AMD PowerColor Red Devil RX 6950 XT - Overclocking vs Undervolting

[@S1distic]

Just ordered a red devil brand new for £650. Really excited for it.

[@elec123]

How was it? I just ordered one as well. Open box full warranty for €700

[@S1distic]

@@elec123 I'm loving the card, there's a slight coil whine but nothing that actually bothers me since I play with headphones. Hope you like yours.

[@elec123]

@@S1distic nice to hear, I've read somewhere that the coil whine can lessen as time goes by

[@S1distic]

@@ThomasS.H I have an 850w psu. But I think you might be ok with 750 depending on the rating. I think the card draws around 300/350w when underload.

[@idrisalmamri6612]

​@@S1distichow's the card holding up? Is the coil whine loud?

[@SMGJohn]

Crazy how efficient RDNA2 actually is, loosing 5 - 10 frames for more than 100 less power draw is insane.

[@Simsonlover222]

yes sir... quite nice

[@d.ink3d]

got my 6800xt nitro SE running at 2160mhz @881mv, losing about 9% fps while drawing about 120watt less power from 280+ to 165w max. Also 20c cooler temp and 30c cooler hotspot temp. Insane, i could also go with 2450 mhz at 1020v with 230w power draw and same fps as stock but not worth it most of the time.

[@supermarketyeast4229]

Just undervolted my 6950 xt to 2250 mhz core and dropped the power limit to -10 in afterburner for the summer months and performance has only slightly gone down while temps went from 95 to 80. Insane difference. Thanks for vid

[@rugby187gaming]

I will come back to this video again if I ever manage to get a nice 6000 series RX card. Love these Red Devil models.

[@PCJack]

Red means more performance obvs.

[@volvo89577]

So did you?

[@rugby187gaming]

@@volvo89577 I managed to get an RX 7900 XT a little while back and have overclocked and undervolted that

[@L4tem4n]

I'm running my RX 6950 XT Red Devil at 2669Mhz stock, 1140mV undervolt, +7% PL and 2370Mhz for the VRAM. This seems to be the sweet spot for my card. It can boost +2.6Ghz in games and gives me 23050 Graphics Score in Time Spy. Also the cooler can manage the 348W power consumption while still being quiet. However, I had to repaste the GPU since my Hot Spot temperature started hitting 110C. After repaste I'm rarely hitting over 90C.

[@octoman_games]

My final OC on my Asrock OC Formula 6950XT is: 2500 MIN/2600MAX, Voltage 1100, VRAM 2350, Power Limit MAX.

[@Tonious]

I just got the same card and I'm learning. Did you get a good undervolt and oc with those settings?

[@octoman_games]

@@Tonious 1100 voltage

[@Adrian-is6qn]

What kind of power draw you have with that?

[@Wrublos212]

Are you able to run 3DMark Time spy? Mine crashing at cpu test at stock GPU speeds. With a little GPU underclock it pass. What is your GPU /Hotspot temperature?

[@octoman_games]

@@Wrublos212 I dont run those suites anymore, they just torture your GPU for no good reason. My 6950XT NEVER goes above 70*C, but I do have it under an aggressive Fan curve

[@anthonyreynoza8535]

Just a tip I think some of these cards are overclocked to far out of the factory. If you higher your clocks and dont gain or even lose performance. Mine came clocked stock at 2640 and was getting me a time spy of 22400 graphics score and if i raised the clocks at all it wouldn't gain anything and would start to even drop score like 50mhz raised. But dropping clocks to 2610 actually jumped me up to 23336 and lowered Temps. It got me the 3rd spot for timespy for 6950xt with r5 3600s. All this with power up to +20 and vram fast timings and 2330. I could get vram to 2380 and it ran fine but scores didn't change .would crash at 2400.

[@ARock-st7gc]

Thx for the video Living in Germany where power contracts are the most costly in the world (currently around 60cents/kwh) I found the Power Consumption from the card the most interessting. Stock: ~325W OC: ~370W UV: ~240W I would definitely go for OV ;-) Pro Tipp: I currently charge my Steam Deck in daytime with Photovoltaik Energy from solar panals on the roof and play all kind of steam titles at 40fps with 15W power consumption at night time. That saves a whole lot of money. Also my unraid server (nearly same hardware as yours) is power optimized with powertop and undervolting to save some bucks the year.

[@PCJack]

No problem, glad you found it useful 👍 Given current energy prices maybe I need to consider my hardware power consumption a little more closely like you have!

