Overclocking:
Can we improve the performance of our Sapphire Pulse RX 7900 GRE Gaming OC by overclocking it? That’s what we’re going to try, and hope that AMD doesn’t restrict frequencies too much.
Step 1: benchmark scores
Of course, it’s important to already know the scores we’ve achieved on the Time Spy benchmark, as well as the maximum boost frequency reached. This will give us the reference scores we need to judge the gains we’ve made by overclocking . We’ll have to keep a close eye on the GPU score to see if it continues to rise as our tests progress.
The overall reference score under Time SPY is 21516 points, with a graphic score of 21872 points. The highest boost frequency is 2287 MHz. Time to overclock this Sapphire Pulse RX 7900 GRE Gaming OC.
Step 2: OC via RADEON drivers
To overclock this Sapphire Pulse RX 7900 GRE Gaming OC, we’re going to use the RADEON drivers to make the modifications. We’re going to start overclocking using the AMD drivers, via the drivers – performance – tuning – manual tuning interface. As a reminder, we’re going to act on the GPU frequency, memory frequency, memory latency and power limit, which on this model is 15%.
First, we’ll increase the power limit to 15% and raise the boost frequency to 2700 MHz.
The result is an increase in the overall score to 22277 points and the graphics score to 22796 points (4.2%). As far as Boost frequency is concerned, GPU-Z tells us that it has gone up to 2482 MHz.
We now increase the frequency to 2800 MHz and, as we expected, our performance is limited by the card’s characteristics. To put it simply, above a certain frequency, even if it’s stable, performance is not as good.
As you can see, even though the Boost max frequency is 2599 MHz, it’s rarely reached, and decreases during the benchmark in order to stay within the card’s limits imposed by the BIOS and therefore by AMD. The overall score is lower, as is the graphics score.
Step 3: reduce voltage
One way of continuing to increase our score is to reduce overall consumption by lowering the voltage. We keep the same parameters as above, but lower the voltage from 1050 mv to 1000 mv
The results are immediate, with the graphical score rising to 23358 points, a gain of 6.8%.
Now we’re also going to increase the memory frequency, but this too is limited, since the maximum the tab allows is 2316 MHz. We’re also switching latency to fast time delay. We’re also going to further reduce the voltage to 900 mv.
Boom, performance explodes! The overall score rises to 23883 points, a gain of 11%, and the graphics score is 24854 points, a gain of 13.6%. This week, we’ll be bringing you a special report on overclocking. Let’s hope we’ll soon have the means to exceed the 2800 MHz frequency!
