Graphics Cards

[vlad_8011]

Its my fourth Radeon, aand second with that issue. Do i need to RMA it, or there is any trick? 

So from begin.
Ryzen 5800X, B550 Tomahawk, XFX Speedster MERC 319 6800 XT, BeQuiet Dark Power Pro 11 850W Platinum.

GPU is brand new, i got 14 days to return it or i may RMA it, i'm really happy for this card, its run extremly cool and quiet, but coil whine.... its strange to me how it behaves. I use older WHQL drivers (22.1.2), as newest WHQL was making all my Windows animations slower and laggy, i even reinstalled Windows yesterday - Win 10 Pro. 

So for example in my only games installed for test it looks like this;
Limited FPS to 60 (ITS ONLY 60), turning everything on ultra, 2560 x 1440 WITH DXR Reflections, and once game load world its starting to whining. Its super loud. 

BUT i turned on GPU info on screen in radeon settings and find one strange thing. I can hit ESC few times to get into quick menu, then back to game, and power draw, when i'm back to game is sometimes 95W, sometimes 145W. When its 95W (it stick to some limit? i use default settings in radeon software) its quiet - it have some whine, but very quiet. When its 145W i cant be in same room beacuse of noise. I left my PC running FC6 with that coil whine for 5 hours, but noise didint decreased.

Please, give me some advice, i live in Poland, and not sure how RMA of XFX looks here, i really wanted this concrete card as its most quiet and cool. 

[elstaci]

If you are certain that the Coil Whine is from the GPU card and not from the Motherboard's VRM or PSU there is not much you can do about Coil Whine.

The more power the GPU card uses the louder the Coil Whine should be.  You can try to Sound insulate your Computer case and there are YouTube videos on some work around methods to help lessen the Coil Whine but I do not know how reliable those videos are.

If the Coil Whine is really loud and it bothers you than I would suggest you try to RMA the GPU card and see if XFX will replace it for you.

Manufacturer's Warranty, from what I have read, doesn't consider Coil Whine to be an issue for RMA unless it is really loud. But it is up to the Manufacturer to determine that.

Sometimes AMD Driver causes Coil Whine so you can see if a previous AMD driver produces no Coil Whine or the same.

Since Poland is part of the EU then you automatically have a 2 year Warranty from the Retailer.

It is a European Union Consumer Law that gives the Consumer a 2 year Warranty from the Retailer in case of any issues.

[vlad_8011]

Yes, already opened RMA ticket in shop where i bought it, with ask to replace. I really hope they will replace it in shop, with no wait till XFX will receive the card. Shop have its own service, they can test it themselves, and they got this card in stock. 

I really have bad luck, i was born 13th of March, and its dragging behind me till 29 years. Previous card, RTX 3080 had thermal issues and VRM termopad had no contact with heatsink, ASUS service made me waiting 28 days for just upgrading BIOS, they didnt touched termopad and new BIOS had only increased fan curve - card was much louder. I wanted Radeon after testing two 6800 XT's, so i sold that RTX, and now this....

This is my last PC, i swear, dont want any more troubles with upgrading, just want all working properly.

[vlad_8011]

So i got replacement, and its brand new unit, IT WHINE EXACLY THE SAME. I totally canot understand how they could made any quality check.

[APmech]

I've had this happen to me before also.  I RMA'd a card due to coil whine and the replacement sounded the same.  I then upgraded to a 1000W PSU and it greatly reduced the coil whine to where it was barely audible.  

[vlad_8011]

I have tested card also on Thermal take Smart SE 630W, it had exactly same coil whine.

[APmech]

Is the coil whine coming from your gpu or psu?

