SPCR

Search in google for "Sapphire TriXX", new OC and fan regulator for 6800 series. Remember to report info about this piece of software, too.

It's a pain to download Sapphire TriXX. It requires registration, product serial number and captcha is case sensitive.
It allows to set fan speed to 0% and it proudly reports fan speed at 0%. Although the fan is clearly spinning at regular 20-26%.
I just don't see any reason in using TriXX. MSI Afterburner works well, it's more fair and it displays graphs inherited from RivaTuner - trusted software.

Reporting in on a Gigabyte 6850...Overall, I'm very happy with the performance increase and noise decrease compared to my reference 8800GTS 320MB.

Trixx vs. MSI's AB:
For overclocking purposes, I found that I preferred Trixx. MSI's was not usable for me, as once I set my core speed, it would no longer properly downclock to idle at 100mhz. It also didn't restore my OC speeds correctly on reboot (unless I did it incorrectly.) Regardless, not downclocking is a dealbreaker. Thankfully, Trixx worked out of the box for both of those issues. These programs are still in development, but as is, I find Trixx to be functionally feature complete.

Overclocking:
I hit 950 core / 1200 memory on stock voltage. I can probably go slightly higher, but I have no need to currently.

Noise/Sound/Cooling:
There's too many variables with my system setup, etc. to give a fair assessment. I'm running 3x 1150RPM Gentle Typhoons in a P183 (2 intake + 1 CPU.) At idle, it's not audible over the case fans. During gaming, the noise increase is small enough that I don't notice it unless I'm specifically listening for it. On the other hand, it might be possible to get lower load noise if one is willing to go to higher temperatures. I don't know what the max safe temp is for these cards.

Issues:
There is an issue with the card clocking while gaming. If while gaming a youtube video (I'm assuming all flash or other similar h/w acceleration) is open, even if paused, the card will clock to 300mhz. Hopefully, this can/will be resolved quickly in a new driver.

Hi everyone, this is quite helpful thread - I decided to buy my own Sapphire 6850 based on this info. My first impressions are very good so far. According to gpu-z the minimal rpm of the fan = 25% @1066 rpm. Setting it lower in ATI drivers won't change rmp, MSI afterburner does not allow lower value than 25%

I can second that the noise level with fan at 25% is really low. When I disconnected all mechanical hardrives and fans keeping just fan in PSU Enermax MODU 82+ 525W @ 530 rpm vs. the HD6850 fan @ 1066 rpm, here the PSU fan sounds considerably louder. With the p182 case closed the VGA at idle would be probably hardly audible even with passive PSU. Even with VGA fan = 40% @ 1555rpm and closed case the PSU fan still feels slightly louder. Only at 45% the VGA fan has clearly taken over. At 45% and 1890rpm the VGA fan still feels quieter than Nexus 120mm @ 1000rpm (compared from memory). I will probably check at which % / rpm the VGA compares to Nexus @ 1000 rpm just to give you an impression what levels of noise you can expect during intense gaming.

I should be probably getting quieter PSU to fully appreciate how quiet the Sapphire card is at idle. It could be that my (1.5 year old) Enermax PSU sample is slightly louder than usual but it's still the quietest PSU I've heard so far.

You can set fanspeed down to 0% in Afterburner, but you have to set your own fan speed curves under settings. Most fans are PWM controlled anyway though, so even if you set 0%, the fan will still likely be spinning.

Powercolor's new version of the 6850 reviewed at TechPowerUp.

I had to back off my memory overclock to 1040. I was getting strange desktop cursor corruption. I'm not sure if I messed up the thermal pad for the memory while reTIMing or something...lowest report I've seen on the net is 1100.

Interesting... a 6850 clocked at 820/1100 MHz performs exactly the same as a stock 5850.

Anyway, looks like Powercolor did a nice job with this card's cooler.

Sapphire Radeon HD 6850 very silent??????? yes it is, im really impressed with the card. preforms awsom and and really silent at 20% fan speed. But it really has no probs with 6% fan speed. my second sapphire card that rocks with afterburner (5570 and 6850)

KayDat wrote:You can set fanspeed down to 0% in Afterburner, but you have to set your own fan speed curves under settings. Most fans are PWM controlled anyway though, so even if you set 0%, the fan will still likely be spinning.

