R9270X disappointing overclocking

[Gendo]

Hi, i recently got a 270X Toxic edition but can't even manage to get a slight overclock and can't find a valid reason why is that, here my specs:

i3-4130 (soon 4770K)
R9 270x Toxic @ 1050/1500
Asus Gryphon Z87
Evga 500B psu
8GB HyperX Ram
Samsung 840 Evo
WD Blue 1TB

I'm aware the card can to more than that but even at 1200 core i get BSOD whatever voltage setting i input, can't be heat because it reaches 53c before crashing and 63c max with fan at 35% when gaming at stock speeds.
Also can someone explain more about voltage (safe?) and the various unlocks available on Afterburner as the last card i had was a 560Ti and had none of that...

Thanks!!

 

[bdiddytampa]

Unfortunately overclocking is a gamble :-/ Some chips will overclock well and others won't, there is never a guarantee that a card will OC well. You could buy 2 of the exact same card and one will OC massively and the other won't at all, it's luck of the draw.

As far as voltage goes, I've never messed with the voltage on my GPUs before, never really had to. Sorry about your bad luck with that card :-/

 

[Brantyn Gerik]

voltage is save up to about 24mv+ after that it starts putitng quite a bit of stress on the card.

also, try a more modest overclock like 1100 on the core. It's very possible that you just got a poor overclocking card, as not all cards overclock the same. there are cherry picks, and then there are duds. The duds still perform just fine, but won't overclock very well

 

[Brantyn Gerik]

wow my spelling was awful. Terribly sorry for that. But touching the voltages in the stock bios is typically pretty safe if your temps are manageable. but as was said before, some cards will handle it better than others.

 

[06yfz450ridr]

increase your fan speed, it could be your vrms heating up but i doubt it on that card, raise your power limit to +20 and increase your voltage a tad.

I used to run my cards at the max 1.3v with no problems besides un-necessary heat.

do you have the option for voltage control?

if you checked unlock voltage etc in the msi settings and its not there go to the msi install folder and delete your .oem file and restart the app and it should be there.



but to me I wasnt able to go past 1200 really on my vapor x, i was able to get 1300 but it had errors, 1150 seems about best for me. i run my cards at 1.244 but they will run fine a little lower

 

[Gendo]

voltage is save up to about 24mv+ after that it starts putitng quite a bit of stress on the card.

also, try a more modest overclock like 1100 on the core. It's very possible that you just got a poor overclocking card, as not all cards overclock the same. there are cherry picks, and then there are duds. The duds still perform just fine, but won't overclock very well

1150/1500 is stock on the Toxic card, can it be the cpu or psu holding back the OC?, just felt strange that i get straight BSOD, with nvidia i usually only get a driver crash...

 

[Gendo]

increase your fan speed, it could be your vrms heating up but i doubt it on that card, raise your power limit to +20 and increase your voltage a tad.

I used to run my cards at the max 1.3v with no problems besides un-necessary heat.

do you have the option for voltage control?

if you checked unlock voltage etc in the msi settings and its not there go to the msi install folder and delete your .oem file and restart the app and it should be there.



but to me I wasnt able to go past 1200 really on my vapor x, i was able to get 1300 but it had errors, 1150 seems about best for me. i run my cards at 1.244 but they will run fine a little lower

There's all sort of options like:

Unlock voltage control
Force constant voltage
Extend official overclock limits
Disable ULPS
Unofficial overclocking mode (with some power play option)

and on the standard interface core voltage and power limit sliders ?!?

 

[Brantyn Gerik]

Your i3 MAY be the limiting factor in your build, i didnt even see this before. It's very possible for that i3 to be limiting what your card will boost up to (won't go to 100% usage in gaming). I've never heard of this limiting an overclock, but your processor is definitely the elephant in the room. (may not be the end all solution)

 

[StarBG]

You must have got the worst r9 270x chip because I thought all examples go past 1200MHz. The normal clock is 1100MHz and with boost 1150MHz. The CPU cant be the problem for overclock like someone suggested. I use the GPU with the Intel G860 for exapmle.

 

[06yfz450ridr]

Your i3 MAY be the limiting factor in your build, i didnt even see this before. It's very possible for that i3 to be limiting what your card will boost up to (won't go to 100% usage in gaming). I've never heard of this limiting an overclock, but your processor is definitely the elephant in the room. (may not be the end all solution)

depending what game it is it could be but it should be able to keep that card maxed out in most cases.

the cards like the toxics are basically highly factory overclocked cards, some may overclock more some may not.



this is what I found

we were easily able to overclock the AMD Radeon R9 270X to 1205MHz on the core and 1625MHz on the memory. The limit in AMD OverDrive is 1625MHz on the memory, so we might be limited by the utility on this clock speed.