[vlad_8011]

GPU, 100% sure
XFX has gone bad... - YouTube

Tried out EVERY SINGLE solution from internet, including;

- Limit FPS to 30, 60 - nothing

- undervolting, overclocking - changing the sound of whine, but not removing the noise

- trying 2 PSU's (Dark Power Pro 11 850W Platinum (currently used in build), Thermaltake SMART SE 630W Gold (spare in wardrobe)) - nothing

- tried to heating the card up for 3 days with Far Cry 6 (ULTRA, WQHD with all DXR ON), FireStrike Extreme - basicly all scenarios where those coils whine the most - nothing

- Placing case horizontally, vertically - nothing

- Holding up with my fingers and squeashing the card in few places - nothing

- Loosing and tightening screws on PCIE slot (i got antisag holder - tied even without it) -nothing

- tried additional power cables for PSU (BeQuiet Power cables) without that thing on the end (capacitors?) - nothing

- Tried wall sockets on all 3 storeys in my house - nothing

- Tried UPS (used for everyday use) - nothing

- Loosing and stiffing back wall in case (LianLi O11 Air Mini) - nothing

- taking PC in my hands and lifting it - nothing

- Vsync, ERP Ready, Freesync, Spread Spectrum - tried disabling and enabling - nothing

-Tried disconnecting all fans in case (with opened glass panel - nothing

What i want to test with next, third replacement (shop says i'll get it on the end of the week) is trying to install ONLY driver, without that Adrenalin Software + MSI afterburner, as i set BCLK and FCLK to 1:1, and Adrenalin software, since August 2021 have CPU tuning buggy feature, which resets CPU settings made in BIOS, once cliking "revert" in Adrenaline software.

Also i asked my brother with different PC and he agreed to test my GPU in his PC.

I totally remodelled my room, now i have PC on my left, using different wall socket.

My PC Specs are:
Ryzen 5800X

MSI B550 Tomahawk

G.Skill Trident Z NEO 2 x 16GB 3600Mhz CL 14

Scythe Fuma 2 + 2 x Noctua S12A PWM fans

BeQuiet Dark Power Pro 11 850W Platinum

Lian Li O11 Air Mini (2 x Noctua 140mm at front, 1 x 120mm on top, 1 x 120mm on back, 2 x 120mm on bottom (all Noctua)

[elstaci]

By any chance the "Replacement" wasn't the same GPU card you sent in was it?

You can tell by the GPU Serial Number. 

NOTE: Nice YouTube with the exact same issue you are having. I don't believe it is a "QA" issue but rather possibly XFX is using cheap electronic parts to keep the price down and larger profit margins.

But if the above was true then there would be a huge amount of Users complaining about loud Coil Whine. So it could be just as you mentioned poor QA inspections.

[vlad_8011]

It was for now 2 cards with serial numbers ;
WXV004418
WXV004422

Waiting for third.

[vlad_8011]

Do, third in row, also coil whine. Left for 24h in Far Cry 6, Cyberpunk in 4K over locked to 2500mhz 285W in places where whining was loudest - no change.

Tried older drivers, no change.

Right now we got very strong wind + storm, our roof is starting to fall of, need to stop PC. 

It's my last XFX product ever bought.

Serial number is WXV004419.

[elstaci]

I would by pass your Retailer/Vendor and directly contact XFX Support (Non-Warranty) and see what they suggest.

[vlad_8011]

Already did that after 2nd card;

"I'm sorry to hear about the issue you experienced with the card. The internet shop is not our direct customer, which means the products are sold from a distributor, so we cannot provide replacements to them directly to resolve the case. Since the same batch may have the issue, please contact the reseller to see if they can provide a refund."

I have reported to them faulty batch.

[elstaci]

Your Retailer/Vendor really screwed you and so did XFX by having such poor QA to not catch the bad batch of GPUs before being shipped to Distributors.

Plus you chose a Retailer/Vendor that isn't a DIRECT CUSTOMER of XFX. 

I would call that a "Perfect Storm" of events.

[vlad_8011]

So, question is what to choose now. I have lost trust to gigabyte and Asus also, beachse of bad experience. I don't see many reports of coil whines of MSI Gaming X, I know their cooling is just OK, but i have fan adapter for standard pwm just in case. 

Does anyone of you have tested MSI cards from this gen?

[vlad_8011]

https://youtu.be/n2DDNESzAIo 

Ended up with another video and another return. It looks like (summed up)  48 hours of burning in GPU didn't helped. 

