dual-bios)
-Should i flash a better Bios? is it worth the risk...my card as an ASIC quality of 79% so it would overclock quite a bit more i believe.

Thanks guys

[Oshino Shinobu]

1) Not that I know of

2) Very risky. You could potentially brick the card

3) I'd say no. GPU Boost 2.0 seems to mostly ignore your settings anyway from what I've seen. And ASIC quality has been made out to be more important than it actually is. It can play a part, but it's not the be all and end all. I have two of the same GPUs, one is above 80% and the other is in the 60% range and both overclock around the same, with like 1-2FPS difference at most, which is in a margin of error anyway. 

[i_build_nanosuits]

1) Not that I know of

2) Very risky. You could potentially brick the card

3) I'd say no. GPU Boost 2.0 seems to mostly ignore your settings anyway from what I've seen. And ASIC quality has been made out to be more important than it actually is. It can play a part, but it's not the be all and end all. I have two of the same GPUs, one is above 80% and the other is in the 60% range and both overclock around the same, with like 1-2FPS difference at most, which is in a margin of error anyway. 

ok then if there is any risk at all i guess i won't do that...

-what about core voltage? how does 62mv sound? is that a lot or is it just a few?

-should i max this slider and aim for highest clock stable off of that? or is 62mv too much?

-or is it pointless to even push voltage since i'm limited by power limit most of the time?

 

temps on the card usualy around 70c tops while gaming with fanspeed around 60%...so overall i think good...looks like headroom for overclocking to me?

[DirtySHISNO]

Considered flashing bios to, but i can't afford to replace the card atm. Here's what i've read/found so far;

 

 

+38mv should be your max if you're staying with air cooling.

 

push the thermal threshold to max and prioritise it, then push power target to max.

 

Set a custom fan curve, more aggressive (louder to) gets lower temps.

 

 

Bump up the core clock and mem clock until you get crashes, then back down some.

 

 

Example, my settings hope some of this helps.

 

[Vellinious]

It's not as difficult as some people make it out to be.  In fact, it's pretty easy.  Takes about 3 minutes.  That said, if something does happen to mess up during the flash process, you have a new paper weight.  If I didn't have a backup available, I probably wouldn't risk it on a single bios card. 

[i_build_nanosuits]

Considered flashing bios to, but i can't afford to replace the card atm. Here's what i've read/found so far;

 

 

+38mv should be your max if you're staying with air cooling.

 

push the thermal threshold to max and prioritise it, then push power target to max.

 

Set a custom fan curve, more aggressive (louder to) gets lower temps.

 

Bump up the core clock and mem clock until you get crashes, then back down some.

 

yeah that's kind of exactly what i did...but i see your power limit is 105%...which is 2% better than mine and this is what i would like to be able to fix

 

 

It's not as difficult as some people make it out to be.  In fact, it's pretty easy.  Takes about 3 minutes.  That said, if something does happen to mess up during the flash process, you have a new paper weight.  If I didn't have a backup available, I probably wouldn't risk it on a single bios card. 

But in case of a bios flash failure couldnt i use another graphics card or even on-board CPU graphics to boot back into windows and try to flash the card another time with the application? if it does not complete it's done?

[Vellinious]

It IS possible to recover from bad flash and reflash to a good one.  I've never had to do this, but from my understanding, the success rate on this isn't very good.  It's much easier to do on a dual bios card.  

[Prysin]

So, i moved to a 1440p Gsync monitor recently and can't upgrade the GTX 780 right now and i'd rather wait for next gen GPU's if possible...so i'm left with overclocking my GTX780 as much as possible.

My problem is GPU boost 2.0 and the way that it works...my GPU has a power limit of only 103% which i think is REDICULOUSLY low...core voltage offset goes up to 62mv though (no idea if thats good or bad)

So that power limit seem to be the main limiting factor to my overclock even if i put the priority to temps and set this to 90c i CAN'T reach higher clocks...right now i'm running +160mhz on the core and in games it translate to around 1170mhz...and the higher the load on the GPU the lower this number goes...making me think i'm hitting the power limit.

QUESTION:

-Is there any other way than flashing a new bios on my card in order to raise that power limit to 115% or something?

-If i'm facing bios flash for my card...how risky that could be? (no dual-bios)

-Should i flash a better Bios? is it worth the risk...my card as an ASIC quality of 79% so it would overclock quite a bit more i believe.

Thanks guys

you could flash the bios to that of a higher clocked card of the same type....

you can find stock bioses here

780 original

https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/index.php?did=10de-1004--

 

780 Rev2

https://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/index.php?did=10de-1004--105a,10de-1004--1784,10de-1004--1788,10de-1004--2961

 

make sure your VRM setup and memory modules is similar to that of the card you are going to use, if not, varying voltage settings may wreck your card.

[Prysin]

it is a shame you already bought a G-Sync monitor.... As upgrades go, a R9 Fury would have lasted quite a few years given the promise of increased performance with Async compute...

you could always sell the G-sync monitor and 780, then grab a freesync monitor + Fury.... but i bet you arent going to do that.

 

however alternativly, go look for a used or cheap (black friday coming up) 780, then do a SLI setup, if your PSU can handle it....

 

2x 780 should give you the horsepower to get good FPS for a couple more years

[i_build_nanosuits]

it is a shame you already bought a G-Sync monitor.... As upgrades go, a R9 Fury would have lasted quite a few years given the promise of increased performance with Async compute...

you could always sell the G-sync monitor and 780, then grab a freesync monitor + Fury.... but i bet you arent going to do that.

 

however alternativly, go look for a used or cheap (black friday coming up) 780, then do a SLI setup, if your PSU can handle it....

 

2x 780 should give you the horsepower to get good FPS for a couple more years

I considered moving to AMD and get freesync but i couldnt stand the idea of having to buy only AMD GPU's form now on..and seing the difficulties AMD is on right now them being that close from going bankrupt this was not even an option...with Gsync and nvidia at least i'm covered for many years i know they will never sell out and stop making GPU's anytime soon them having 80%+ of the market share.

Also GTX780 in SLI still only give me 3GB of VRAM which this also need to be adressed in next upgrade i will have a card with a lot more VRAM...i will upgrade in the future but for the time being i'm still very happy i can play any games on high settings without issues FXAA is perfect it looks sharper than 16xMSAA at 1080p and with Gsync even a game running at 50FPS is butter smooth...so there's that!

BF4 at full ULTRA settings and 2xMSAA run at 80FPS and GTA 5 on high run also at 80FPS+

Batman and witcher are harder to run but i can get easily 50FPS with medium/high settings and it's truly beautiful...the images are so sharp and the rendering is very smooth still...GTX780 can game at 1440p quite well actually...at least with Gsync that is and at least for the time being!

Don'T worry about me, i made the right decisions

That screen is insanely beautiful and gaming on it is a blast...you have no idea! high refresh rates and Gsync and everything makes for a MUCH better gaming experience than with the standard 24'' 1080p 60hz no Gsync monitor that's for sure!

i could have bought an R9 390 and Freesinc 1440p 27'' display for almost the price of the Gsync monitor alone...but again, AMD IMHO is a big no no...it's to much of a big decision to gamble on AMD for the future at this point.