Radeon RX 480 converts to RX 580 with a code

This week the folks at AMD are witnessing an odd occurrence with their latest RX 580 graphics card. While the RX 580 features a new power state and faster processing speeds, it's pretty much just a slightly modified RX 480 card. Users saw this and started in tweaking their hardware with software freely available from AMD. It would appear that an RS 580 BIOS file flashed to an RX 480 card results in what's pretty much an RX 580 – almost.

Before we go any further – know this: this isn't the sort of operation the average game player should be enacting. Flashing a BIOS to the card a gamer has tossed a few hundred bucks on isn't a good idea if they don't have a few hundred bucks more to buy a new card. That's the risk – if that's the risk a gamer wants to take with their card to grab a bit of a speed boost, then by all means, go for it.

Know that any flashing of BIOS – or any other non-recommended moves on a piece of hardware like this – are the responsibility of the user doing the flashing. One possible problem that could occur is a destroyed motherboard. Per ExtremeTech's Joel Hruska, users with the first six-pin PCI Express RX 480 had a problem that was quickly fixed, but could easily return if something isn't just-so. That problem is too much power being drawn from one location, and the results could be disastrous for more than one piece of hardware.

Even without this boost – and inevitable fires that'll have a good chance of happening – the barely 10% increase in performance between the RX 480 and RX 580 is not worth the risk. If you've got a stack of GPUs just waiting to be tested, and more than your fair share of motherboards that won't be missed if fried, be our guest. Head on over to the OverClocked3D forums to see how its done.