New Firmware Boosts RTX 3080 Ti Mining Speed By 21 Percent

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EVGA's fix for a power limit may work on other card brands.

EVGA RTX 3080 Ti XC3
(Image credit: EVGA)

As reported by OwnSnap, miners have figured out a way to gain more performance out of the RTX 3080 Ti graphics cards with the built-in LHR silicon. This is done through either a BIOS flash, or if you own an EVGA card, can be done with a firmware upgrade.

This whole conversation started when Reddit user @bravo_char, posted information on how to improve the performance of the 3080 Ti. According to him, most RTX 3080 Tis with the default BIOS have a hidden power limit that is activated during periods of high memory load, which is a trait of mining workloads.

Thankfully, the issue was brought to EVGA's attention and the company has issued a fix.  So if you have an EVGA RTX 3080 Ti, it would be best to upgrade the firmware to unlock more mining performance from your card. This can be done through EVGA's Precision X1 software. Bravo noted that after updating the firmware on his XC3, the card went from 66MH/s to a whopping 80MH/s, a gain of 21 percent.

However, this leaves other RTX 3080 Ti models, including the Founders Edition, without an official firmware update to fix the power limit issues. As a temporary solution, Bravo notes that you can download the EVGA RTX 3080 Ti XC3 BIOS with the updated firmware and flash it onto a non-EVGA branded RTX 3080 Ti to get the same effect.

However, Bravo reminds us that flashing a BIOS to another graphics card model is very dangerous if you don't know what you are doing. So please only do this at your own risk.

But the results could be even better than what EVGA's cards can achieve. Another miner known as Red Panda Mining on YouTube, upgraded his Inno3D 3080 Ti iChill X3 to the EVGA XC3 BIOS, and gained an even-higher 91MH/s.

Aaron Klotz
Aaron Klotz
Contributing Writer

Aaron Klotz is a contributing writer for Tom’s Hardware, covering news related to computer hardware such as CPUs, and graphics cards.

14 Comments Comment from the forums
  • RodroX
    Good news! Not for me.
    Reply
  • sstanic
    Hans...
    Reply
  • HKD25
    You are definitely part of the problem. Anything that assists Miners and/or scalpers should be boycotted and driven into the dirt, considering the current availability of GPUs, and the prevalence of unethical practices.
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    HKD25 said:
    You are definitely part of the problem. Anything that assists Miners and/or scalpers should be boycotted and driven into the dirt, considering the current availability of GPUs, and the prevalence of unethical practices.
    It doesn't matter. People who take crypto-mining seriously on a much larger scale than people taking their news from more mainstream tech media have their own communities that are days if not weeks ahead on this sort of stuff.

    The people who really want to know about this stuff likely knew several days ago, which is how they could confirm that the EVGA vBIOS works on multiple other models before the story went mainstream.
    Reply
  • hasten
    HKD25 said:
    You are definitely part of the problem. Anything that assists Miners and/or scalpers should be boycotted and driven into the dirt, considering the current availability of GPUs, and the prevalence of unethical practices.
    I see you joined just to post this! Hooray! Im here to 100% guarantee this didnt shift the availability of gpus at all. In fact because it has so little impact im going to counter you and say it actually made them more available because now that guy shooting for a lhr 3080/70ti for mining might step it up leaving more mid range cards for consumer purchase.

    And bringing ethics into this is silly. On that point, i think it is unethical of you to disparage these people. Your video game playing enjoyment has more value than their livelihood? Its more important for you to play halo than for joe down the street to eat? In my opinion that is as ethically deprived a stance to hold as eugenics.
    Reply
  • Krotow
    This article only confirm that only worldwide crypto mining ban by any means necessary will end GPU shortages and partially other IT part shortages as well.
    Reply
  • Unolocogringo
    Now the article will bring hundreds of " I flashed my bios now my card does not work threads."
    Traffic is traffic I guess.
    But for some reason comments do not show for this article???????
    Conspiracy?!?!?
    :homer:
    Reply
  • spongiemaster
    Unolocogringo said:
    Now the article will bring hundreds of " I flashed my bios now my card does not work threads."
    Traffic is traffic I guess.
    But for some reason comments do not show for this article???????
    Conspiracy?!?!?
    :homer:
    No, it won't, and people have been reporting missing comments on articles for a while now. It didn't "coincidently" start with this article.
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    Unolocogringo said:
    But for some reason comments do not show for this article???????
    Editors forgetting to add the forum link when putting a story up has been a thing for years, though it appears to have become far more frequent in recent weeks.
    Reply
  • Unolocogringo
    InvalidError said:
    Editors forgetting to add the forum link when putting a story up has been a thing for years, though it appears to have become far more frequent in recent weeks.
    Sorry for the misunderstanding it was a satirical post!
    There is always a conspiracy about something!!! Anything !!!
    OH and you forgot to read my sign first.
    😇
    Reply