[@Simsonlover222]

@@PCJack in my opinion UV with this card and the performance you get makes it a nice ratio between performance and graphics... get a efficient 4k monitor and you could play half a day without breaking a sweat xD

[@Szala89r]

You should turn on resizable bar.

[@bentrinker1937]

Yes! It’s free performance!

[@anthonyreynoza8535]

Dropping voltage to 1150 or lower improves performance for my card. I ended up at 1135 and it let my card boost higher at lower temps and get higher scores on 3dmark.

[@ThomasDercole2230]

Msi 6950xt, 5800x3d, 1440p unengine score 295 fps currently. 330w used. Amd really must be making huge bios updates.

[@nxxiv436]

@@younsukashiwhat the fuck? Coil whine happens with any card pushing a lot of fps or heat it

[@YamatoForever]

What were your final frequency, voltage, and power limit settings?

[@johnmuzak]

At the end he said his Undervolt had to be bumped up slightly to 1100mV. So 2500-2600 mhz, 1100mV and 100% Power Limit.

[@Sup3riorr]

Sapphire 6950 nitro + running at 2610-30ish on 1.1volt power limit 20% super stable in cyber

[@menacho10]

Great video, a great purchase I think rn

[@PCJack]

Cheers mate!

[@TeasingPredator]

That junction temp is way too high over the actual GPU temp. Mine was high as well, so I repasted thermal paste and now it's 14 ℃ over.

[@PkmnGymLeader]

A 30C delta is completely normal for this card. It would only be a real concern if it was more like 50C over. Even then, if it's below 100C then it's not a big issue. The card won't be thermally limited until 110C. Even that is within spec, so it's not dangerous.

[@Synergy4375]

Okay but why the weird resolution? That effects the results

[@YamatoForever]

Thanks for the video. Do you use an extra wide screen? What was your final Power limit? 20? I didn't hear you change it.

[@heddihx]

Curious about this too. I noticed it was mentioned in few other places that bringing the power limit up is to make sure stability testing is more accurate while undervoling and you can set it beck to default after but not 100% sure

[@syncj838]

Does anyone know if he used the OC or silent BIOS switch for his undervolt? Or does it not matter which is used

[@Cannaroct]

For the RTX 4 series it's the opposite. More OC potential and low power draw. Thank you for the video. I'm planning to switch to this card for Linux.

[@wurzlgaming]

oh my ..i wanted to buy an AOI for this card and sadly its not available .. came to this video and actually i think this is a good solution as well - undervolting

[@mikecheeze4312]

What's is your test setup? Mine stock hits 80c/105c stock and hits 85c/110c with power limit maxed. I'm have a lan cool 215 case 67f room temp...

[@thousandyoung]

They are Bad Cards. Repaste them.

[@Wrublos212]

Are you able to run 3DMark Time spy? Mine crashing at cpu test at stock GPU speeds. With a little GPU underclock it pass.

[@vSOGvv]

how is it you were able to get that fps i have run this and i only get 152fps i have a 6950xt

[@Adam_3316]

bro i have the same cpu and my reference eddition rx 6950 xt gets around 15 fps more. Why???

[@andy-v]

Hotspot is too high.

[@ukpanda007]

I was looking to upgrade my 3070 to this card but i saw so-many ppl complaining about coil wine and high temperature put me off to be honest. Its £600 in uk atm

[@dr.hannibal8338]

Yes the coil whine on my card is so horrible I can even hear with headset

[@mrunknow188]

do you have the power color red devil model ? @@dr.hannibal8338

[@26DeislerFCB]

fantastic work

[@subi-brz]

Can I run this GPU on a 1000w psu with a i5-10400 processor??? :O

[@kenobi639]

Absolutely

[@jadadpe3873]

well you could but the 10400 is quite a bottleneck. you wont be getting the max performance from this card so might not even be worth it until you upgrade that

[@mrwannabe00]

Is r5 5600x good pairing with the 6950xt with 850w?

[@jadadpe3873]

@@mrwannabe00 better than the 10400 pairing but will probably still run into bottlenecks

[@mrwannabe00]

@@jadadpe3873 rip

[@ch3ddarg0bl1n]

Have you experienced coil whine with your card? I picked up a red devil 6950xt about a week ago, I've tried upgrading to a 1250w psu from 850w, ran heaven on and off for about 30 hrs total now on top of regular gaming. Just tried undervolting and it didn't seem to help the whine much either

[@PCJack]

Mine does have coil whine but undervolting did help reduce this for me but it will vary from card to card.

