Gx640 Vbios Br35701.030

Yay, finally, the official release!

MSI Global ? Computer, Laptop, Notebook, Desktop, Mainboard, Graphics and more

 

Flashed and works as well as the beta version, no problems sleeping, etc.

 

How did you flash it? I put the files on a bootable flash drive, but I can't boot from it. Realtek Boot Agent doesn't see it, and when I boot from it y selecting it in the list that comes up when you press F11, it doesn't work. What am I doing wrong?

 

Wow, that was surprisingly quick and painless. After reading the beta vbios thread, I was expecting to encounter all sorts of problems. By the way, would I need to reset the embedded controller? I read somewhere when flashing the bios, resetting is needed. It doesn't mention if it applies to flashing the vbios.

Maybe it isn't bootable. It's been a few years back, but I remember I downloaded a Win98 bootdisk image, mounted it and ran the "\\dos\sys <drive letter of usb>" command from dos prompt. Then I copied all the contents of the image over to the USB.

 

Basically the bios seems to have the same properties as the one I released here except this one is for GX640/1656 ^^

 

So it worked. I had to download a DOS bootable image.

 

I'm completely lost.......... can somebody post nooby step by step instructions or link to one? thanks

 

So I updated the vbios and updated CCC to 10.6 and everything runs fine (no more black screen after sleep or restarting on battery). But now I have this odd problem (really not a big deal, but I'd still like to figure it out).

I still need to mess around a little and see if it is related to CCC 10.6 or the vbios, but when I boot my computer, the card automatically sets the clocks at 405/1000, although it is still reading the stock clocks as 625/1000 in the CCC information page. I have no problems under/overclocking using the AMD GPU Tool, so it's really not a big concern... especially since I usually underclock to keep the fan noise down unless I'm gaming and then bump the clocks back up, but I just wanted to see if anyone else noticed this. Anyone have any idea why it is doing this?


EDIT: Pretty sure this is just a feature of powerplay... if I disable it and reboot, the clocks boot correctly at 625/1000. Just seemed weird that even while plugged in, the clocks were booting lower than stock. If you boot on battery with powerplay on, the clocks boot at 300/400.

 

It's definitely a PowerPlay thing. In fact, this is why Powerplay exists : to save power. If your card is not used, and you are on high performance settings, the GPU is downclocked to 405/1000. When you play a game, it will automatically be reclocked to 625/1000.

Hope I've answered your question

 

405/1000 is the default for low load 2D with the new VBIOS then? Not quite satisfactory for me, especially with the 1000MHz memory clock. I've been using 100/150 for web browsing and the like recently, so I'm not going to be in any hurry to update the VBIOS.

 

If you set PowerPlay to "Optimize Battery Life", the GPU is downclocked to 300/400 while idle.
The weird part is that, with the same settings, when you connect a projector, and set the output display to Projector Only, it's downlocked to 100/150.

EDIT: I know all of this because this "new" VBIOS is in fact the Beta one.

 

Imo you are wrong. May have a look here.

100/150 at idle
300/400 load (3D) for max. battery
625/1000 load (3D) max. performance
...

405/1000 at idle would be silly.

 

Google something like "dos on flash drive" and then juat throw your files on there. That way, DOS will boot, and you can run the bat file.

 

I thought you changed those settings yourself.

 

1000 at idle is daft, make sure you get that changed

 

Before I flash my VBIOS, I'm waiting to see a definitive summary on clock speeds, similar to what @tilla has done.

Basically, I'm not going to bother to flash my VBIOS unless it completely removes the need for me to manually set clock speeds with the GPU Clock Tool.

 

I only changed the uvd clockinfo from 500/1000 to 300/400. And lowered the voltage of all clockinfos.
Compare the new GX640 bios with this from Danteleet.
The only difference at clockinfos is the first one coz of the 5850<> 5870.

 

I were wrong about the new VBIOS. It's not exactly the same as the Beta one. I've just updated it and here are the REAL summary with new MSI drivers (which contain modified 10.5 drivers + Catalyst 10.6) :

- Max Battery / Idle : 300/400
- Max Battery / YouTube (Flash 10.1 HW decode enabled) : 500/1000
- Max Battery / Gaming : 300/400
- Max Performance / Idle : 405/1000
- Max Performance / YouTube (Flash 10.1 HW decode enabled) : 500/1000
- Max Performance / Gaming : 625/1000

 

My underclock is 100/100, I am with the old vbios but there is no bugs or artefacts in screen.
Under 100 there is no noticeable difference (I tried 80/85)

 

I'm not happy with those clocks, so I'll stick with the old VBIOS and manual adjustment for now. I will probably update it eventually, but even if I do I'll be manually setting lower clocks anyway.