For me that company with their GPU's (XFX) lands next to the Gigabyte with their PSU's and ASUS with their customer service - on my personal black list.

There is no way I would choose this brand anytime in future, even for lowest price. There is reason behind discounts in Poland for those cards - all of them propably have those faulty coils. For this moment it's cheapest 6800 XT in Poland. XFX still don't have even option, where support ticket (RMA) is created with coil whine. 

Such behaviours should be loudly published over all those fancy YouTubers who still recommend XFX 6800XT, that's their shoot in the leg.

[vlad_8011]

Just came to say, I bought cheaper 6800 XT gaming Z Trio - it also whine, but very quiet - acceptable level on same clocks and power usage. Major concer was hotspot temps, but after SHORT test delta between core and hotspot is around 10 degrees C. 

Bad news is I had to reinstall OS (Windows 10 x64) as system shot down and restart takes 3 minutes on SSD M.2 pcie3 x4. Not sure the cause, but probably ADATA SSD Toolbox did this - I reverted changes uninstalled it, but system shutdown still takes 3 minutes. System reinstall is not a problem tho.

[vlad_8011]

I found out main issue about coil whines with XFX card, and believe me or not, this is rather disgusting.

So first XFX 6800 XT i had, was BLACK version (RX-68XTACBD9)

XFX USA (xfxforce.com)

And all newer, coily whines 6800 XT they released are CORE versions (RX-68XTALFD9)

XFX USA (xfxforce.com)

They stopped production of BLACK, its insane overpriced on AMAZON, while keept selling those waste bins CORE, when i look at reviews of both cards :
Amazon.com: XFX Speedster MERC319 AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT CORE Gaming Graphics Card with 16GB GDDR6 HD...

Amazon.com: XFX Speedster MERC319 Radeon RX 6800XT Black 16GB GDDR6 HDMI DisplayPort USB-C PCIe 4.0 ...

You can see they really cutted quality, and my guess its exacly on coils. All reviews over internet from known portals are from BLACK version. 

This company is burnt for me.

[Vynski]

The only XFX Radeon card I ever owned was DOA.  It had an attractive price when I ordered it, a 580 if my memory is correct.  However, I returned the card for a refund and wrote XFX off of future build lists.  I recommend MSI or ASUS motherboards or GPU's.  Better quality; higher price, fewer or no issues.

[vlad_8011]

MSI is only brand I trust for now. ASUS GPU I had, had no contact with heatsink on one termopad. It was termopad on VRM, so no sensor here to show temperature readings, but VRAM was just next to VRM (ASUS RTX 3080 TUF OC V2 LHR), and temperatures after around 90 minutes of load (gaming to be precise, furmark was throttling the card) on memory was 112 degree C. I sensed it on RMA. What they did? First, on issue describe I saw "no display output" (I haven't reported any of this).

Secondly, they updated BIOS, with only increased fan curve (very loud).

Third - they left termopad intact, and writes that card is OK and returned it to me. That was my personal hardware - with hardware in my work (mainly motherboards), where voltage on default for CPU was too high, and we lost one CPU (Intel i5 skylake iirc) they said just sorry, released new BIOS with lower voltages and that's it. 

After that I was only fixing people's private MB's from ASUS, where they had messed up CPU socket pins (brand new) and RMA rejected this.

I personally hate ASUS software, that is BIOS in MB, system apps, and GPU tweak in general - worst software I worked with. They got fantastic hardware, but software destroy it.

Last hardware from ASUS (I still use) is ZenFone 6, which was promised, they will bring security updates for "long after end of support" - well, exactly when 2 years passed since phone release, there was no software or security update at all.

I could write very long list of GIGABYTE hardware issues (my personal 2 examples plus ton of hardware I worked on + very lot of issues with other people's hardware I was suppose to fix) but there is no sense - they are just on my black list in every category - GPU, MB, even pc case. That's for Gigabyte and AORUS. 