[@ch3ddarg0bl1n]

@@PCJack Gotcha thanks! Really appreciate the response, subbed

[@PCJack]

@@ch3ddarg0bl1n No problem 👍 Cheers mate, appreciate it!

[@PlayinWithMahWii]

Make sure you have your card plugged into two PCIe cables, not one that has a pigtail with two ends. This fixed my coil whine!

[@juan.v9952]

@@PlayinWithMahWii golden tip, thank you!

[@rnf123]

Very useful video.

[@retix8924]

I have same GPU, but the Problem with mine is the GPU is on Stock Settings 110c Hot spot. But why? Can anyone Help me? Sorry for the Bad english but im From Germany.

[@idrisalmamri6612]

You can repaste your gpu but by doing that you will void your warranty and is (to put it frankly) quite a hassle, go to the tune settings and apply these settings, you will get virtually no performance lose and the Hotspot will be stable at 80c-85c (keep in mind every gpu is different, these settings might or might not work for you) : Min clock speed: 2400mhz Max clock speed:2500mhz Vram clock speed:2376mhz Voltage: 1100mv I got a score of 22,000 in timespy, weirdly enough at stock settings, I got 21,700, this shows you that at lower voltages, the gpu is much more stable, my gpu went from sucking up 335w to 240-260w, if you get blackscreen, stutter or unstable performance you can increase the voltage by 10 increments at a time until you hit the sweet spot.

[@sprsk]

Does RX 6950 XT support RDNA3 ?

[@Craig468]

I can't near your base score with my msi 6950xt. I don't know enough about pc's. Maybe it's because I have a i7 10700k and not a 13gen cpu. Great video enjoying watching it and learning from it.

[@alpha13sierra]

Check his Unigine resolution. You're probably getting around 170-175 fps at 1440p fullscreen, which is fine.

[@Craig468]

​@alpha13sierra I checked again today the only difference I see is in the mode settings I have 2560x1440 8xaa fullscreen. in the video the setting is 2560x1143 8xaa widowed. My fps is 190. Maybe that's where the difference is.

[@idrisalmamri6612]

Your undervolted rx 6950 xt scored higher than my OC rx 6950 xt red devil?? Mine barley exceed the 4400 mark, your UV card scored 4800+? How is that possible? I used the same benchmark tool, same settings, stable oc with no hiccups or stutters, same resolution, different cpu (i5 13600k, but at higher resolution it shouldn't be a big of a difference ) I use waaaay faster memory (mine is ddr5 6000 mhz) and a 850w gold psu, is there something im missing here?

[@Synergy4375]

Assuming you used 1440p not this weird 2560x1143 res

[@idrisalmamri6612]

@@Synergy4375 I use 1440p and tried the weird resolution, same results, I'm still baffled by this, I even overclocked my cpu, thinking it was the bottleneck/the reason behind the low score, nothing, it got a small bump in score, that's it, I'm even using the same version of the benchmark, this dudes rx 6950 xt even scored higher than the rtx 3090 ti (which is stronger than an rx 6950 xt, @ 2k heaven benchmark score of 4600/4700), im curious, not frustrated, just curious, Im I doing something wrong?

[@Synergy4375]

@@idrisalmamri6612 I mean I’ve never compared them against 3090ti but if that’s the case then yeah this is a little sus tbf…. I’ve just ran mine while tweaking a little more -XFX 6950xt 2800mhz the whole way through with 2410 memory fast timings and only get 4570… something definitely off 🤔

[@idrisalmamri6612]

@@Synergy4375 either he won mega ultra silicon lottery or something of the settings is definitely off, I couldn't think of something else tbh, mine without overclock fluctuates between 4300 and 4400, 4200 when UV, very bizarre.

[@Synergy4375]

@@idrisalmamri6612 imo it’s beyond the silicone with those scores at stock… I mean from my experience, my 6950xt is silicone lottery W as its overclocking and stuff is brilliant with temps included vs what the more common norms are and beats most or matches the scores in time spy etc…. Wasn’t till I saw this video I doubted myself, but then comparing everything he’s monitoring vs mine I beat him in every area clocks speed and consistency temps mem speed power limit etc etc ….. so I’m thinking he’s not been entirely honest or forgetful, and possibly got some custom bios or something beyond the gpus adrenaline tuning. And like you his are the only scores I’ve found at “stock” to be so high🤔…

[@Top3Entertainment]

Does this change the noise volume of the coil whine?

[@PCJack]

OC did actually increase the volume of the coil whine slightly but UV did noticeably reduce it in comparison.

