Sapphire ATI Radeon x1950pro overheating

[erestel]

Hi,

i have been having issues with games lately with said card. i dont know much about hardware or overclocking other than which slot to put the card in and how to find out about the temperature. however comparing to what i see in other posts, seems the overheating issue i am having is quite severe.

with the ATI overdrive i can see the GPU temperature, and i realize my card runs at ~73c WITHOUT running any 3d applications besides windows aero interface, which is apparently considered "overheating" by others. with games (i checked the temp playing Titan Quest at almost lowest graphics setting and a lagging framerate) it goes almost to 120c.

According to ATI Tool website, 1950pro is the ONLY GPU not supported by the website. i also cannot use AMD overdrive software to adjust fanspeed as i am not using an AMD cpu.

so here are my questions:
-what are some utilities that i can maybe heighten the fan speed, if there is any?
-somewhere i read that the card is power hungry. what utility can i use to make sure it is getting enough power?
-and if it is not, how can i give it more power?
-is there anything else i can do to the card (besides selling it and getting a different one) to lessen this problem?
-what other causes do you experts diagnose for the lacking performance? as i said i know only so much about hardware.

thanks.

[strike-down]

I think rivatuner might have the option to adjust the fanspeed
can be foud here:
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=163
Ive never looked for any option for fan speed, but it might be there

Riva tuner has alot of other tweaks that might be useful

[Webby]

Okay at a guess your heatsink is full of dust and needs cleaning. If this is the case a good clean out will solve all the over heating problems.

To adjust fan speed you need a copy of ATI Tray Tools (can be downloaded from here) I assume it supports the 1950 pro install it and find out

Assuming you have not just bought it and it was running fine previously then its reasonable to assume it is receiving enough power.

And if it is suffering performance problems then it may be throttling to prevent over heating, if on the other hand you just bought it and its not living up to your expectations then that is because you bought a card which was at its peak a two years ago a lot changes in graphics cards in that period!

[erestel]

Okay at a guess your heatsink is full of dust and needs cleaning. If this is the case a good clean out will solve all the over heating problems.

i checked earlier and the GPU fan was indeed dusty. i cleaned it out.

To adjust fan speed you need a copy of ATI Tray Tools

will install after messing with riva tuner. thanks for the info.

Assuming you have not just bought it and it was running fine previously then its reasonable to assume it is receiving enough power.
And if it is suffering performance problems then it may be throttling to prevent over heating, if on the other hand you just bought it and its not living up to your expectations then that is because you bought a card which was at its peak a two years ago a lot changes in graphics cards in that period!

bought it new 2 years ago. i used to have a 500W power supply that came with the case, recently upgraded to 550W brandname one. seems fine. it ran flawlessly at least for the first year and a half.
so looks like overheating is the problem then. nothing fixed yet--see below.

I think rivatuner might have the option to adjust the fanspeed

installing it... i had problems with it with vista x64. now the installer of rivatuner is asking me to restart. gonna do it in a while--will update on what happens.

in the past i never put the case's side fan on, thinking that a open space for airflow is better. after expert advise, i hooked up the fan and thought it made a difference. but now the computer has been running for about 2 hours, and the GPU temperature is back at 68c, only 5c decrease from without fan. anything else i could do?

[erestel]

Installed Riva Tuner and ATI Tray Tools.

in Riva Tuner, after getting it working without error messages on x64, i find a number of registry settings possible for fan speed, among other things, but dont know what or which i should change. can someone advise?

in ATI Tray Tools, i am warned that "lower level driver not found". in "low level driver installation tool", i keep clicking the "start" button and nothing seems to happen. can someone advise also?
EDIT: after looking around online, i found ATT Loader, and it makes Tray Tools work. after poking around (without changing anything, really) a little bit a found the fan speed setting. and boy did i hear the fan working harder. will see in couple minutes how much it helps.

at time of edit, GPU temp stands at 65c.

thanks.

edit 2: while playing Titan Quest, a 2006 3D game at almost lowest graphics settings, i alt-tab out to glance at the GPU temperature, and was disappointed to see that it still hits over 100c (or should i be worrying about this?)

[strike-down]

did you also clean out the heatsinks?
Edit: Are you using the stock cooler or an aftermarket cooler?

[erestel]

for the Sapphire card, the heat sinks are almost totally wrapped in the case, and the only side it is exposed seems very clean.

cooler on the GPU is stock. there is also another fan that came with the case, happens to point right at the side of the heat sink.

Titan Quest seems to be a specific case. i have the OSD on showing the temp and just watch it goes straight up as the game starts.

the card runs at 63c without any 3d applications. is that normal? i read elsewhere that 60c+ is already considered overheating.

[Webby]

GPUs are more resistant to temperatures than CPUs but you really don't want to be running over 100°C

If you have been unable to get inside the cooler to clean it out it is probably still clogged full of dust the easist way to clean it will be to remove it from the card and then the should be some way to take it apart or you could try giving it a hoover (when its off the card) or use a piece of wire to poke out any dust bunnies.

To put it back on you will need some thermal paste so make sure you have some before taking it off.

[strike-down]

The stock cooler on that card does seem pretty weedy from the images I've seen. So if cleaning out the heatsink doesnt work, it would probably be worth getting an aftermarket cooler for your gfx card such as this one:
http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?W...37;2c+ATI+1950
(I havent seen any reviews for this cooler, so I dont know what its real world performance is, but from the product description, and the fact tht its a beefier cooler than the stock cooler, it should do alot better.)

Edit: If you do go for this option, first check that sapphire havent placed a warranty sticker over one of the screw heads (if the card is still in the warranty period)

[EnglishLion]

I had my X1950pro running with an arctic cooling accelero X2 and it ran much much cooler than yours. I've just removed it though to fit my new HD4850 so I can't tell you exact temps.

I agree with the others that you really need to clean out the fan. There's no reason why you can't take the card out and use a vacuum cleaner to suck dust out from the fan's outlet - a hand held like a dustbuster would be ideal.

By the way the beta version of ATITool does support X1950pro.

[erestel]

i finally took the time to open up the fancy cover and check the heat sink. the area next to the fan was covered by dust, so i cleaned it out (and it looked disgusting).

anyways, i wasnt expecting much--say max 5c drop or something.

well guess what, the GPU is running at 42-44c at idle right now. thats amazing. thanks guys!

[strike-down]

No worries, Its amazing what a difference a little bit of dust can make

[Webby]

Yeah it always surprises people what the dust bunnies can get up to!

Sounds like your temps will be much more reasonable now