MSI in the other hand have great software, fantastic hardware, but average finish - "radiators" on motherboards are just metal bricks, fans on GPU are still Hydro dynamic bearings, RGB looks very poor (specially on card I just bought - you can count how many LEDs are behind milky strip) and they are starting to do things they can't - PC cases and fans with very low level. Also still can't forgive them for not release SUPRIM X for AMD cards.

That said, I have very small trust to partners like EVGA, SAPPHIRE, XFX, KFA2 (Galax), BIOSTAR and ASROCK (worst possible BIOS not starting with RAM or SSD M.2, which sometimes work, sometimes not - these were detected randomly after each restart) because of coil whines. I see lot of reports on German pages and Amazon about coil whines of those brands, besides that, in Poland, I can mostly count on shop policy as RMA to manufacturer with shipping take very long.

[elstaci]

I am beginning to believe the reason why you get so much Coil whine in your GPU cards could be poor power from your outlet in which you PSU is not able to compensate for.

If you were to connect a UPS to your PC that outputs clean power and see if the Coil Whine disappears.  just throwing out ideas since it is rare that you should get so many GPUs with Coil Whine.

I am using a CyberPower UPS on my PC which outputs a clean AC Sine wave to the PC. Never had any power issues using the UPS.

I needed to get the UPS because at the time I would lose house power intermittently from anywhere from one or two seconds to several minutes up to one or two hours. Each time it would reboot my PC which isn't a healthy situation power wise for my PSU and hardware due to large power spikes that might occur after power returns.

I happen to be a big fan of Asus Hardware. I have several Asus products like a Motherboard, GPU, & Optical Drives.  I have had very little problems with Asus hardware. At least for me, they have lasted several years.

But I do agree about Asus software. I stopped using Asus software a long time ago due to issues they cause with my PC besides hogging a lot of resources and driver space.

EDIT: Asus did have a Overheating AMD GPU card issue which they did a recall or issued a fix. The problem was that the screws to the GPU card's shroud or Cowl wasn't putting enough pressure on the GPU and heat sink to make good contact. Thus the GPU card was overheating. 

[vlad_8011]

I'm also using Cyberpower UPS. Tried with an without it. That mainly because I live 100M from power transformator and have 236V in the wall outlets.

But  in my whole history, I had coil whine only on:

-Gigabyte R9 270 OC (so loud that me and older brother could not sit in same room as PC)

- MSI GTX 1080 Gaming X (2 of them)

- XFX 6800XT MERC CORE from this thread (3 of them in row)

Also had stronger cards (more power hungry) which had 0 coil whine

- MSI GTX 1060 Gaming OCV1

- MSI GTX 1080Ti Gaming X Trio

- ASUS RTX 3080 TUF

- XFC 6800 XT MERC BLACK

So I guess it's not the power from outlets, but poor quality check.

[Vynski]

I agree with you 99.9%

I've been building and servicing / repairing computers since the mid 1980's.  Over that time you observe a lot of problems associated with cheap products.  

It is truly my philosophy that you get what you pay for in laptops, desktops, graphics, wi-fi, any hardware.  

Do your homework prior to purchase.

Don't expect a b350 motherboard to do the job of an x570 board.  Even within the X570 you have several levels of quality.

And YES I am probably one of MSI's biggest supporters and fans.

[vlad_8011]

"It is truly my philosophy that you get what you pay for in laptops, desktops, graphics, wi-fi, any hardware.  "

1000000% agree. I remember my first PC, PC of my older brother and quality (REAL QUALITY) ladders with price ladder. 

I have very long story to tell, about decreasing quality for rising price, about people thinking they got good product, while they are just naive and dont really know term of good product.

Spoiler

Before my First PC, bought for my own money, my oldest brother was giving me old, repasted, cleaned products (MB, CPU, GPU) - this was all working - loud, but it was working. No coil whines, nothing.

Then there comes my first own PC, with i5 4690, Gigabyte R9 270 OC, 8GB RAM and dont remember MB.... anyway loudest possible coil whine ever heard, just squecking all over the room, since turning system on. Bad first experience i would say...