[@jadadpe3873]

Hi, are these undervolt settings relatively universal? I recently purchased an asrock 6950xt for $600. Actually my main question would be is an 850W gold rated psu (Thermaltake toughpower GF1) enough to handle it (up to OC)?

[@blitzer921]

What matters more is the 12v rail of your psu to have enough output capacity for the amperage to handle the occasional power spike. Your psu has more than double the amperage that 6950xt needs in the 12v rail so you are more than fine to OC this beast to the max.

[@jadadpe3873]

@@blitzer921 Haha thank you Im not too well versed in psu's 😅

[@dr.hannibal8338]

@@blitzer921 I got seasonic 1300w plat is that good enough?

[@snappified1622]

@@blitzer921Hi! I have an rm750, 2019 I believe. Is there a way to find the amperage info?

[@craigstan889]

Can I run an 6950XT with a 750W EVGA SuperNOVA B3 - Bronze? I'd really like to try and undervolt the card to mitigate any PSU concerns... but this is my first tiime. Or should I just purchase a Nvidia 4070 for the same price? My goal is to run Diablo IV 4K 100+ FPS -- I have a 4k 144mhz and a WQHD 1440P monitor. Any help would be greatly appreciated!!! Thank you :)

[@Juurus]

750W will be enough, and it's a trustworthy PSU afterall. If the PSU draws more current than it can handle, the OCP will kick in and switch off the PSU. Get the 6950XT if you plan to play at 4K resolution because you're going to need the VRAM.

[@redrock425]

Running mine on a 750W Seasonic Ti

[@Bos_Meong]

lmao dude im running 2060 super On 400 watt psu for 2 years and nothing happen. Stop being paranoid 😂😂😂

[@AlaaSalehLE]

​@@Bos_Meong bro, this card takes 3 x 8pin connectors correct me if am wrong. I would undervolt it to be safe

[@Bos_Meong]

@@AlaaSalehLE 750w is already enough for anything. here i tested 4070ti + 5900x with furmark and wattmeter, it consumes 450w only (that excluding the fact the number displayed are based of the efficiency of your psu) so the actual consumption is less than 450, even though the recommended psu are 700.... a 6950xt would probably hit 500w consumption so its still far from 750... but i dont know how amd card works and never used one so i cant guarantee... If you can undervolt it to reduce ~50 to 100w consumption then go on. Then run furmark afterwards and see if your system is stable or not.

[@youngpusseydon]

Hey, do you think that 750Watts 80Gold PSU can handle this graphic card?

[@variety5061]

Depends on the rest of the system draw. I'm running a single NVME drive, OC'd 9900k, 2x16gb DDR4, all on a 750w PSU. Runs just fine!

[@youngpusseydon]

@@variety5061 i have ryzen 5 5600x stock, 2xNVME and 2x8gb DDR4 so i think this should work fine

[@variety5061]

@@youngpusseydon Yeah you should be fine. You could always UV to be on the safe side.

[@aliertugu8475]

Yes, i think so. I’m running it on 700W seasonic titanium psu, and nothing happened so far.

[@Saiphedias0815]

Respective power draw ???

[@Undesired_Hero]

Doesnt your GPU run a little hot? Have seen other reviews run it as low as 65c with 1200 RPM

[@andreamichelezucchi8600]

Well, he was not touching the fan curve, which means that he let it get hotter than what it needs to be for no reason. Personally, my card's fans are at 100% speed in the moment the card touches 60 Celsius. A cooler card is a better performing card, with longer lifespan.

[@andy-v]

Loot at his hotspot. This isn't good at all.

[@PlayinWithMahWii]

@@andreamichelezucchi8600 This is *not* true. Resistance through silicon transistors- like those in any computer chip- is inversely proportional to temperature. As temperature goes up, resistance goes down, meaning less voltage is needed to maintain the same current. Meaning less power used, and better performance at lower voltages when the card is warmer. It's perfectly safe to be running this card up to 90C even, the thermal limit at the hotspot is 110C, it won't throttle at all till then.

[@HubaSultani]

At higher temperatures, the leakage current increases so cooler silicon is always better & will last longer! @@PlayinWithMahWii

[@HubaSultani]

I think you're both wrong. At higher temperatures, the leakage current increases so cooler silicon is always better & will last longer! @@DylanClements98

[@Вадим-к6ж8р]

1700 RPM from the box looks noisy

[@andy-v]

What's up with your hotspot?! That isn't right..