Need to flash XFX 5870 to latest bios, plz help...

[poohbear]

hello, its my first post here but im a long time member of anandtech and numerous other hardware sites. I registered because i read alot of the potential answers here after a google search led me to these forums.

i recently bought a used XFX 5870, and it was working fine in RTS games but i encountered the gray screen of death with verticle lines while doing some prolonged FPS gaming. I learned through my google searches, which led me to this forum inparticular, that XFX pushed their clocks too far with their original XFX release: 875/1300 was overheating many of the cards apparently, and those are the default speeds of my current used XFX 5870. After some digging around i found that anything sold after march/2010 was set to 875/1250. So, i've manually brought down the clocks to 875/1200 just to be safe & have'nt encountered any more grey screens w/ vertical lines.

However, after underclocking it in CCC i noticed the idle temps are ridiculously high, the ram STAYS at 1200mhz in desktop/2d mode, which pushes the temps way up. This is apparently a problem with post catalyst 10.4 drivers. So, when i use the default settings in ATI overdrive my speeds idle at 157/300mhz, but as stated it also sets default 3D mode to XFX's factory settings to 875/1300, which is too much!

I've been switching back & forth between default and the 875/1250 speeds, but its really annoying because sometimes i forget to switch back and it idles @ 400/1200 for hours (can't imagine that's good for life of my used card )

Can anyone please guide me through the steps of properly flashing my XFX 5870? I tried the latest version of ATIwinflash here with the latest version of XFX's 5870 bios found here, but unfortunetly it just froze. i freaked out for a minute thinking i borked the card, but did a reboot and its working again.

Thanks in advance for reading and any assistance u can provide.

 

[fullinfusion]

Welcome to TPU, Im sure your going to love it here.

Have you first tried to make a custom profile for your gpu?

And Id recommend you updating your ccc driver to 10.10e and up and see if it helps.

 

[fullinfusion]

Go and read THIS that Erocker put together, mabey you can alter it for your clocks.

If you need the tools to flash in dos let me know, Ill upload them for ya.

 

[Athlon2K15]

id like to know the model number for this card. 875 shouldnt be too much for the core. the 1300mhz memory could be the issue but i have a hard time believing that too.

 

[fullinfusion]

id like to know the model number for this card. 875 shouldnt be too much for the core. the 1300mhz memory could be the issue but i have a hard time believing that too.

Yeah I agree with you too. IMO XFX have some dodgy gpu's. Sure, there warranty is great but really get with it. I had nothing but problems with there cards but the customer service was great!

 

[revin]

id like to know the model number for this card. 875 shouldnt be too much for the core. the 1300mhz memory could be the issue but i have a hard time believing that too.

Mine is the First Release of the XXX Edition HD-587A-ZND9 875/5.2Ghz
With the "Referance Fan" location and has been nearly perfect since I got it shortly after they came out.
With some "heavy? razzing from here I have also ran 1000,1050/1300 a couple times,[screenies are buried in TPU somewhere] but I need this to last so I dont want to push it[I may just had got lucky?]

I seen that now XFX Has my model listed as "5000" instead of the 5200
They added a new Fan setup with 578X-ZNxx located in the Center
The last set of 4 #'s indicate if a "Game" was included

So if it's XXXX version stock clocked it would be HD-587AorX-ZNDx depending what fan.

Hope this can the OP to know which card it is

So far the only time i've had those "issues" w/mine is w x64 drivers, and 10.12's just are killing me with "Display Driver has Recovered blabla with x64os, but it will 2D clock something like 157/300
I'm still trying to go thru and find a stable set that will lower 2D clocks like that,BUT with x32 drivers 10.11 and under even with mem at 1300 manual fat 36-48% idle temps reamined well under 40c

It "may" be that some other owner tried pushing it too far

 

[poohbear]

Welcome to TPU, Im sure your going to love it here.

Have you first tried to make a custom profile for your gpu?

And Id recommend you updating your ccc driver to 10.10e and up and see if it helps.

Thanks for all the responses guys! Sorry for the delay in responding, currently living & working in Tokyo so we're 13 hours ahead of EST!

Fullinfusion, i tried the cats 10.12 but it occasionaly crashes w/ the 5870 (windows tells me the display driver stopped working), my understanding is this is a wider issue w/the 10.12s and not just my card. Thanks for linking me to the registry mods by Erocker, i considered them but a bios flash would be more permanent and just better for the longevity of the card (when i resell, or hafta reinstall the OS). Again thanks for the link, but I'm not too keen on software solutions to a bios problem.

AthlonX2, my model number is: HD-587A-ZND9 v1.2 (stock clocks are 875/1300).

I guess what im asking is if the 2010-3-04 XFX bios on this bios page is the one i want? Its the latest one yea? It wont brick my card because its the wrong model or something?

What are your opinions on WinATIflash vs DOS flashing? like i said the WINATIflash just froze, locking the screen up, so is that a problem with the card & bios im trying to use, or does WINATIflash just not work all the time?

Thanks in advance for all your help guys.