I put that into RMA, it was bought in local shop, they GLOUED coils on that GPU, then i could play even 300FPS without any coil whine - but that model had partially opened coils, you could put gloue inside them - now its impossible. 

Later i upgraded to fewest problematic platform - i7 6700K, GTX 1060 OCV1 (MSI), Z170A Motheboard (MSI), 16GB RAM, 550W PSU (Silentium PC GOLD) and everything was so fine, i was so happy.... untill CPU started to overheat. Many repasting after with  no internet that time, i used internet cafee after school, and that was first time i heard about Intel's not soldering their IHS, and i have to RMA or delid it. I asked friends - they said if it works, just leave it (it was turbo jet noise of my CPU cooler - SilentiumPC Fortis 3 V2) and i wanted to change CPU - but soon after there was that leak about spectre and meltdown, i really felt that performance loose, and on the horizon i saw Ryzen CPU's. I leaved that hottie runing its own life althrough gaming was not comfortable and really short (max 90 minutes before shutdowns of PC).

I waited, and meanwhile i tried to upgrade GPU, to be on pair with stronger CPU - i choosed MSI as usual, GTX 1080 Gaming X - it was card from my dreams - horizontal placement of heatsink fins, heat going out of case, low temps and very quiet fans. Well.... first time i wanted to buy used - i was scammed and loosed 2500PLN (580 USD). Bad luck. Then i bought finally Ryzen 2700X, faster RAM, MSI Mobo and finally, brand new GTX 1080 Gaming X. That was month after release Turing. Guess what - brand new PSU, 630W Thermaltak Smart SE (got it spare till today) and very high ptch coil whine, exacly from GPU. I said NO WAY! RMA, received new card (same model with different serial number) but shop and MSI support contact was really suprisingly nice - i had no direct contact with service of MSI, but through shop, but guy in shop was threating me as priority, we was writing email by email, then i decided to send it to RMA, decribed which epochy they should use for coils and they decided to try it (!). Of course they failed :D. But guess what - i was 580 USD in the back, right? MSI Service offered me change for GTX 1080 Ti Gaming X Trio. I asked for warranty - it was just like i would buy new one. It propably was refurbished, in not original box, but hell, i'll take it. It was best card i ever had. Not a single coils had whine, performance was fantastic, but temperatures was somehow rising after year of usage around 5 degree more under load per month. I reached 86 degree core. It was exacly 23 months from replace. I decided to repaste it - boom - 64 degree max. No termopad replacement - just paste. 

Now, i wanted to upgrade with RTX 3000 and RX 6000, decided for 6800 XT Red Devil limited edition paired with Ryzen 5800X, keep MSI X470 Gaming Pro Carbon AC and get 850W PSU (got this BQ Dark Power Pro 11 850W Platinum, which was sealed off when it get to me (!!!!!)). First, i choosed PSU for upgrade - bought Seasonic Prime 750W Platinum - coil whine since begin, i returned it, got 850W instead, Seasonic Prime Platinum - again coil whine on PSU, since swwitching it on with switch on back. I started to understand what is real quality, and not bought opinions. Seasonic have wide problems with coil whine, and yet people are recommending them ( what is wrong with these people?) - if you search for seasonic prime platinum coil whine - mass of threads about it, even at seasonic forms - users say its fine, its best PSU i ever had! REALLY!? Is that his first PSU in his live?

Returned this crap ofcourse, and bought BQ, got Ryzen 5800X (figured out how to keep low temps as one of the first people, even made test with all suggested settings temps + performance impact
(BIOSy do płyt głównych ASUS i Gigabyte B450 i X470 dla Ryzen 5000 | PurePC.pl) )

B550 Tomahawk, and that red devil... God it was loud, and had coil whine. So i sold it (to gamer with headphones, he know how loud it was) and bought used XFX Merc 6800 Xt Black - guy drove 320KM to deliver it to me personally (private person) - and he personally wanted to put it in my PC (he loved that card). Ofcourse, i was little suprised how loud are fans (remember, previosly i had GTX 1060 and 1080 Ti gaming X) and decided to keep it for some months and try some Ray Tracing things *. THAT WAS MISTAKE. For that time i havent loosed any single penny - i sold for price i had bought those cards. Not less, not more. And Bought RTX 3080 TUF OC V2 LHR from ASUS. Terrible software (ended up reinstall of system, beacuse of ASUS RGB tools and some crate armor or smth, and of course GPU Twaek II and III in all of it weaknesses), ended up with using MSI software (ofcourse), and disconnected RGB header on GPU itself. It was fine,

