How to enable additional shaders on Radeon HD 6950

[DJManiac]

With the new card I must set my clocks, close Trixx, then apply 20% powertune in CCC otherwise the card throttles it speeds down under load.

Exactly the same here! Wrote it several times some post before....

Let me (us) know when you find out something regarding this....

 

[alex2112]

Sound like you still go with 6950 Clocks - probably from before flashing....

Take a look at ATIs Overdrive and see if Overdrive is activated with 800 GPU clock....

But if I still running with 6950 BIOS why do I have Memory clock from 6970 1375? Overdrive is activated and i just manually increase core to 880 in it.

 

[manofthem]

But if I still running with 6950 BIOS why do I have Memory clock from 6970 1375? Overdrive is activated and i just manually increase core to 880 in it.

I hadthe exact thing happen to me. What worked for me was to uninstall the drivers, reboot, then reinstall. It checked out at 880 after I did that. Try it out

 

[DJManiac]

But if I still running with 6950 BIOS why do I have Memory clock from 6970 1375? Overdrive is activated and i just manually increase core to 880 in it.

I never said 6950 BIOS - I said 6950 Clocks!

Exactly what I said... Overdrive was the reason... If your Limit in Clocks of Overdrive is now 950/1450 be sure that u have succesfully flashed it....

Have fun..

There is no need to uninstall/install the driver again.....

 

[alex2112]

If your Limit in Clocks of Overdrive is now 950/1450 be sure that u have succesfully flashed it....

Have fun..

There is no need to uninstall/install the driver again.....

Thats right, my limit clocks are 950/1450 so It looks like I have stock 6970 now, thank you again

 

[wmblalock]

Exactly the same here! Wrote it several times some post before....

Let me (us) know when you find out something regarding this....

I don't know what changed since last night, or if the programs just did something by themselves, but now, with the new card, if I use Afterburner then my card throttles it's clock speed, while if I use TRIXX, it DOES NOT throttle. It was the opposite last night

I keep switching between programs trying to test things, but it seems when I open and close different programs, different settings stick and others don't.. very confusing. Although, I like the way its working right now (no throttle down with Trixx)

Actually, I'm kind of irritated because now, no matter what, if Afterburner is open my card throttles down, and I like to use Afterburner for the OSD function only. I am also completely missing all sliders except the fan slider in ccc no matter what I do... I'm very confused as to exactly what's going on here.

 

[wmblalock]

Since my Afterburner throttles my clock speeds for whatever reason, does anyone else know of another good OSD program to show my GPU Temps & Clocks on the screen during games??? Riva Tuner is pretty old and doesn't seem to support much for these cards

 

[TRiGDaDDy]

I have tried everything from the whole bios to the shader unlock with a sapphire hd6950 and keep getting the could not erase rom error. I have to rebbot and get stuck and WIndows wants me to start in safe mode after it the last two times. I just start windows normally and get the 1408 shaders. I bought the video card from microcenter a week and a half ago brand new. NOt sure what to do. I follow the exact instructions to flash it to the shader unlock or the bios and it never succeeds. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[wmblalock]

I have tried everything from the whole bios to the shader unlock with a sapphire hd6950 and keep getting the could not erase rom error. I have to rebbot and get stuck and WIndows wants me to start in safe mode after it the last two times. I just start windows normally and get the 1408 shaders. I bought the video card from microcenter a week and a half ago brand new. NOt sure what to do. I follow the exact instructions to flash it to the shader unlock or the bios and it never succeeds. Any help would be appreciated.

Have you tried saving your bios, using the scripts in this thread to mod it, then use this script here to actually flash your card? Put your bios in the winflash folder after extracting this scrip then run the script.

http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/1920/HD_6950_to_HD_6970_Flashing_Tools.html

If I try just using winflash, my bios wont erase either. Also, sometimes it takes a try or two for it to work. Once in a while my system will freeze while trying to flash, then I have to boot the system with the card bios switch on '2', get winflash ready to go, and right before I hit the program button, switch the video card switch back to bios '1'. Are you sure you bios is in position '1' when you try to flash?