 

[poohbear]

Thanks for all the responses guys! Sorry for the delay in responding, currently living & working in Tokyo so we're 13 hours ahead of EST!

Fullinfusion, i tried the cats 10.12 but it occasionaly crashes w/ the 5870 (windows tells me the display driver stopped working), my understanding is this is a wider issue w/the 10.12s and not just my card. Thanks for linking me to the registry mods by Erocker, i considered them but a bios flash would be more permanent and just better for the longevity of the card (when i resell, or hafta reinstall the OS). Again thanks for the link, but I'm not too keen on software solutions to a bios problem.

AthlonX2, my model number is: HD-587A-ZND9 v1.2 (stock clocks are 875/1300).

I guess what im asking is if the 2010-3-04 XFX bios on this bios page is the one i want? Its the latest one yea? It wont brick my card because its the wrong model or something?

What are your opinions on WinATIflash vs DOS flashing? like i said the WINATIflash just froze, locking the screen up, so is that a problem with the card & bios im trying to use, or does WINATIflash just not work all the time?

Thanks in advance for all your help guys.

bumpity bump. can anyone answer the above questions?

specifically:

1) Is the latest xfx bios on the techpowerup site good for my card HD-587A-ZND9 v1.2 ? i get grey screens @ 875/1300, but 875/1200 its fine. im just worried i might use the wrong bios and brick my card.

2) what are your opinions on winATIflash vs Dos Flashing? Is winATIflash on win7 64bit ok?

thanks in advance for any assistance guys.

 

[Barrade]

<- Figured I better register myself

Been looking here awhile for similar issues. For the most part I've been having the exact issues that you have been Poohbear. Same model card & all. I've tried getting better support from XFX to no avail. I just re opened another ticket hoping for information at least from a comparable card. My main concerns are voltage settings & primarily a better Fan speed profile for our cards.
Previusly I had a 4870x2 (another very hot running card) - same issues mainly - so.. Arctic cooling had this NICE cooler that I modded to my card & it ran beautifully after that. However - Warranty was gone @ that point.. sure enough one of my power chips or something that was running too hot had fried & since I had an aftermarket (sufficient cooler) - I was out my $600 in less than a year.

X your fingers we get an official bios flash from xfx w/
1. Stable voltages
2. More sensative fan profile
3. better sensing of state? (2d/3d/idle etc)
4. Lower clocks if we must (I'd prefer this card to last more than a year)

 

[poohbear]

barrade, this issue was resolved with a bios given to me from XFX, its this exact same bios:

http://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/70946/XFX.HD5870.1024.100223.html

Essentially it bumps the core up to 900 (with a little voltage increase) and lowers the memory to 1250. Please be aware this is for the XFX 5870 XXX edition, the one that has a default clock of: 875/1300. 1300 for the RAM is too much for the 5870, dropping it down to 1250 resolved this problem. The bump up to 900 with a little voltage increase (to the gpu) negates the 50mhz drop in memory clock to keep the performance up. hope that helps.

 

[Bo$$]

<- Figured I better register myself

Been looking here awhile for similar issues. For the most part I've been having the exact issues that you have been Poohbear. Same model card & all. I've tried getting better support from XFX to no avail. I just re opened another ticket hoping for information at least from a comparable card. My main concerns are voltage settings & primarily a better Fan speed profile for our cards.
Previusly I had a 4870x2 (another very hot running card) - same issues mainly - so.. Arctic cooling had this NICE cooler that I modded to my card & it ran beautifully after that. However - Warranty was gone @ that point.. sure enough one of my power chips or something that was running too hot had fried & since I had an aftermarket (sufficient cooler) - I was out my $600 in less than a year.

X your fingers we get an official bios flash from xfx w/
1. Stable voltages
2. More sensative fan profile
3. better sensing of state? (2d/3d/idle etc)
4. Lower clocks if we must (I'd prefer this card to last more than a year)

why warranty gone? you dont have to tell them you removed the cooler

 

[poohbear]

yes Bo$$ is right, u just had to replace the stock cooler and u would've been fine. Anyways, the problem with after market coolers on these hot running cards is that they miss some hot spots (especially the VRM chips). Sure they cool the GPU and RAM much better, but they leave other chips on the card with no cooling and those are the ones that end up dying out.

 

[Barrade]

Well on my former card cooler (from arctic silver) I suppose I'd have just felt guilty even tho I still to this day have that 1 ton stock cooler that came with that 4870x2.

I did however get a response from xfx on the exact -ZND9. My tech had said they've tried the bios updates with no + effect. They'd prefer to run my card through the xfx gauntlet & send me a replacement or = Same card assuming it passes - shouldn't, it doesn't pass my standards .
Also had said it'd likely be a Gen'2 cooler not the 1st gen. My issue primarily comes up if I forget to pre-set my fan speed before gaming. It seamed the hotter my card got above 45C the higher chance of crashing / VLOD(Vertical lines o'death). Fortunately I live in Alaska & keeping my card @ 45C or below is pretty ez.

 

[fullinfusion]

XFX is a flop for manufacturing gps's. There customer service is top notch though imo.

Id never buy from XFX ever again.