Question RX 6950XT not hitting max GPU clock speed

[Jamezz2]

I ran Time Spy to compare a completely different issue, when I noticed that my GPU clock speed isn't hitting what I have it OCd to in MSI Afterburner. I have it set to 2800 MHz core clock, but when I ran Time Spy it barely, if ever, went above 2500. Even in the very beginning of the test, when it isn't hot and I can't imagine why it would be throttling. Even after the full test, i'm pretty sure it never went over 80c anyway. Anybody have any ideas why it won't go up to the full clock speed? Is there something I have to change, or is that just normal, that's the best this card can do?

Other specs it may help to know, Ryzen 9 5900X at 4.7, 32gbs of ram, the card itself is a Powercolor Red Devil. Other settings in Afterburner are core voltage at 1200mV, power limit at +20, memory clock is 2400MHz. I also have no idea why, when everything is just idle, the core clock will show as 0-50 in Afterburner, but the memory clock shows as still basically maxed, touch under 2400.

 

[hotaru.hino]

Did it ever run up to 2800MHz? That seems kind of high to me when the official boost clock speed is 2310MHz. 2500MHz seems more reasonable to me for how hard a given 6950XT can be pushed to.

Also the values you input in MSI Afterburner or any sort of utility are often suggestions. Just because you can tell it to go to say 3000MHz, doesn't mean it will. Especially if it hits some electrical limit first.

 

[Homeman]

I ran Time Spy to compare a completely different issue, when I noticed that my GPU clock speed isn't hitting what I have it OCd to in MSI Afterburner. I have it set to 2800 MHz core clock, but when I ran Time Spy it barely, if ever, went above 2500. Even in the very beginning of the test, when it isn't hot and I can't imagine why it would be throttling. Even after the full test, i'm pretty sure it never went over 80c anyway. Anybody have any ideas why it won't go up to the full clock speed? Is there something I have to change, or is that just normal, that's the best this card can do?

Other specs it may help to know, Ryzen 9 5900X at 4.7, 32gbs of ram, the card itself is a Powercolor Red Devil. Other settings in Afterburner are core voltage at 1200mV, power limit at +20, memory clock is 2400MHz. I also have no idea why, when everything is just idle, the core clock will show as 0-50 in Afterburner, but the memory clock shows as still basically maxed, touch under 2400.

1) Hotspot temp?
2) If you haven't already tried: Close Afterburner and run the automatic overclock in the amd adrenalin application. Monitor and report

 

[Jamezz2]

1) Hotspot temp?
2) If you haven't already tried: Close Afterburner and run the automatic overclock in the amd adrenalin application. Monitor and report

I reran timespy after closing Afterburner and using the GPU Overclock setting under Automatic Tuning in Adrenalin. Adrenalin came up with 2723 for the GPU Clock. During the run, it maxed at 2424MHz, and the hotspot maxed at 105c, the GPU at 78c.

Did it ever run up to 2800MHz? That seems kind of high to me when the official boost clock speed is 2310MHz. 2500MHz seems more reasonable to me for how hard a given 6950XT can be pushed to.

Also the values you input in MSI Afterburner or any sort of utility are often suggestions. Just because you can tell it to go to say 3000MHz, doesn't mean it will. Especially if it hits some electrical limit first.

No, I have yet to see it ever hit that high. I set it a while ago when I first got the card. IIRC I was just setting higher and higher speeds until it crashed.

 

[hotaru.hino]

No, I have yet to see it ever hit that high. I set it a while ago when I first got the card. IIRC I was just setting higher and higher speeds until it crashed.

Unintuitively what setting a higher clock speed means in MSI Afterburner is undervolting the card. Video cards operate on a so-called V-F curve. That is, for a given voltage, it'll try to get up to a certain frequency. All setting the clock speed does is make it so it tries to hit a higher frequency for a given voltage than stock, such that the stock speeds are now going to try to operate at a lower voltage, hence undervolting.

In any case, whatever you set it to will not work. Besides that, the cards on defaults tend to overclock themselves near their limit anyway, so any adjustment to try to push them harder is only going to be for bragging rights at best.