Wednesday, April 19th 2017

Radeon RX 480 Cards Can Successfully be Flashed to RX 580

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Wednesday, April 19th 2017 09:52 Discuss (77 Comments)

User TonybonJoby in our own forums has successfully flashed his XFX RX 480 graphics card with the BIOS from a Sapphire RX 580 Limited Edition (the one that runs at 1411 MHz Boost clocks, yes.) Having obtained the Sapphire's BIOS right here on TPU, he then flashed it onto his graphics card (which possesses a dual-BIOS setup; this is an important point which you should consider, as it gives you an extra safety net should anything go wrong) through ATIFlash. The newly-christened RX 580 thus smiles for the screenshot, with a stock clock of 1411 MHz, higher than most overclocks possible with the RX 480 cards, probably due to increased voltages on the BIOS level. The user then tested the card on The Witcher 3 and Furmark, with no problems having been reported. Just remember to back-up your BIOS with GPU-Z and make sure to peruse our forums for some details on this flashing process before you get the proverbial grease on your elbows.

Essentially, this may allow you to bypass some artificial overclocking limitation with your graphics card, probably by increased voltages on different power states of the card. You should do this at your own risk, and remember, the only guaranteed way of getting an RX 580 is... you guessed it, buying an RX 580. However, this might also give you an extra performance boost, and free performance is always good, right?

Source: TechPowerUp ForumsThanks for sharing @TonybonJoby!

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77 Comments on Radeon RX 480 Cards Can Successfully be Flashed to RX 580

CounterSpell

where are the benches of the flashed 480?????

I NEEEEDDDDD

wiyosaya

Sounds a lot easier than back in the day changing a SM resistor position on my GeForce to turn it into a Quadro. :)

But now that the news is out, how long before the ability to do this is killed by the likes of AMD?

Zaxx420

With any kind of luck, the 470 may flash to a 570 as well...the little extra clocking headroom may be worth it. I'd be skeptical if I were flashing a 'lesser-binned' or budget oriented card model. Will wait and see if/when someone tries flashing a Sapphire 470 4GB Nitro+ card 'up' to a 570 4GB Nitro+...these cards are near identical as far as hardware and construction / lay-out are concerned...fingers crossed! Hope it's not exclusive to 'Limited Edition' firmware...even though there's some talented n determined modders out there.

Bojcha

Actually in "some" cases would be good to flash 5xx to 4xx. Guess it's possible.

NebWehttaM

Flashed my Sapphire Nitro + OC 8gb to 580 updated driver. Tried voltage increase.
Lots of artifacts in heaven and crashes.
Possibly voltage controller issue.

crazyfrog

I was impressed the 480 could be flashed to 580 spec so that it could reap the benefits of the added features in the amd drivers. Then I realised the 580 doesnt have new features just better clocks and a new name.

l)e3j4y

Fail on my Sapphire reference card o_Oo_O.

crazyfrog

l)e3j4y said:
Fail on my Sapphire reference card o_Oo_O.

So overclock in afterburner. Btw I use a 1070 still golden

Mistral

wiyosaya said:
But now that the news is out, how long before the ability to do this is killed by the likes of AMD?

"The likes of AMD"? How often in the past has AMD done it exactly?

#10

crazyfrog

Mistral said:
"The likes of AMD"? How often in the past has AMD done it exactly?

It's deceptive I remembered they rebranded the 7970 as the 200 and 300 series then RX 400 series with better fab and a few tweaks meaning 2 big rebrands and recycling the architecture. Recently I was reminded about the 7970 ghz edition which does the same thing as the 580 adding some extra mhz.
Bring on vega :)

#11

EarthDog

natr0n said:
Did the news cards get a die shrink or not ? I'm confused.

die got refined :kookoo:

Nerp.

#12

Steevo

crazyfrog said:
It's deceptive I remembered they rebranded the 7970 as the 200 and 300 series then RX 400 series with better fab and a few tweaks meaning 2 big rebrands and recycling the architecture. Recently I was reminded about the 7970 ghz edition which does the same thing as the 580 adding some extra mhz.
Bring on vega :)

Deceptive like, Nvidia did it first? Or deceptive like Nvidia using differing cores for the same card for three generations? Or deceptive like 3.5GB memory?

Also, 7970 became 280X and nothing more. Different cores were used in the 3xx series, and the 4xx series.

#13

crazyfrog

Steevo said:
Deceptive like, Nvidia did it first? Or deceptive like Nvidia using differing cores for the same card for three generations? Or deceptive like 3.5GB memory?

Also, 7970 became 280X and nothing more. Different cores were used in the 3xx series, and the 4xx series.

Differences are meh just the number of recycles of this architecture with releases now.

I do really want the 1070 to get rebranded as an 1170 or 1160 or even a bios editor to get released just so I can flash my 1070. I can hit 2050mhz and suspect I could hit 2200mhz on 1.2v as oppose to the 1.093v I'm stuck on.

