STRIX RX 480 to RX 580 BIOS MOD

[beret21]

So i recently purchased a Strix RX 480 OC (Used) (First time ever bought such expensive card)
The card was overheating (It was told by the seller) So i got it in pretty fair price. First day i tested it for any other issue then heating.

Next Day i did this

DO AT YOUR OWN RISK

As i dont mind loud Fans i thought why not MOD it to RX 580.
So got the original Strix RX 580 OC BIOS from ASUS site, downloaded AMD/ATI ATIFlash tool.

Followed these step (How To: Flash Your RX 480 to an RX 580 In Easy Steps!By Brendan van Varik)


Download ATIFlash and extract it;
Create a folder on your C:/ drive and call it ‘ati’ and copy the ATIFlash files into the folder;
Open ATIFlash (from C:/) and save your BIOS with the appropriate button, call it stock or something you can recognise;
Download the RX 580 BIOS for your card and place it in the ‘ati’ folder and name it appropriately;
Click on the Start button, and type in ‘cmd’, right click and run with admin rights;
If you have more than one card, replace the ‘0’ with ‘1’ for the second GPU, ‘2’ for the third etc. – note that the primary GPU is 0 and not 1;
cd c:/ati
atiwinflash -f -p 0 580.rom
Wait and restart PC when asked


I Recommend DDU Clean and new drivers ( 18.9.1 are my fav)

IS IT WORTH IT ?
You can overclock your RX480 even higher and get more benchmark score
But it was satisfying to me so i did it

Some things to consider ! (Strix RX 480 is the best candidate due to OVERKILL VRMs)
Will It will fry your GPU : Strix RX 480 has the best PCB and Strix RX 580 has the same PCB as that of RX 480 so u cant fry it. VRMs are overkill so u will not be overloading anything at all
Temps : Will be higher for sure as RX 580 requires more voltage and the fact that Strix RX 480 Cooler suck due to the issue mentioned in my video ( Useless Heat-pipes )
Brick : You can brick your card but its repairable, all u need is another working i-GPU or another GPU and board with more PCIE slots.
PSU : 500W minimum with 80 Plus. You are changing the GPU Watts usage from almost 130 Watts to 160 Watts (Gaming)
Furmark : No it still doesnt fry GPU after BIOS Flash

 

[Johan45]

Thanks for sharing your success story, most of what we get is the opposite and someone wants to "fix" their borked flash attempt.

 

[beret21]

Thanks for sharing your success story, most of what we get is the opposite and someone wants to "fix" their borked flash attempt.

I think the biggest reason will be that they will be using wrong bios or bios of different manufacturer. Or using bios of overclocked 580 versions.
Being honest i am not that happy with the OC we get on RX 480. Although w.r.t reference card we might be 200 to 250 MHz above but those extra MHz dont show the difference in game.

 

[samsa]

Good to know it can be done and thanks for the guide. I have a friend with an Strix RX 480. Might be worth for him trying.

 

[beret21]

Good to know it can be done and thanks for the guide. I have a friend with an Strix RX 480. Might be worth for him trying.

Welcome man.

 

[bennuchios]

I've had a go at flashing the bios of my Sapphire Nitro RX 480 4gb. To a Sapphire Nitro RX 480 9gb. The flash takes, but fails to reboot.
Is it safe to assume it's the card isn't one of the lucky ones that actually has 8gb vram on board?
Or should I be looking at something else?

Basic specs;
I7-4770k
RX 480 4gb
PSU Silverstone Strider Gold 750w 80 Plus Gold

 

[bennuchios]

*8gb

 

[Alaric]

I think it was only the very early cards that had 8 GB with 4 GB unused that could actually be reflashed. AMD shut that down pretty quick, and it was only in the early days of release to meet demand. As soon as the crypto crapstorm hit the vRAM didn't matter, as it had no effect on mining ability. Then the whole VGA market went down the tubes. I got one of the rare RX 480 8 GB cards at $259 at release (VisionTek reference card) and patted myself on the back as prices went from outrageous to freakin' stupid at the speed of greed. LOL Then I jumped ship to Nvidia right before their lesser product (for mining) got hit. One of the rare times I got lucky-twice-in the hardware upgrade game.

 

[bennuchios]

I managed to flash my 4gb card to 8gb... Although for it to be recognised, I need to run an old driver version 16.11 as opposed to 18.2/3 which is current...
Will have to do more testing to see if the gains are worth using such an old driver.
Time and testing will tell.