New 5850

[Teratoma]

Ordered a new 5850 last night from newegg. Finally! Hasn't shipped yet. It will be replacing a 4830 on my main rig. Haven't decided what to do with the old one yet. My other systems are either SFF or don't have PCIe 2.0 slots. I think my next upgrade will be my son's PC (SuperMicro socket 478 P4 :eek:) so I could use it in that box later on.

http://usa.asus.com/product.aspx?P_ID=6Kz9jp2PUnDKZf67&templete=2

[Fire$torm]

Yipeee!!!!!!! More upgrades \m/

[DrPop]

That is sweet! Nice upgrade, Tera. If the card has good cooling, you can BIOS flash it to a 5870 and then set it to permanent O/C @ 900 to 925 core clock w/ voltage at 1.163 just like a 5870. Depending on the project, it will equal or beat a stock 5870 and only trail an O/Ced 5870 by 3 to 9%.

Great idea on using the old card in your son's rig. Will we see a "Teratoma's Son" joining the team soon, I hope? :D

[Teratoma]

how much more power does that OC draw? I only have a 500w PSU and I am a little concerned.

I think my oldest Son is too young to start with this just yet. None of this would interest him right now anyway. I think Keith had already came up with nicks for both of my boys...Terabyte & Terabit! :D

[Fire$torm]

how much more power does that OC draw? I only have a 500w PSU and I am a little concerned.

I think my oldest Son is too young to start with this just yet. None of this would interest him right now anyway. I think Keith had already came up with nicks for both of my boys...Terabyte & Terabit! :D

If you don't mind me chiming in....
First...
HD 5850 specs & Power requirements (From AMD site):
*Maximum board power: 151 Watts
*500 Watt or greater power supply with two 75W 6-pin PCI Express® power connectors recommended (600 Watt and four 6-pin connectors for ATI CrossFireX™ technology in dual mode)

Second...
I don't know what kind or brand of PSU you have but consider the following:
*Generic PSUs usually die sooner than quality brands like Antec, Thermaltake, CoolerPower, etc...

*Generic PSUs usually lose the ability to produce rated output over time sooner than quality brands and actual output drops at a faster rate. Better PSUs will lose 5~20 percent over the life of the unit.

*All PSU power feed cables (for the PC components) have current limits rated in Amps.

Most components in an ATX spec PC are powered from 12V lines only but many MB components actually run at lower voltages like SATA/PCIe/USB controllers etc... Because Ohm's Law states P = I * E, reducing voltage without reducing Power consumption causes an increase in current draw, I = P / E.
Example: A MassCool Fan drawing 2 Watts at 12 Volts.
I = 2/12 = 0.1667 Amps. Now we redesign the fan so it still draws 2 Watts but at 6 Volts. I = 2/6 = 0.333 Amps.

I say all that to make this point. A PSU that, at its best, is close to the minimum system power requirements will likely reach the current (Amps) limits on the cables long before it hits the wall in power (Watts) draw. This is the reason I never recommend low wattage PSUs. When you factor in the other considerations, using a PSU that only meets minimum system requirements is a potential disaster waiting to happen.

My rule: Calculate system requirements, multiply that by 1.5 and then spend as much as you can afford buying a PSU rated HIGHER than the your math result and only buy a brand name unit. A little more money now will save you a bundle later.

Sorry for the dissertation. Hope this helps.

[DrPop]

Errr...:confused:#-o yeah, what he said. ;)

Seriously, I'm finding out more and more the PSU makes a huge difference in the stability of the rig. Tried swapping a higher end card into Kat's rig and result was not so good... I'm feeling the PSU blues now too. Looks like I'll be lining up with you one of these days to get a bigger and badder one. :p

[Slicker]

+1

I have two quads with relatively lower power, cheap PSUs in them. Neither can run a GPU any more because the power off due to lack of power. A third dual core box died when the GPU went south and blew a cheap PSU. I put in a spare (cheap) PSU and blew that also. Instead of shutting down, it just burned up. Lesson learned. Minimum 500W means buy a good 750W. The 80 plus rating is better, but the really good ones will be well over 90% efficient. They cost more, but may save more power in the long run. Also, I believe the closer a PSU runs to its max rating, the worse it does at wasting power. e.g. A 500W PUS at 480W load will burn more power than a 700W running at 480W load. (Correct me if I'm wrong here guys.)

I don't buy anything under 600W any more. Also, you may want to check the amps required by the card. Some of the cheaper PSUs have several (3-4) 12V rails but none higher than 18-20A. If the GPU needs 25A, it may not run even though the PSU wattage is rated high enough.