 

[wmblalock]

Ok, well I figured out what was going on regarding my previous post about the card throttling. I realized that Afterburner is not what was throttling my card, it was Trixx, even after I had closed it. I had Trixx running on startup, and apparently each time you run Trixx it disables power control, thus the card throttles, until your next reboot, even if you exit the program. Mind you, this is with my second Gigabyte 6950 that is a friends.. I don't think Trixx throttled MY Gigabyte 6950. I am going to pop it back in the computer in a minute and check and see. I know this card uses different VIDs to control 3D voltage (mine VID4, the new one VID3), maybe that has something to do with my Trixx disables the power slider control on one Gigabyte 6950 but not my new one? Let me pop My card back in and ill post back...

 

[dom99]

Ok, well I figured out what was going on regarding my previous post about the card throttling. I realized that Afterburner is not what was throttling my card, it was Trixx, even after I had closed it. I had Trixx running on startup, and apparently each time you run Trixx it disables power control, thus the card throttles, until your next reboot, even if you exit the program. Mind you, this is with my second Gigabyte 6950 that is a friends.. I don't think Trixx throttled MY Gigabyte 6950. I am going to pop it back in the computer in a minute and check and see. I know this card uses different VIDs to control 3D voltage (mine VID4, the new one VID3), maybe that has something to do with my Trixx disables the power slider control on one Gigabyte 6950 but not my new one? Let me pop My card back in and ill post back...

How can you tell if trixx is throttling the card? im using trixx at the moment

 

[wmblalock]

How can you tell if trixx is throttling the card? im using trixx at the moment

I use GPUz, open it to the "sensors" tab and check the box "continue refreshing this screen while GPUZ is in the background". Then start Kombustor or Furmark and watch the GPU Core Clock number in GPUZ. If it goes up and down, your being throttled. If it stays steady at your current clock speed then its not.

 

[DJManiac]

Ok, well I figured out what was going on regarding my previous post about the card throttling. I realized that Afterburner is not what was throttling my card, it was Trixx, even after I had closed it. I had Trixx running on startup, and apparently each time you run Trixx it disables power control, thus the card throttles, until your next reboot, even if you exit the program. Mind you, this is with my second Gigabyte 6950 that is a friends.. I don't think Trixx throttled MY Gigabyte 6950. I am going to pop it back in the computer in a minute and check and see. I know this card uses different VIDs to control 3D voltage (mine VID4, the new one VID3), maybe that has something to do with my Trixx disables the power slider control on one Gigabyte 6950 but not my new one? Let me pop My card back in and ill post back...

Probably it has something to do with the different 3D VIDs as you already said.... That seams to be the only difference... And if Trixx or AB grab the VID at different places and found less mV as expected, than the programm throttles down... MAY BE?!

For me AB did not throttle my card! I have VID4 for 3D with ASUS 6970 BIOS. TRIXX throttles here...

Strange Strange!

 

[dom99]

I use GPUz, open it to the "sensors" tab and check the box "continue refreshing this screen while GPUZ is in the background". Then start Kombustor or Furmark and watch the GPU Core Clock number in GPUZ. If it goes up and down, your being throttled. If it stays steady at your current clock speed then its not.

Checked and Trixx does not throttle my card even when GPU usage is a constant 100%. using 6950 unlocked shaders @ 880MHz 1375MHz 1.1V 10.12 drivers.

Does 10.12a provide better performance? lookin forward to official new driver release

 

[itsdanny]

I like to use Afterburner for the OSD function only. Since my Afterburner throttles my clock speeds for whatever reason, does anyone else know of another good OSD program to show my GPU Temps & Clocks on the screen during games??? Riva Tuner is pretty old and doesn't seem to support much for these cards

Nope, but there are ways around it. I made an executable with the same class and file name and it seems to be good. OSD hooks fine. Or you could load it in a debugger and find where it is finding the parent MSI Afterburner app and patch it there. Either works.

 

[wmblalock]

Nope, but there are ways around it. I made an executable with the same class and file name and it seems to be good. OSD hooks fine. Or you could load it in a debugger and find where it is finding the parent MSI Afterburner app and patch it there. Either works.

I think most of that was over my head. What did you make an executable of / for? What do you mean class, and what file name?

**EDIT** I guess I don't need to worry about it anyway, since after that post I made about not being able to use AB because of throttling I found out a lot more ... what I posted above.. and now with my original card, since it allows me to use the power control slider with Trixx (unlike my second card which made the power control slider disappear all together), I can use Afterburner for OSD only and the card won't throttle. In my previous post I thought Afterburner was causing the card to throttle, now I see that the combo of Trixx and Card2 disabled Power Control slider causing the card to throttle. My Card1 doesn't throttle anymore because, with trixx, the power control slider in ccc doesn't disappear and still works.