#14

EarthDog

Steevo said:
Deceptive like, Nvidia did it first? Or deceptive like Nvidia using differing cores for the same card for three generations? Or deceptive like 3.5GB memory?

Also, 7970 became 280X and nothing more. Different cores were used in the 3xx series, and the 4xx series.

First? Maybe. But they havent done it in three generations if my memory serves (770?). AMD's rebrands were plentiful the past three generations. Hawaii, Tonga, Pitcairin...Polaris. like 8 cards were rebrands with clock differences.

Edit: http://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-reveals-specs-of-amd-radeon-r9-300-series-hawaii-tonga-pitcairn-and-bonaire-get-new-life/

#15

LordCody420

i calling bs since 1 its only screenshots and 2 take a look at the release date of the after screenshot

#16

crazyfrog

EarthDog said:
First? Maybe. But they havent done it in three generations if my memory serves (770?). AMD's rebrands were plentiful the past three generations. Hawaii, Tonga, Pitcairin...Polaris. like 8 cards were rebrands with clock differences.

Edit: http://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-reveals-specs-of-amd-radeon-r9-300-series-hawaii-tonga-pitcairn-and-bonaire-get-new-life/

I don't think Nvidia will do a rebrand but looking at the 1.093v voltages they're using they might? The last time they did was with the 600 series where they used 1.175v while the still safe voltage was 1.212v used in the 700 series and had hard boost limits set in bios which caused the driver to crash if you go beyond that overclock offset.
The worst case I found of this was with a 660 ti direct cu II. They made various versions of these cards and I had the slowest with stock speeds with 980mhz boost which went to 1100 in game. To my surprise the hard boost limit was set to 1100mhz but after going through making a custom bios and tuning an overclock I could run 1280mhz without issue. Admittedly there was a bios update on the Asus site which silently patched the boost limit to 1150mhz.

#17

R-T-B

Adam Freeman said:
I don't know what is the point in going into the hassle of flashing the bios to transform an Rx 480 to Rx 580. Flashing the bios won't transform a lower binned gpu to a better binned one that overclocks better. It's easier to try manual overclocking and adjust gpu vcore and clockspeed to obtain the best combination of voltage and frequency that result in higher performance with acceptable power draw.

Voltage unlocks basically.

#18

crazyfrog

EarthDog said:
First? Maybe. But they havent done it in three generations if my memory serves (770?). AMD's rebrands were plentiful the past three generations. Hawaii, Tonga, Pitcairin...Polaris. like 8 cards were rebrands with clock differences.

Edit: http://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/anton-shilov/amd-reveals-specs-of-amd-radeon-r9-300-series-hawaii-tonga-pitcairn-and-bonaire-get-new-life/

Nah flashing graphics bios files is super easy and extremely common if you research flashing 480 to 580 there's a ton of people doing it.

#19

crazyfrog

R-T-B said:
Voltage unlocks basically.

Are there voltage unlocks? What voltage is enabled on each?

#20

R-T-B

crazyfrog said:
Are there voltage unlocks? What voltage is enabled on each?

It says right in the article higher voltages are enabled.

#21

ziddey

ShurikN said:
460 and 560 are not same chips. (unlike x80 and x70)

Can you link to proof of this? If you're referring to the different core count, the rx460 has 1024 as well, but needs a bios mod to unlock (driver needs patching, so a signed rx560 bios would be convenient). That said, last I've read, the rx560 isn't out yet and there's conflicting reports about whether it'll actually have 1024 core or still just 896.

Zaxx420 said:
With any kind of luck, the 470 may flash to a 570 as well...the little extra clocking headroom may be worth it. I'd be skeptical if I were flashing a 'lesser-binned' or budget oriented card model. Will wait and see if/when someone tries flashing a Sapphire 470 4GB Nitro+ card 'up' to a 570 4GB Nitro+...these cards are near identical as far as hardware and construction / lay-out are concerned...fingers crossed! Hope it's not exclusive to 'Limited Edition' firmware...even though there's some talented n determined modders out there.

http://forums.guru3d.com/showpost.php?p=5421955&postcount=8
You're in luck. Looks like that's the only bios currently posted, and has been a confirmed success for what you're trying to do. I flashed it as well on my strix, but because the outputs are different, I've only got use of one dvi port. Otherwise is working just fine.

#22

Prima.Vera

AMD be like:

#23

EarthDog

Prima.Vera said:
AMD be like:

fixed. :p

#24

Bucknuts77

Most 480's only have one 6 or 8 pin pcie while 580's have duel so even with the flash I would think you would still need to underclock some for stability and not running fans loud as heck.

#25

timo_capa

buildzoid said:
BTW the new Nitro+ card is a totally different PCB from the old Nitro + I doubt the new BIOS will work with the old card.

Works fine for me on a Nitro+.

1411 / 2250 -36 mV

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Radeon RX 480 Cards Can Successfully be Flashed to RX 580

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77 Comments on Radeon RX 480 Cards Can Successfully be Flashed to RX 580