[Crazybob]

Congrats Tera on the new card. Sounds like you'll be adding some more cobbles to the pile pretty soon. I can verify what they are saying about the PSU's. The lower watt boxes, just end up costing you money, time and a lot of frustration. Also something everyone with a GPU should remember, MAINTENACE. Just got done with a rebuild and man what a bunch of crap. I'll elaborate in another thread for those interested. Congrats again.

[Mike029]

Congrats!! Love the upgrades guys. I also buy bigger PSU when I can afford them. I got lucky and picked up the 750 PCP&C that newegg had for sale. No problems since. Keep the upgrades coming.:cool:

[Teratoma]

The PSU is an Antec. I believe it is an Eathwatts which is rated at 80%. Mobo is Asus, about 2 or 3 years old so the capacitors should be in decent shape. I know that I need a larger PSU in this box and I'm pretty sure it will run the 5850. My question is whether or not additional OC will push me past the capability of the 500w PSU or if the increase in power draw is minimal enough to run. I may not even want to OC it anyway...the option came up and I was sorta thinking (typing?!) out loud.

BTW, card arrived yesterday. Haven't had a chance to instal it yet. Got home a little late as I had a little accident with my car on the way home. Not horrible, details are unimportant, but my insurance company isn't going to be too happy with me even though I may not hit my deductable on this one. It's kind of icy here in the north east so I am off to drive my mom to work and then get new tires for the truck before we get into an accident with it too. Seems like I am back in the mode of more money going out than coming in again. Just glad I finally got the card before the funds were "demanded" elsewhere.

[Fire$torm]

The PSU is an Antec. I believe it is an Eathwatts which is rated at 80%. Mobo is Asus, about 2 or 3 years old so the capacitors should be in decent shape. I know that I need a larger PSU in this box and I'm pretty sure it will run the 5850. My question is whether or not additional OC will push me past the capability of the 500w PSU or if the increase in power draw is minimal enough to run. I may not even want to OC it anyway...the option came up and I was sorta thinking (typing?!) out loud.

BTW, card arrived yesterday. Haven't had a chance to instal it yet. Got home a little late as I had a little accident with my car on the way home. Not horrible, details are unimportant, but my insurance company isn't going to be too happy with me even though I may not hit my deductable on this one. It's kind of icy here in the north east so I am off to drive my mom to work and then get new tires for the truck before we get into an accident with it too. Seems like I am back in the mode of more money going out than coming in again. Just glad I finally got the card before the funds were "demanded" elsewhere.

Sorry to hear about the, err..., mmmm, incident. Its those little things that can make the disposable income truly disposable :(

To answer the OC question....
Yes. But considering, rated output, age and use, there is not a whole lot of wiggle room. Remember, it is not just a wattage concern but also a current concern. Just don't go adding an internal 8TB RAID 5 array or a half dozen 180mm high output case fans and you should be ok. I would recommend saving up for a 750W+ PSU for the next upgrade purchase.

[DrPop]

System requirements for the 5850 and the 5870 are the same - 500W with (2) 75W 6pin PCI-e connectors. This is because they are exactly the same card...the 5850 just has some shaders disabled and is BIOS modded to lower clock speeds and lower voltage.

Running the 5850 at 1.163 voltage won't harm anything - you are essentially putting it back to 5870 status from where it was neutered. :D After you have set the voltage back where it should be, run the core clock up to 900MHz (850 if you really want to be ultra safe, as that is where a 5870 is set stock) and set the mem clock down around 450MHz or so.
Now, you still can't quite get 5870 O/Ced performance out of the 5850 because of those few shaders being disable, but if you O/C it per above directions, it will easily equal a stock 5870. And, it should come in 10% or less behind an O/Ced 5870. For a lot less money! :p

For reference, a 5870 at stock clocks will suck about 300W+ doing a CRYSIS loop. That's about equal to crunching DNETC or MW w/ the opti app 100% on it.
With a 500W PSU, you can do it, you're just not leaving much of a cushion. 200W for rest of the system and 300 for the card.