*i had Silverstone Alta F1 case - dreamed case, but unfortunely, Radeons dont like that position (video outputs facing top) - that was one of reason i choosed RTX. And here we go, how do you think it lasted ok? I tell you, 7 months. 7 months was enough, for some pressure on termopads to compress. One at VRM was too slim and was not toching heatsink. Memory temperatures reaching 112 degree was "normal" (i remember, someone at seasonic forums claimed same way....) . RMA, lot of confusion, shop forwarded card to asus service with "no video outputs description", added overheating VRAM and termopad to correct. What ASUS did? Upgraded BIOS, with higher fan curve (loud as thos chinese Radeons right now) and leaved that termopad, not even opening the card. 

Again, changing the case for radeons, selling RTX, this thread starts with first radeons after that RTX. On selling this RTX i lost 557,34 USD. Nobody wanted to buy it. Its was 10GB version BTW.

I know its darn long story, but you can see some point - how todays quality is getting deeper and deeper, while prices is geting sky high - and i ask for what? For something that is not worth any single penny over MSRP? I get it, we had Celebrity19, we had miners, and all huge inflation, but people remain the same. Bying overpriced hardware, write its ok, they can live with coil whine, they can live with overheating, it just work, if it die they gonna RMA it. I know market of PC gaming is getting bigger and bigger, but in my opinion, today fashion of RGB light is too strong, and that light makes peoples blind. 4 cards to get single one working just OK .It got some ticking noises when browsing internet and on desktop with no load, with loud original fans and there is no real alternative. I checked every teardown of all reviewed 6800 XT (every have same set of coils, only ASUS which i dont trust use different and MSI, ofcourse), not to mention there are still no review os Sapphire PULSE (someone didnt get paid?) and ASrock phantom gaming - these cards are available, instead of Nitro + which is huge overpriced and Taichi is non existend in lot of countries. And here comes that xfx with all gold reviews of card they dont produce, but are making its cheaper, worse version - that almost a scum. Is customer wont notice product part number he wont even know he's buying scammed card, and not that he saw in review. Shops usually dont even say its CORE or BLACK in its name. 

This is todays market, this is the time i'm leaving this hobby, its just unbearable. Fighting with services, which clearly shows, they got you in ***, they dont care about gamers, miners are their main customers, and they know about it. Believe me or not, but you'll see that when new gen will come. All those restrictions, low value of coins... it will just change, same as last time, Pascal, Turing, Ampere all over again. GPU's (i say mostly about it) will become even worse, these are gonna be made just to live some 2 years max, and shine all rom of miner with its RGB.

And motherboards? Heh. Intel's LGA 1700 - what we got? Users need to put spacers for socket and manufacturers simply ignoring it? What times do we have?

[vlad_8011]

Ladies and Gentelman, MSI 6800XT Gaming Z Trio started to whine yesterday with no reason. 

This is absurd and definetly LAST HIGH END PRODUCT I BOUGHT. The less end products have less issues. After such time i see ton of threads about coil whine on various configs. BeQuiet PSU's are known for almost no whine at all, so culprint here is GPU itself. 

Prices are going skyhigh (in Poland we dont feel any prices drops, is increasing again) and quality is the same as in 2016. WE WANT JUSTIFICATION OF THOSE PRICES IN QUALITY. 
AMD, should clarify, which components can be used, so none of partners would use cheap components causing coil whine. This was meant to change, some nwe gen coils was meant to be used and what we have? Still same BS quality over and over with higher and higher price. I'm out - from PC's once and for all. 

[vlad_8011]

And I was right, damm I was right.