Even when set to 0% or any other value below 25%, gpu-z still reports it as if 25% was set (and the fan is indeed spinning even at 0%). So this is definitely a "hardwired" limitation of the fan but I guess 25% should be good enough for almost everyone even here on SPCR if silent idle is what they are looking for. As far as silent load goes - it is not silent with default fan control. Here is a little (subjective) comparison of my PSU, Nexus reference fan and HD 6850 fan:

HD6850@40% < Modu82+@530rpm < HD6850@45% < Nexus 120mm @ 1060rpm(12V) < HD6850@50%

At 50% the Sapphire fan is clearly dominating over the Nexus fan loudness. So 45% is probably the limit I would (again subjectively) call as "quiet". Note that default fan control will spin the fan somewhere between 50%-55% during normal gameplay (depending on the case airflow). However with added 120mm low rpm fan blowing in front of the card (for better airflow in p182) I was able to set what I would call "quiet 6850 fan profile" using Afterburner. Using this profile having the 6850 fan set to 45% the temperatures never stepped above 85C even at full load (during gameplay). I consider temps in 80 - 85 C a good compromise for the quietness. Of course FurMark is a different story... Sapphire 6850 + FurMark + quiet is near impossible.

I am even considering to buy another 6850 for CF, both maybe 10-15% underclocked hoping that they would stay below 85-90 C with 45% fan speed. That should provide some decent performance for fairly low dB. Pitty that the PCS+ 6850 probably won't be available in local shops. (looks very impressive)

Yes, I was very surprised how quiet this card was at idle.
When I tested it during the night in quiet house on my desktop with silent Seasonic X650 PSU and SSD I disconnected case fans and HDD, only had CPU fans at 300rpm and this card could barely be heard at 2-3 feet in open case. Almost complete silence. I can only guess that this is what 11 dBA sound like so I think HT4U measurements are likely to be correct.
To me it looks very quiet with fan up to 36% which (with Afterburner fan control) should be enough for HD video playback at any reasonable ambient temperature.

Sapphire did excellent job with this card.

appletree wrote:Even when set to 0% or any other value below 25%, gpu-z still reports it as if 25% was set (and the fan is indeed spinning even at 0%). So this is definitely a "hardwired" limitation of the fan but I guess 25% should be good enough for almost everyone even here on SPCR if silent idle is what they are looking for.

Must be a limit of your card model specifically. My 5870 shows differences below 25%, and reflects in GPU-z. In fact, Arctic Twin Turbo Pro fans react funny, as the minimum fan speed percentage is 8%; any lower, and the fan actually starts going faster, with 0% roughly the same speed as 25%. Must be a PWM issue.

Could asus 6850 be more silent than Sapphire? I want to buy 6850 but cant decide between this two. thanks

Could.

PowerColor HD 6850 PCS+ seems to be quieter than ASUS Radeon HD 6850 Direct CU under load.

In idle the fan noise of the PowerColor HD 6850 PCS+ is about the same as on other HD 6850 variants we have seen so far. Under load the card is noticeably quieter than these cards, I'd consider 31 dbA "quiet" for a card in the HD 6850 performance range.

Lower load noise is more important to me since there's usually more headroom for lowering the fan speed in idle. I hope the fan has a smooth sound.

PowerColor HD 6850 PCS+ seems to be quieter than ASUS Radeon HD 6850 Direct CU under load.

Powercolor fan is huge, can it be a 10cm fan? it really should preform better. cooler also has more fin areal it seems??

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Powe ... /card1.jpg


http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/ASUS ... /card1.jpg

leifeinar wrote:it really should preform better.

You can't say that without knowing fan speed or performance. Also remember that the card is overclocked.

Sorry, bad english what i ment is that because of its physical attributes, bigger fan and heatsink everything points to a better preformance reagrding sound levels. measurements from techpowerup points to it. and if its a great card it will be discussed here in the forums for sure

Why not just get a 6850 with the cheapest cooler possible and then install Accelero S1 on it? It will probably cost approximately 30 Euros with Turbo module and memory heatsinks, but you will get much better performance. The premium you guys pay for an overclocked VGA with some fancy cooler is exactly about 30-40 Euros, but I am sure that Accelero with a 120mm fan strapped to it will work better than any MSI Ultra-Galactic-Master-Hawk-Lightning Edition.

Anatorax wrote:Why not just get a 6850 with the cheapest cooler possible and then install Accelero S1 on it?

Warranty.

Anatorax wrote:The premium you guys pay for an overclocked VGA with some fancy cooler is exactly about 30-40 Euros, but I am sure that Accelero with a 120mm fan strapped to it will work better than any MSI Ultra-Galactic-Master-Hawk-Lightning Edition.

That becomes at least three slots wide and higher, not really comparable. Not suitable for all.