 

I also updated the vbios, but I cannot say I'm very pleased with it. Is there any correct tool to monitor both the clocks AND the voltage of graphics card.

How can I edit these settings?
I'd really love to be in control of my graphics card with minimal effort and risks.

I can still use AMD GPU Clock tool for setting clocks, but I am more interested in gaining control over GPU voltage.

 

But I thought on MSI's site it says that you just run the enclosed .bat from the package directly in Windows? What's with this bootable flashdrive deal?

 

Running a .bat in Windows to flash the VBIOS is just asking for trouble. It's possible that it actually sets the flash to occur at boot, in which case it would be fine, but I can't say for sure.

 

I have a external usb floppy drive and already created the dos but I cannot fit the bios, .bat, and the .exe file. Do I need them all or am I doing something wrong.

EDIT: I got it to work with a usb flash drive. I essentially use the hp tool to copy the bootable floppy drive to my usb flash drive.

However, how can I tell if I already have the updated vbios? GPUZ tells me it 012.020.000.032.035701 and my hardware id is 10611462&REV_00. Anyone who updated mind telling me theirs?

EDIT2: Catalyst tells me I am in fact running the latest vbios in the Information Centers>Graphics Hardware for anyone looking/poking around .

 

hey , after i flash my bios , which steps i must do to reset the embbed controller ?And is it important to do this or we can skip it?

 

unplug everything, go watch a tv show/pron then your set

 

i have just updated the new bios , everything work fine but i realize that the problem with sleep awake still happen , the computer sometimes can awake from sleep but sometimes it can not , i will investigate more and post result here

 

That's strange. I would've thought that 300/400, 405/1000, and 500/1000 would all be fine for waking up from sleep.

 

ok guys , i have figured out the problem , the computer won't wake up if it go to sleep mode while my wireless mouse's usb still plugin(it is genius 915 laser mouse) , when i take off the usb before put the computer to sleep , it wake up fine

edit : the mouse 's usb is not a problem guys , i have been wrong , i will investigate more

 

Thats smells like a prob with overdrive imo. Have you overdrive enabled?
405/1000 and 300/400 are definately not idle clocks.
Danteleet earlier had this same behaviour. I thought he had to delete his old profiles.xml to let the real powerplay values to work. Maybe overdrive overrides the normal values.
At me even max performance is idleing at 100/150!
The other ones seems to be correct.

The only tool to watch your current voltage is GPU observer gadget. It can also show your gpu temp, clocks and gpu load.
Look here.
You have to use RBE to change the settings. Look around, there are lots of tuts.

 

By accident I figured out under which circumstances the wakeup issue doesn't happen.

Underclock your video card to 100/100 using ATI Tool and it's fine. Even with the old vBios.

 

Yeah, I figured out that this powerplay thingy does more bad than good.
405/1000 idle in performance mode? - you gotta be kidding me, AMD!

 

after update the bios , the hibernate issue was fixed perfectly for my machines but not the sleep issue , sometimes the computer can awake and sometimes it can not . i haven't figured out what exactly cause the problem

 

I don't have overdrive enabled, but I'm using a profile to change gamma.
However, this profile only contains settings for output colours, so...

Are you sure that my idle clocks are uncommon ? If so, what should I do to fix that ?

 

my clocks after update the vbios is exactly like yours , if something is wrong then it must be the bios itself

 

+1

Same here.

Well, I think I got the clue.

I opened the vBIOS with RBE and the clock settings are practically the same as of those in GX740.
However, there is a glitch:
There are power states as what clock notebook should use in certain situations.
My guessings:

State 1 is for somehow balanced notebook operation:
625/1000@1,05V for games
400/1000@0,9V for medium tasks
100/150@0,9V for low tasks
Imageshack - state1o.png

State 2 is for flash playback in browser etc., UVD one and only setting
500/1000@0,9V

State 3 is for powerplay setting "maximum battery", no matter if notebook is plugged or not.
300/400@0,9V for high and medium tasks
100/150@0,9V for low tasks
Imageshack - state3.png

State 4 is for powerplay setting "performance":
405/1000@0,9V for low and medium tasks
625/1000@1,05V for high tasks
Imageshack - state3.png

So the problem is that I am only able to choose between State 3 and 4 where I should go to state 1.
Is there any way to "tell" GPU to use certain power states?

I sincerely believe it will be understandable for you guys.

 

Quite understandable

But that's weird. Powerplay makes only difference between 'Performance' and 'Optimized Battery'.
So, i dont know when it should use this state 4.
I even tested to change the Boot-Performance-Option in the BIOS. But still being idleing at 100/150 (Clock 01). Open furmark it goes straight to 700/1000 here.
Btw. I never seen 405 here till now.
I'll try to ask Danteleet, imo he had exactly the same problem at beginning.