 

[itsdanny]

I think most of that was over my head. What did you make an executable of / for? What do you mean class, and what file name?

For the MSI Afterburner app. Exact Window name and file name as the latter. Basically, I think OSD uses some APIs to detects specific static variables or handles to see if MSI Afterburner is active, if not, it does not hook any apps with its wrapper.

Good info btw. My card, picked up on the 5th, was a Gigabyte, and it is also controlled in the VID3 variable.

 

[wmblalock]

For the MSI Afterburner app. Exact Window name and file name as the latter. Basically, I think OSD uses some APIs to detects specific static variables or handles to see if MSI Afterburner is active, if not, it does not hook any apps with its wrapper.

Good info btw. My card, picked up on the 5th, was a Gigabyte, and it is also controlled in the VID3 variable.

Ahh, see, there are two versions of the card. Ones with VID3 3D voltage and ones with VID4 3D voltage. Those with VID3, like you, don't have the power control slider with trixx, thus trixx is useless. But with people like me, who use VID4, we can use trixx because we have the power control slider.

It seems I should make a new thread titled "6950 modding and overclocking guide" and put all this info in there so people can get the best software / setup for their card right outta the gate. It's really confusing since some software, like AB works better with some cards (VID3 cards) and programs like trixx work better for other cards (VID4)

 

[itsdanny]

Ahh, see, there are two versions of the card. Ones with VID3 3D voltage and ones with VID4 3D voltage. Those with VID3, like you, don't have the power control slider with trixx, thus trixx is useless. But with people like me, who use VID4, we can use trixx because we have the power control slider.

It seems I should make a new thread titled "6950 modding and overclocking guide" and put all this info in there so people can get the best software / setup for their card right outta the gate. It's really confusing since some software, like AB works better with some cards (VID3 cards) and programs like trixx work better for other cards (VID4)

If I recall correctly, the power control slider only disappeared when MSI Afterburner was running. If it wasn't and TriXX was still active, the Power Control Slider was still there.

 

[DJManiac]

Gigabyte 6950 #1 Ordered 12/29/10

Gigabyte 6950 #2 Ordered 1/13/11

More than WELL DONE!!!! This brings bright light to this topic!!!!

Many Thanks!!!

 

[wmblalock]

Ok, well I removed my findings and the post above because they were incorrect, itsdanny's post made me go back, re-test a few things and double check my findings. So it turns out, here is what I found out now.

I had just been using Kombustor's reading of the core clock to tell if my card was throttling. This is not an accurate source of the actual clock speed and I should have been using GPUz. Now, using GPUz, I find out that both of my Gigabyte 6950 cards have been throttling all along. DOH :shadedshu

But I did still get some useful information from my research of two Gigabyte 6950s.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

First Finding:
Different 6950s use different VIDs for 3D voltage. Even the same model card from the same manufacturer. One of my Gigabyte 6950s uses VID3 and the other one uses VID4. So test your card to find out which one and make sure you are using the correct VID. This is also another good reason to edit and use your OWN card's bios rather than flashing a modified bios from another card to yours... even if it's the same manufacturer.

Second Finding:
A final explanation / bug of overclocking with Trixx. When overclocking with Trixx, even if your power control slider in CCC says +20%, that's not accurate and it may not be using +20% power causing your card to throttle down while gaming. You can confirm if your card is throttling by running Kombustor or Furmark while watching the GPU Mhz sensor in GPUz.

Here is the bug in Trixx. Trixx resets your Power Control to 0% each time you either restart your computer, or each time you change your clock speed in Trixx and click apply. Even though it resets your Power Control setting to 0%, your CCC still shows the slider as being at +20%. This is what fooled me. What you have to do, if you use Trixx, is this. Each time you restart your computer, or change your clock speeds in Trixx, you must open up CCC, move the Power Control slider down to something other than +20%, click apply, then move it back to +20% and click apply again. It's a little tricky because you only have 1 second to click apply before the slider goes back to whatever it was. Another way of doing it is to close Trixx, then open CCC, set Power Control to anything other than +20%, apply, then set it at +20% and hit apply. After that re-open Trixx. This way you don't have to fight with Trixx moving the slider every 1 second.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

[wmblalock]

I am sort of stuck now as to what I want to use to overclock the clock speeds of my 6950 now.

