I have R9 390 in a VFIO setup which I have used for the past few years. I rarely use the VM anymore but when I want to play something new that doesn’t run well under proton I fire it up. I was running Ghost Wire Tokyo upon release without issues then about a couple weeks back, after a few minutes of game play I would completely lose power from the UPS.
The UPS in question is a 1000VA/500W UPS. Before this I had an APC 750/450W UPS that ran for years with the same setup and never overloaded. I considered the location of the UPS as it may be overheating and was looking into either relocating or providing proper ventilation to it.
At that point I decided to swap the host and guest GPU in the system. The host GPU is a RX 470 and I have no issues related to UPS/power when using this. What I found interesting is what happened when using the R9 390 in Ubuntu. The 390 will work all day long under normal usage however a few minutes after trying to run a game or benchmark It would completely lose display out from the GPU. The computer continues working as I can hear the audio etc in the back ground but I would have no display out from the GPU at all. The only way to regain video out is to perform a hard shutdown of the system as resetting does not return it.
So using the 390 on the VM results in total lost of power from the UPS and usage on the Ubuntu host results in a lost of display. I did come across a couple posts on some forums with issues relating to the lost of display with the 390. Most of the forum posts didn’t have a resolution but I did see a couple responses where they were able to get it working by undervolting which I have yet to attempt.
I want to note that I managed to purchase a 6600XT (at close to MSRP!) yesterday to replace the 390. I was looking to repurpose the 390 in another build but if it’s on the way out I guess I can’t complain as I got close to eight years of usage from this thing.
I am curious if anyone has any suggestions or at least encountered similar issues with the R9 390? The only quick options I can think about is attempt the undervolting or to probably connect the PC to the surge side of the UPS and retest.
That’s most likely a power problem. Either your PSU is undersized for the card, or the UPS is preventing your PSU form supplying the power your GPU needs.
The first step here is to remove the UPS and plug your computer directly into the wall. If you experience no issues issues then I’d suggest your UPS is undersized - 500W is very low for a PC with two GPUs. What wattage is your power supply?
Also IIRC the cheap desktop UPSes you can buy are apparently not a good thing to use with desktop PCs. Something about pure sine wave vs stepped sine wave UPSes, and Power Factor Correction in modern PSUs needing pure sine wave UPSes.
The power supply is an EVGA 750W. The current UPS is a Chicago Digital Power rated at 500W. The power rating of the UPS might be cutting it close as I think the suggested power supply rating for the 390 is 500W If I recall correctly. The catch is that is worked for the last few years on an APC 450W rated UPS without issue but then it’s different brands, probably different quality as well.
The options for UPS locally are a bit rough consisting of mostly low end type UPS. Sine wave UPS are just out of budget and not that readily available locally. There was a place locally with the cyber power 1500VA UPS but haven’t been in stock for the past few months.
I just tested running Unigine Valley both with PC connected to surge side and straight off the wall and noticed I still lost display. When I started monitoring temps, I noticed that all of a sudden the temps shot up into the high 80s. Looked into the case at that point and and realized that the VRM fan on the Kraken G12 stopped working. After further inspection I found that one of the thermal pads fell off the GPU onto the fan preventing it from spinning. Rectified then ran the test again.
With the VRM fan now working, the temps slowly crept into the high 80s and even into the 90s where I then cut the benchmark off. I have a Corsair H55 paired with the Kraken G12. It’s coming up to that 5 year age so maybe the pump is crapping out, will troubleshoot further into this.
So a bit of half assed troubleshooting from me as the cooling may have been the initial issue or one of the potential issues. I would convert back to the air cooler but of course I have no idea what I did with the original cooler screws
