Hello all,
So recently I upgraded my ATI Radeon HD 4890 for an ATI Radeon HD 7850 (brand: XFX). Everything runs golden on stock settings. As I usually do, I decided to try out the overclocking as I heard that the HD7850 is a good overclocker. I pushed from stock core clock 860 MHz to 1050 and was stable without changing voltage - any more and that was black screen or vertical lines crashing. So then I saw about upping the voltage from stock 1.138V to 1.225V, and I found I could up the core clock to 1175 MHz and be stable (with +20% power draw). Meanwhile, I found a cozy home for the memory clock at 1350x4MHz and left it at that. I could run Bioshock Infinite and Diablo III for extended periods of time with no problem. Good stuff.
Yesterday, however, after playing Diablo III for an intermediate period of time, I ran into a straight black screen crash - with the power still "on" as far as I could tell. Had to hard reboot. Now, what's odd is that I was relatively certain that my overclock was stable; temps never rose above 76ºC in normal usage, and in fact when I pulled back the memory clock the temps were usually around 72ºC (and even lower - talking 68ºC - for less demanding applications). While not optimal I considered this acceptable. So I loaded up HWinfo and went for it again - another crash occurred and I rebooted and checked the data spreadsheet. No odd behavior whatsoever except for the crash.
I dial back the overclock to 1100 MHz on the core clock and 1300 MHz on the memory clock, and eventually I got another crash. So I reduced the voltage to 1.138V and dialed back the overclock to stock settings (with normal power draw) - I also confirmed that it was back to stock with GPU-z. I uninstalled all drivers/extra clocking programs and reinstalled latest drivers from ATI. Still more black screens - although fewer and further in between. In fact, I can only achieve stability when I underclock the GPU to 800 MHz on the core clock and 1100 MHz on the memory clock. With these settings, there are no more black screens.
So. I need help troubleshooting the culprit. The GPU is likely because I did give it a pretty demanding experience with the benchmarking, and maybe I even overdid it on the overclock. Oh well. But I also have the feeling that it could be my PSU since the GPU seems perfectly stable when underclocked - maybe I was asking too much of my PSU after all, and it just couldn't handle it?
Hard to say. Here are my specs:
AMD Phenom II X4 965 - 3.4 GHz Quad-Core (NOT overclocked)
ATI Radeon HD7850 XFX Double D
PSU: 530W Rosewill with 20A/+12V
So recently I upgraded my ATI Radeon HD 4890 for an ATI Radeon HD 7850 (brand: XFX). Everything runs golden on stock settings. As I usually do, I decided to try out the overclocking as I heard that the HD7850 is a good overclocker. I pushed from stock core clock 860 MHz to 1050 and was stable without changing voltage - any more and that was black screen or vertical lines crashing. So then I saw about upping the voltage from stock 1.138V to 1.225V, and I found I could up the core clock to 1175 MHz and be stable (with +20% power draw). Meanwhile, I found a cozy home for the memory clock at 1350x4MHz and left it at that. I could run Bioshock Infinite and Diablo III for extended periods of time with no problem. Good stuff.
Yesterday, however, after playing Diablo III for an intermediate period of time, I ran into a straight black screen crash - with the power still "on" as far as I could tell. Had to hard reboot. Now, what's odd is that I was relatively certain that my overclock was stable; temps never rose above 76ºC in normal usage, and in fact when I pulled back the memory clock the temps were usually around 72ºC (and even lower - talking 68ºC - for less demanding applications). While not optimal I considered this acceptable. So I loaded up HWinfo and went for it again - another crash occurred and I rebooted and checked the data spreadsheet. No odd behavior whatsoever except for the crash.
I dial back the overclock to 1100 MHz on the core clock and 1300 MHz on the memory clock, and eventually I got another crash. So I reduced the voltage to 1.138V and dialed back the overclock to stock settings (with normal power draw) - I also confirmed that it was back to stock with GPU-z. I uninstalled all drivers/extra clocking programs and reinstalled latest drivers from ATI. Still more black screens - although fewer and further in between. In fact, I can only achieve stability when I underclock the GPU to 800 MHz on the core clock and 1100 MHz on the memory clock. With these settings, there are no more black screens.
So. I need help troubleshooting the culprit. The GPU is likely because I did give it a pretty demanding experience with the benchmarking, and maybe I even overdid it on the overclock. Oh well. But I also have the feeling that it could be my PSU since the GPU seems perfectly stable when underclocked - maybe I was asking too much of my PSU after all, and it just couldn't handle it?
Hard to say. Here are my specs:
AMD Phenom II X4 965 - 3.4 GHz Quad-Core (NOT overclocked)
ATI Radeon HD7850 XFX Double D
PSU: 530W Rosewill with 20A/+12V
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