4090 is burning, whining as hell. AMD, I hope you're made right decisions when developing PCB and adjusting restrictions for AIB partners.

This is beyond scale. Prices of course rising. 

[spmkd]

Hey there Vlad,

Can you let us know if you found an AMD card that doesn't whine?

I have so far tested 3 second hand RX 6800 XT (2xRed Dragon, 1xTUF) and all of them had very noticeable coil whine when playing games.

I currently use Nvidia Zotac 1070 AMP Extreme which does have about 5% of the coil whine the 3 AMD's had. (if everything is quite you would be able to hear it only a bit, almost not noticeable)

I have "RM Series™ RM750 — 750 Watt 80 PLUS® Gold" PSU.

[vlad_8011]

Hey.

Im really sorry to hear you hit TUF with coil whine - thats one of 3 brands that have least coil whine from people reports.

From my little investigation, i found out MSI Gaming X/Z, ASrock and ASUS TUF are way to go when trying to get card with no coil whine. My card settled a little, but only with undervolting ( 2250mHz/1050mv) and it whine, but in acceptable loudness.

Also recommending replacing PSU for future builds in mind, so 1000W or 1200W Platinum would be best option (recommending BeQuiet here). 

I am quiet freak, i replaced all fans with noctua, turned down RPM of those fans, applied UV to CPU and GPU to get cool and quiet PC, and in the end, its not fully possible on high end components. Till this day i really regret i sold XFX 6800 XT BLACK - that was so solid, that i could apply OC, UV and card didn't had slightest coil whine.

Fun fact about new gen GPU's - they also whine as hell - both NV and AMD. And someone here said i hit worst storm of events....
Now imagine, after release of AMD 7000 Radeons, many of my friends (9 persons) decided to go in previous gen, as it was listed for good prices - 2 of them choosed RTX 3060 12GB, 7 of them choosed RX 6000 (3 x 6800 XT, 2 x 6900 XT, 2 x 6950 XT) - they all bought GPUs from different places, winner was Kamil (greetings if you find this thread mate ) who took 6800 XT Nitro + for 755 USD. Now, best part is - NONE OF THEM HAD COIL WHINE. I mean, we can call it miracle, right? Few of them used some old PSU's (with plan to upgrade), 650, 700, 750W, at least one of them had not GOLD rated PSU, but just + . As far as i know, after PSU upgrades (and overall platform upgrades) they still dont have coil whine, while they all have different brands GPU's. 

[spmkd]

Hey there Vlad,

So, finally, it seems that I found out what is causing the coil whine. Seems that using a single power cable with its dangle addition to power the 2x8pin card was the culprit.

On the latest card (PowerColor RedDevil 6800 XT) which I also bought, powered by two separate 8pin cables, there is coil whine ONLY when starting a game (for about 1-2 seconds). After that, there is none whatsoever.

This makes me believe that all previous cards had the coil whine because of improper power connection.

So, my issue is resolved with the 750 W Gold PSU. Finally, peace!

All the best and hopefully this will help some people.

[vlad_8011]

Well, i was connecting with dual power cables.

But XFX 6800 XT Merc BLACK, MSI 6800 XT Gaming Z Trio doesnt have that problem, so i guess that was 3 faulty cards, from bad production batch. 

[wandal]

Hello Vlad.

I have exactly the same issue (thick noise and coil whine) an my pc.

Ryzen 5700X 4.5GHz 1.1v (PBO and C-STATES disabled), B550 Tomahawk FW7C91vA9, MSI 6900 XT Gaming X (1500MHz GPU Clock), DeepCool PQ1000M (Fan disabled).

I spend many time to test my pc with various replacement:

Sapphire RX6800 Pulse - unacceptable HEAVY coil whine, thick noise

Sapphire RX6800 Nitro+ - HEAVY coil whine, fans whine, NO thick noise

Asrock RX6800 Phantom Gaming D - unacceptable HEAVY coil whine, thick noise

BeQuiet Straight Power 11 750W Platinum - no any changes

Testing various motherboard firmware:

7C91vA9, 7C91vAA, 7C91vAB - thick noise still here

7C91vAC - thick noise much louder, unacceptable

Currently i think the thick noise issue is GPU firmware releated.