If I use Trixx, I have to mess around with the Power Control slider each time I reboot or change my clock speed, that's a pain.

If I use Afterburner, I have to enable "Unofficial Overclocking" to increase the 6950s default overclock limits, which causes two problems. It causes the card to run at full 3D voltage/speeds 24/7 and never idles the card down in 2D mode. This isn't good for the card. The second problem with Afterburner is that If you create two profiles (one for 2D and one for 3D) so that the Afterburner automatically switches profiles and idles the card down somewhat (although it can't fully, so its still not great) in 2D mode, then I lose control of my user defined fan curve in Afterburner which keeps my card cool. See, when "Unofficial Overclocking" is enabled in Afterburner, it defaults back to ATIs fan curve every time you click "apply" in the program, and every time it automatically applies a 2D or 3D profile (which it will do constantly as you use your computer). You can get Afterburner to use the user defined fan curve again by double clicking the user define button twice, but its not practical to do that each time it automatically switches 2D/3D profiles, which happens all the time.

Any program suggestions?
It seems like there is no program that will just do it all correctly. Maybe I could run two programs, but I'd really rather not.. Here is what I want to do, hopefully with just one program. Any suggestions would be great. It seems so simple, it sucks that no program I can find will do these 4 simple things! Does anyone have a solution that does all of the 4 necessary things below?

1. Have increased overclock limits beyond that of a stock 6950
2. Have the program not disable or screw with the Power Control settings. I need it at +20% all the time.
3. Allow the card to idle itself down in 2D mode, so it's not running 100% voltage and speed all the time while in 2D use
4. Allow me to set a custom fan curve to keep the card cool.

 

[manofthem]

Ok, well I removed my findings and the post above because they were incorrect, itsdanny's post made me go back, re-test a few things and double check my findings. So it turns out, here is what I found out now.

I had just been using Kombustor's reading of the core clock to tell if my card was throttling. This is not an accurate source of the actual clock speed and I should have been using GPUz. Now, using GPUz, I find out that both of my Gigabyte 6950 cards have been throttling all along. DOH :shadedshu

But I did still get some useful information from my research of two Gigabyte 6950s.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

First Finding:
Different 6950s use different VIDs for 3D voltage. Even the same model card from the same manufacturer. One of my Gigabyte 6950s uses VID3 and the other one uses VID4. So test your card to find out which one and make sure you are using the correct VID. This is also another good reason to edit and use your OWN card's bios rather than flashing a modified bios from another card to yours... even if it's the same manufacturer.

Second Finding:
A final explanation / bug of overclocking with Trixx. When overclocking with Trixx, even if your power control slider in CCC says +20%, that's not accurate and it may not be using +20% power causing your card to throttle down while gaming. You can confirm if your card is throttling by running Kombustor or Furmark while watching the GPU Mhz sensor in GPUz.

Here is the bug in Trixx. Trixx resets your Power Control to 0% each time you either restart your computer, or each time you change your clock speed in Trixx and click apply. Even though it resets your Power Control setting to 0%, your CCC still shows the slider as being at +20%. This is what fooled me. What you have to do, if you use Trixx, is this. Each time you restart your computer, or change your clock speeds in Trixx, you must open up CCC, move the Power Control slider down to something other than +20%, click apply, then move it back to +20% and click apply again. It's a little tricky because you only have 1 second to click apply before the slider goes back to whatever it was.

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Thanks for all the heads up and the hard work you put into this. Well done!

 

[wmblalock]

Thanks for all the heads up and the hard work you put into this. Well done!

No problem. Hopefully it helps other 6950 owners.
I really wish I could find a good solution to control my cards overclocking and fan correctly though. Per my above post, it seems like nothing does a complete job.

 

[manofthem]

No problem. Hopefully it helps other 6950 owners.
I really wish I could find a good solution to control my cards overclocking and fan correctly though. Per my above post, it seems like nothing does a complete job.

Yeah, it was weird today. I'm back using MSI AB, but even after I apply a profile, say 900/1375 (one I used often), a few seconds later it would be back to like 400/625 (my 2D profile). Sometimes it would stay, sometimes not. Weird..