 

Alright thanks.

In fact we all have the same values Danteleet wrote on his first post (except 625 VS 700).
You're saying that now he's got YOURS ? If so, we're definitely waiting for his answer !

 

You should change your state4 to state4.png.

 

Is it in any way better to boot from a flash drive than from a cd?

 

If you want to boot from a USB drive, you have to do two things. First, Google "diskpart bootable usb" without the quotes, then google "dos on flash drive" withough the quotes. Once you do that, just copy over your VBIOS package files, and boot from the USB drive.

 

I don't want to boot from a USB drive. I'd rather boot from a cd drive.

I was just wondering if it was safer to use a usb drive.

 

I am impress with this update so far, my idle temps drop! I am connected to a external monitor (1920x1200) and my 5850 idle @ 46c-47c while the 430m idle @ 36c-38c (Ambient @ 26c). I tested sleep and I have not ran into the black screen problem yet .

 

Hi,

yeah at first I was getting the same as you. On sector, I was getting 405/1000 @ 0.9 even though it was set up at 0.8V in my vbios since I had modified it.
This is how I realized that it was not taking my vbios into consideration at all when idling. Then I tried on battery, and I got... 405/1000 @ 0.8 which is what it was supposed to be with my current settings!
So I tried several things, I'm not really sure did the trick though.

First thing I did was uninstalling ccc completely, leaving the gpu drivers though, cleaning registry with ccleaner and rebooting. After rebooting, everything was working fine without ccc, I was getting 405/[email protected] which is what I was supposed to get at this time. But then I installed ccc again and.... back to 405/[email protected] !!!

So I figured, there must be a parameter somewhere in ccc forcing this voltage.

I went to "C:\Users\Your Windows ID\AppData\Local\ATI\ACE\Profiles.xml" and opened it with notepad.

By scrolling down, I found out some odd values. Near Idle, I found 40500, 100000 and 900 being the clocks and voltage of the gpu. Right under this, I could find my current overdrive settings.
Anyways, I edited this, so that I had 0.8V instead and when I rebooted, I think it did the trick (although I'm not even sure that was that anymore, since it's been a few days and I kinda pulled my hair off trying to find a way to make this work ^^)

After this, I edited my vbios so that I would have 100/[email protected] when idling and this is exactly what I got after flashing. Then I had to change it again since I was getting quite a few artefacts. I tried 100/[email protected] but still had some.
Then 150/[email protected] and Windows would not boot, beware with this setting.
Then tried 200/[email protected] and still no boot, beware too.
I had to settle at 300/[email protected] which is not exactly low, but I'm getting about the same idle temps (48-50°, but my room is warm) as before, when I had 100/[email protected], and at least it's stable

Anyways, if you have anymore question, go ahead and ask. What I can say is stay away from overdrive since it will most likely override or simply mess with your vbios settings !

Edit : the thread : http://forum.notebookreview.com/msi...bios-powerplay-overdrive-etc-all-working.html
I will update with my new settings soon, and probably more tests since I will be doing some for a review on a french forum =)

 

boot from usb is quite easier because you don't need to burn the file into cd-room. All you need is an bootable usb and copy those file into it

 

I think those are the settings for ATI overdrive. Changing them did nothing for me. Maybe it's because I don't have overdrive enabled.

What do you use to check your voltages? I'm using the GPU gadget recommended by @ttila, but I understand it only reads off the bios, it doesn't really give the actual voltages, right?

Out of curiosity, what is "warm" to you? At 300/[email protected], I idle at 50C in an air-conditioned room, that's around 22-24C ambient which, to me, is nice and cool. During the day at 32-34C ambient, same clocks, I idle at 56-58C. Still, it's 10C lower than with the 625/1000 default clocks.

 

"Warm" is that my room is probably around 30-32°C even at night.

I use the gpu gadget too. It's not reading the bios, it's giving the true value. if I disable powerplay now, it clocks to 700/[email protected] which is my default clock, and it's nowhere to be found in my bios.

 

Ah... I suppose that's normal considering you have a larger chassis and most likely, better cooling.

Did you flash your bios with custom clocks/voltages? I flashed my bios with custom voltages, and the GPU gadget basically reports my custom voltages so I wasn't 100% sure they were actual voltages. If I disable powerplay, it goes to 625/[email protected] which is my new default voltage in the bios and not the factory default of 1.05V.

 

That's weird, it goes to factory default when I do disable powerplay.

Right now I'm idling at 53° so yeah it's normal, and I'm sitting on inactive notepad cooler and removed the metal mesh inside the backplate yesterday night

And yes I flashed with custom clocks and voltage.

 

Conventional wisdom says it should use the new defaults. Weird indeed...