This is a shame. New hardware is completely garbage.

[vlad_8011]

Yeah, I also think it's not PSU/MB related. 

It's a shame how bad new hardware become, and I'm writing this as ex owner of GTX 1080, GTX 1080 Ti, RTX 3080 10GB TUF, Red Devil 6800 XT, XFX Merc BLACK 6800 XT (only silent model of this card), XFX Merc CORE 6800 XT and current owner of MSI 6800 XT Gaming Z Trio. 

It look as there is completely no quality check. If I would release device like this in my job, I would heavily feel it on my salary. As new hardware comes out it's even worse (new gen CPU, MB, GPU. This is simply unacceptable, and reason why I don't want to make any more upgrade - no matter of the price and performance jump. I don't need super computer that makes noise, that makes me mad, while on paper it makes 27db noise.

Reviewers also are putting their brick into this wall of shame. When I see "card is running very quiet" my blood is staring to boil.

[wandal]

Finally found permanent fix for GPU thick noise. Combined with heavy underclock and deshroud mod this makes GPU deadly silent all time.

MorePowerTool -> Feature Control -> GFXOFF

[vlad_8011]

Is there any side effect? 

• GFXOFF
• GFXOFF is a feature found in most recent GPUs that saves power at runtime. The card's RLC (RunList Controller) firmware powers off the gfx engine dynamically when there is no workload on gfx or compute pipes. GFXOFF is on by default on supported GPUs.

Userspace can interact with GFXOFF through a debugfs interface (all values in uint32_t, unless otherwise noted):

amdgpu_gfxoff

Use it to enable/disable GFXOFF, and to check if it's current enabled/disabled:

$ xxd -l1 -p /sys/kernel/debug/dri/0/amdgpu_gfxoff

01

Write 0 to disable it, and 1 to enable it.

Read 0 means it's disabled, 1 it's enabled.

If it's enabled, that means that the GPU is free to enter into GFXOFF mode as needed. Disabled means that it will never enter GFXOFF mode.

amdgpu_gfxoff_status

Read it to check current GFXOFF's status of a GPU:

$ xxd -l1 -p /sys/kernel/debug/dri/0/amdgpu_gfxoff_status

02

0: GPU is in GFXOFF state, the gfx engine is powered down.

1: Transition out of GFXOFF state

2: Not in GFXOFF state

3: Transition into GFXOFF state

If GFXOFF is enabled, the value will be transitioning around [0, 3], always getting into 0 when possible. When it's disabled, it's always at 2. Returns -EINVAL if it's not supported.

amdgpu_gfxoff_count

Read it to get the total GFXOFF entry count at the time of query since system power-up. The value is an uint64_t type, however, due to firmware limitations, it can currently overflow as an uint32_t. Only supported in vangogh

amdgpu_gfxoff_residency

Write 1 to amdgpu_gfxoff_residency to start logging, and 0 to stop. Read it to get average GFXOFF residency % multiplied by 100 during the last logging interval. E.g. a value of 7854 means 78.54% of the time in the last logging interval the GPU was in GFXOFF mode. Only supported in vangogh

As far as I understand this is "idle mode" when no load in on GPU. So is there any thermal changes, power usage changes, fan rpm changes on idle?

I remember something similar on RTX 3080 TUF - in GPU tweak user could enable card to be always in 3D mode, but it was harmfully for thermals and power usage ain't idle.

[wandal]

Idle power icreased to 15~20W. However, i dont see any changes in thermal or fans behavior.

[vlad_8011]

How about VRAM frequencies? 

[wandal]

VRAM clock stuck bug already fixed by editing blank time (Custom Resolution Utility). This is the first thing i found out after buying new GPU, thank you AMD.

(CPU Temp and Current are bugged and always shows wrong values. Thank you AMD again.)

[bobpi]

I do not know if it would help, but I only use Sapphire AMD brand cards. A bit more, but less hassles.