Just got my Sapphire 6850 1GB today and man was happily surprised there was a 1.8m HDMI-cable included. And the performance is awesome compared to my old Radeon 3850. I'm loving it.

Scoop wrote:Just got my Sapphire 6850 1GB today and man was happily surprised there was a 1.8m HDMI-cable included. And the performance is awesome compared to my old Radeon 3850. I'm loving it.

What about noise?

Mine is great for a high end vga, but it could have been better @ load.

Ive got 3/4 of an Accelero S1 im installing now. S2 doesnt fit. the sapphire has allmost 1" tall wrm heatsink, but it fits between the fins og the s1.

i think a S1 fits without anny mod, maby its 1-2mm to long. my S1 was modded for the 5770.

seems that the card has a strange bios thats messing with the clocks goes up and down during idle

leifeinar wrote:seems that the card has a strange bios thats messing with the clocks goes up and down during idle

What were you doing at the time? Looks pretty normal to me. Anything that has GPU acceleration would clock the card up one preset power level. I have a 5870 and it happens all the time. For example, flash videos in the browser.

_MarcoM_ wrote:

Scoop wrote:Just got my Sapphire 6850 1GB today and man was happily surprised there was a 1.8m HDMI-cable included. And the performance is awesome compared to my old Radeon 3850. I'm loving it.

What about noise?

Can't hear it over the rest of the system while idle. In my opinion the sound of the fan is actually quite pleasant as it ramps up in speed. I play with headphones on so the noise under load doesn't matter anyway. And the thing idles at a chill 40C. Furmark stability test stabilizes at 70C. Gotta get the clocks up on this thing.

The Sapphire HD6850 is not even remotely quiet. Even at the lowest speed 25%, it's audible above my 3 WD Green drives and 3 120mm case and CPU fans in my Antec P182 case (PSU is Seasonic X650). It idles at 60C. In contrast, my fanless ECS 9600GT (95w, preinstalled Accelero cooler) idles at 50C in the same case and doesn't go much above 60C under load. But the killer for the Sapphire HD6850 is its horrible behavior in Windows Media Center, where it manifests the 29/59 Hz bug as flicker or really bad judder; it actually does both, and the traditional fix of disabling dynamic contrast doesn't help. My long-lost (OK, sold) 4670 was fine in comparison. Maybe they'll sort it out in a future driver, along with getting the Windows 7 mouse cursor looking right instead of faded, but I ain't waiting. Reading the AMD forums, they've been having a lot of trouble for months just getting the mouse looking correct; there are multiple issues. Jeez.

After trying the GTX460 and HD6850, I'm sticking with my fanless 9600GT. It works as well as any card can in Media Center, and it's fine for 720p gaming even for current titles like Just Cause 2. The GTX460 displayed random DVD glitches in Media Center once or twice an hour, and it too was far from quiet. Even if these cards worked right in Media Center, to make them quiet would cost another $50 or so to buy an Arctic Cooling kit, and even then there's no guarantee. I guess higher-end PC gaming capabilities are simply incompatible with my other more important considerations, quiet HTPC and desktop use, and nothing much has improved in the last two years since I last looked at this. I guess I could try a fanless 5750, but it's not going to get me to 1080p gaming, and it might have the same bad behavior in Media Center as the HD6850. Not worth the trouble.

Well it was going too well with this upgrade of mine. It was too good to be true. So what is wrong? The damn thing doesn't detect my HDTV while it's connect via a DVI-VGA cable. My 3850 detected the TV instantly but clicking 'detect monitors' does nothing here. Just tells me I only have one monitor connected. I don't suppose there's a solution? Quite depressing. Is it the drivers? Why is the new CCC all fancy looking now. How do you clone a screen on it? This ruined my day pretty much.

Scoop, make sure you connect VGA to the right port. In 6850 specs Sapphire lists one DVI port as DVI-D meaning no analog VGA signal on it.

ATI/AMD rearranged everything in Catalyst earlier this year. I can't compare to the old Catalyst as I didn't have it. But there are multiple posts on AVS Forum telling how to find display configuration in new drivers (once you detect all your displays)

Run Catalyst Control Center - Advanced
Use the "Graphics" pull down menu top left
click Desktops & Displays
Right click on the small display icon at the bottom
Click the configure option

For other Media Center issues you can also refer to the following threads (some are about 5xxx series but still may be applicable)

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1285048
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1287544
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1224697

I currently don't have any issues with 6850 but I don't have 24p-capable HDTV or HDMI receiver yet.

Thanks micksh.

Yeah I was confused 'cause both of my displays were detected when I swapped them around. I hope I can sort this out now.