It seems the voltage is already maxed from the factory.

 

[StarBG]

1205MHz was the lowest I saw in many reviews, also the voltage is locked if I am not wrong and it is better not to mess with the GPU in physical form to change it or bios flash and you lose the warranty when you overclock.

 

[Gendo]

Your i3 MAY be the limiting factor in your build, i didnt even see this before. It's very possible for that i3 to be limiting what your card will boost up to (won't go to 100% usage in gaming). I've never heard of this limiting an overclock, but your processor is definitely the elephant in the room. (may not be the end all solution)

depending what game it is it could be but it should be able to keep that card maxed out in most cases.

the cards like the toxics are basically highly factory overclocked cards, some may overclock more some may not.



this is what I found

we were easily able to overclock the AMD Radeon R9 270X to 1205MHz on the core and 1625MHz on the memory. The limit in AMD OverDrive is 1625MHz on the memory, so we might be limited by the utility on this clock speed.


It seems the voltage is already maxed from the factory.

The max i've got was 1180/1530 +20 power limit.
Strange enough the stock Unigine Valley score (1080 maxed no AA) was 54, oc'd is 54.7 but now at stock i get 49 with Gpu usage of 98% and 780MB memory.
Worried i've fried something 🙁

 

[StarBG]

You did not change vcore so there is not a high risk to damage the GPU. You can push the power limit even higher and when you get errors from artifacts it does not damage the GPU and you can just change the OC back to normal.

 

[Brantyn Gerik]

If you get a crash, you will almost always get lower numbers after the crash without a reset of the system. This is normal, just restart your computer

 

[Gendo]

If you get a crash, you will almost always get lower numbers after the crash without a reset of the system. This is normal, just restart your computer

WIth Nvidia cards i used to have just a driver crash, now i get bsod or just resets so it always restarts unfortunately...
Also there's 5 leds on the backplate, i've seen them changing from 1 to 3 but no clue what's all about since there's no mention anywhere about that lol

 

[06yfz450ridr]

If you get a crash, you will almost always get lower numbers after the crash without a reset of the system. This is normal, just restart your computer

WIth Nvidia cards i used to have just a driver crash, now i get bsod or just resets so it always restarts unfortunately...
Also there's 5 leds on the backplate, i've seen them changing from 1 to 3 but no clue what's all about since there's no mention anywhere about that lol

the leds on the back is the visual temp monitor, if its only 3 your temps are fine not sure exactly what temp that is though.

I would give OCCT a try and run the gpu test, I would suspect you saw really no increase because you are getting tons of errors.

that gpu has the sapphire dual bios switch correct? is that switch pressed and lit up running the UEFI bios?

 

[Gendo]

If you get a crash, you will almost always get lower numbers after the crash without a reset of the system. This is normal, just restart your computer

WIth Nvidia cards i used to have just a driver crash, now i get bsod or just resets so it always restarts unfortunately...
Also there's 5 leds on the backplate, i've seen them changing from 1 to 3 but no clue what's all about since there's no mention anywhere about that lol

the leds on the back is the visual temp monitor, if its only 3 your temps are fine not sure exactly what temp that is though.

I would give OCCT a try and run the gpu test, I would suspect you saw really no increase because you are getting tons of errors.

that gpu has the sapphire dual bios switch correct? is that switch pressed and lit up running the UEFI bios?

Temps are 64c max when gaming or furmark with fan to auto, that switch is pressed and in UEFI mode, i always try furmark when overclocking and at stock i have no issues with it or while gaming for that matter.
Someone had mentioned that could be the Vram getting hot so i've tried to run the the OC again but with manual fan speed to 45% so to cool it more even if the core was fine and lasted a bit longer in the benchmark but the failed again...

 

[06yfz450ridr]

If you get a crash, you will almost always get lower numbers after the crash without a reset of the system. This is normal, just restart your computer

WIth Nvidia cards i used to have just a driver crash, now i get bsod or just resets so it always restarts unfortunately...
Also there's 5 leds on the backplate, i've seen them changing from 1 to 3 but no clue what's all about since there's no mention anywhere about that lol

the leds on the back is the visual temp monitor, if its only 3 your temps are fine not sure exactly what temp that is though.

I would give OCCT a try and run the gpu test, I would suspect you saw really no increase because you are getting tons of errors.

that gpu has the sapphire dual bios switch correct? is that switch pressed and lit up running the UEFI bios?

Temps are 64c max when gaming or furmark with fan to auto, that switch is pressed and in UEFI mode, i always try furmark when overclocking and at stock i have no issues with it or while gaming for that matter.
Someone had mentioned that could be the Vram getting hot so i've tried to run the the OC again but with manual fan speed to 45% so to cool it more even if the core was fine and lasted a bit longer in the benchmark but the failed again...

Test using occt