7870 GPU usage and other oddities

It seems that a lot of GPU problems revolve around specific versions of drivers. Though AMD has their own support structure, you can often learn from information reported by others who fold.

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IvantheDugtrio
Posts: 11
Joined: Sun Jan 13, 2013 5:56 am

7870 GPU usage and other oddities

Post by IvantheDugtrio »

Basically I've gone through OCN to get my Sapphire HD 7870 folding and have made some progress, however GPU usage is typically next to 0%. I am using Catalyst 12.11 beta modified by DarkRyder to work best for Folding.

http://i.imgur.com/OFJwU.png

I also have an EVGA GT 640 (for hybrid PhysX) which is folding quite well and GPU usage is practically full according to MSI Afterburner.

The other oddity I mentioned was that according to GPU-Z the 7870 does not support OpenCL:

Image

But the GT 640 does:

Image

Does this mean that the OpenCL driver for my 7870 is not working or is being disabled by Nvidia's drivers or is it just an incorrect readout?
Last edited by IvantheDugtrio on Sun Jan 13, 2013 8:07 am, edited 1 time in total.
P5-133XL
Posts: 2948
Joined: Sun Dec 02, 2007 4:36 am
Hardware configuration: Machine #1:

Intel Q9450; 2x2GB=8GB Ram; Gigabyte GA-X48-DS4 Motherboard; PC Power and Cooling Q750 PS; 2x GTX 460; Windows Server 2008 X64 (SP1).

Machine #2:

Intel Q6600; 2x2GB=4GB Ram; Gigabyte GA-X48-DS4 Motherboard; PC Power and Cooling Q750 PS; 2x GTX 460 video card; Windows 7 X64.

Machine 3:

Dell Dimension 8400, 3.2GHz P4 4x512GB Ram, Video card GTX 460, Windows 7 X32

I am currently folding just on the 5x GTX 460's for aprox. 70K PPD
Location: Salem. OR USA

Re: 7870 GPU usage and other oddities

Post by P5-133XL »

Image
IvantheDugtrio
Posts: 11
Joined: Sun Jan 13, 2013 5:56 am

Re: 7870 GPU usage and other oddities

Post by IvantheDugtrio »

I've already looked into these issues and have followed the guides for getting it working on modified 12.11 drivers. I actually installed the modified drivers right after doing a clean re-install of Windows Server 2012 Datacenter. There shouldn't be any remnants or fragments of the bad drivers around.
I heard removing the GT 640 would help however I don't think it's worthwhile since that would just cut my overall folding performance.

If it helps this is how things look now:

http://i.imgur.com/m4N2I.png

It's better than before where there wouldn't be any spikes in GPU usage however it could still be a lot better.
P5-133XL
Posts: 2948
Joined: Sun Dec 02, 2007 4:36 am
Hardware configuration: Machine #1:

Intel Q9450; 2x2GB=8GB Ram; Gigabyte GA-X48-DS4 Motherboard; PC Power and Cooling Q750 PS; 2x GTX 460; Windows Server 2008 X64 (SP1).

Machine #2:

Intel Q6600; 2x2GB=4GB Ram; Gigabyte GA-X48-DS4 Motherboard; PC Power and Cooling Q750 PS; 2x GTX 460 video card; Windows 7 X64.

Machine 3:

Dell Dimension 8400, 3.2GHz P4 4x512GB Ram, Video card GTX 460, Windows 7 X32

I am currently folding just on the 5x GTX 460's for aprox. 70K PPD
Location: Salem. OR USA

Re: 7870 GPU usage and other oddities

Post by P5-133XL »

Since you are running SMP and an ATI video card make sure that you're using SMP:3. The ATI video card will use an entire CPU core all on its own. Over-subscribing the CPU will kill the productivity the SMP slot.

Make sure you are in Advanced mode (upper right of FAHControl). Click Configure and go to the slots tab. Double click the SMP slot and change the number of CPU threads from -1 to 3.

Also make sure you have a passkey
Image
IvantheDugtrio
Posts: 11
Joined: Sun Jan 13, 2013 5:56 am

Re: 7870 GPU usage and other oddities

Post by IvantheDugtrio »

So an update on the situation.
I've changed my OS to Windows 8 pro after experiencing other bugs in Windows Server 2012 due to it's barebones nature. Right after installing Windows 8 I installed Catalyst 13.2 beta 4 modified drivers with 12.8 OpenCL drivers. I then proceeded to install all the other system updates before finally reinstalling Folding@Home. Right now my PPD is a little bit higher than before (1500 PPD now versus 500 PPD) though it still isn't right. MSi Afterburner records 0% usage on the 7870 and 90% usage on the GT 640.
I changed SMP usage to 3 cores though that didn't change anything. So what can I do now?
Also I have a passkey.
7im
Posts: 10189
Joined: Thu Nov 29, 2007 4:30 pm
Hardware configuration: Intel i7-4770K @ 4.5 GHz, 16 GB DDR3-2133 Corsair Vengence (black/red), EVGA GTX 760 @ 1200 MHz, on an Asus Maximus VI Hero MB (black/red), in a blacked out Antec P280 Tower, with a Xigmatek Night Hawk (black) HSF, Seasonic 760w Platinum (black case, sleeves, wires), 4 SilenX 120mm Case fans with silicon fan gaskets and silicon mounts (all black), a 512GB Samsung SSD (black), and a 2TB Black Western Digital HD (silver/black).
Location: Arizona
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Re: 7870 GPU usage and other oddities

Post by 7im »

Mixing GPU vendors and getting them to fold together can be problematic. See this fredfoobar post for help sorting out the best GPU settings... http://foldingforum.org/viewtopic.php?p=199379#p199379
How to provide enough information to get helpful support
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