However, with that PSU being an ANTEC 80+ cert., it's a good one, and probably has some beef to it. I'm easily sucking the limit off my ANTEC 650W Earthwatts PSU in my big rig, and it's rock stable. You can run your 500W like that for quite a while, as long as you don't have a crazy system full of extras in that case like 6 HDDs and stuff sucking juice off it. ;)

[Sarge104]

The PSU is an Antec. I believe it is an Eathwatts which is rated at 80%. Mobo is Asus, about 2 or 3 years old so the capacitors should be in decent shape. I know that I need a larger PSU in this box and I'm pretty sure it will run the 5850. My question is whether or not additional OC will push me past the capability of the 500w PSU or if the increase in power draw is minimal enough to run. I may not even want to OC it anyway...the option came up and I was sorta thinking (typing?!) out loud.

BTW, card arrived yesterday. Haven't had a chance to instal it yet. Got home a little late as I had a little accident with my car on the way home. Not horrible, details are unimportant, but my insurance company isn't going to be too happy with me even though I may not hit my deductable on this one. It's kind of icy here in the north east so I am off to drive my mom to work and then get new tires for the truck before we get into an accident with it too. Seems like I am back in the mode of more money going out than coming in again. Just glad I finally got the card before the funds were "demanded" elsewhere.

Glad you are doing okay dispite the fender bender...been lucky up here, only windshield rock chips for our vehicles, crossing my fingers that is all that happens for the rest of the winter. :D

[Mike029]

Glad your not hurt. Property can be fixed. Congrats on the new card.

[Teratoma]

Last year I didn't so well with the winter either...lost control just after a snow storm and nearly totaled the car. At least this time it wasn't my fault, but they way things worked out the insurance companies will probably put the fault on me. Hopefully the owner of the other vehicle (delivery truck) won't want to put a claim in and risk his premiums going up. The damage to his truck is minimal, basically cosmetic...I'll fix it myself if I have to.

Anyway...back to the card....

This card require a 6 pin and an 8 pin for power, not 2 6 pins. The PSU only has 6 pins for PCI-E. I had only given it a quick glance earlier on and assumed the 8 pin atx connector was for PCI-E. OOPS. So I ordered an adapter online...just have to wait for it. Which means the card sits in the box until then.

As for power, I am not planning on adding any more to this box anytime soon so I should be ok. I ran thru the power calculator a few times. The 5870 shows as using about 53 more watts than a 5850...473 vs 420. I can always drop a CPU core or 2 in BOINC to save a little power if needed, but I may wait on the OC until I get a larger PSU.

Here are the specs in case anyone is interested. Nothing crazy or anything...

Asus P5QL Pro mobo
Q9300 CPU
Artic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro CPU cooler
2x2GB PC2-6400 RAM
Sapphire HD4830 soon to be replaced with the Asus 5850
Seagate 250GB SATA drive
Pioneer DVD R/RW (an old IDE model!)
Antec Sonato III Case
Antec Earthwatts 500W

When I get the PSU I will save this one for my son's upgrade. He has my old system and that PSU was pulled from an old server when I built it. It has been rock solid but I would rather replace it if I can.

[DrPop]

Thanks for listing your system specs - that's great news. Your Q9300 is the newer 45nm style quad core, so TDP is reduced to only 95W! You can easily run that 5850 in that rig O/Ced anywhere from 850 to 900/450. That's probably as high as I'd take it, though.

[Teratoma]

I wish I had a metered PDU to know exactly how much power this box will pull. I would feel a lot more comfortable with that info before OCing it. So, until I can confirm the actual usage I will hold off on the OC for now. Anyone know any other good ways to measure the actual wattage?

[Mumps]

I wish I had a metered PDU to know exactly how much power this box will pull. I would feel a lot more comfortable with that info before OCing it. So, until I can confirm the actual usage I will hold off on the OC for now. Anyone know any other good ways to measure the actual wattage?

For under $20 you could pick up a Kill-A-Watt. (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16882715001) I've got one here and it definitely is helpful.

[Teratoma]

Awesome! Thanks Mumps!

[Teratoma]

Finally got the power adapter yesterday and got the card installed last night.

Finished out some MW tasks. Run time went from about 5.3 min on the old 4830 to just under 2 min.

Loaded up with DNET now. 4830 runtime were about 2,600 sec granting ~1,545 cs. 5850 runtimes are now around 1,100 sec and are granting 3,100-3,300 cs. I knew there was a "bonus" for the 58xx but wow! Very nice!

[DrPop]

Tera, that is just awesome! The team thanks you. And yeah, I have a hard time running much other than DNETC on the 58xx cards because the bonus is rather nice! :D

[Teratoma]

Well I've been slowly pushing for my 10M MM there for a while, now I won't have to wait so long. Already thinking it will be my next 25M MM!! :D