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PC overheating/shutting down with HD 4850. Looking at HD 7770

First post
Author
Tim Maser
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#1 - 2012-10-11 19:08:03 UTC  |  Edited by: Tim Maser
Running on a 2009 Dell 435 Mini Tower. The Intel i7-920 cpu is still holding strong, so in the last year I've upgraded the ram and added a SSD. I left the video card alone, as the Radeon HD 4850 512mb was still capable for my needs. Been away from EVE for 4 years and performance is still good. One problem, this video card is power hungry and seems to quickly overheat. It has randomly shutdown twice shortly after starting up EVE again. I never played taxing games on this machine before. Could be the card's age or a defect I never discovered, I don't think it's EVE.

Last night I used EVE to stress test the card to see if it really is a heat issue. I think it's safe to assume it is after 15 minutes.


Temps idling on desktop:
  • Radeon 4850 83c (kind of high). In large vaulted room at comfortable temperature


Shortly after undocking in EVE:
  • Jumps to 103c, fan speed increases, going from silent to loud and annoying.
  • Moved camera to view station, ship, engine effects: Quickly rose to 113-116c.


Pushed it more by maxing out graphics at 1920*1200 (still playable):
  • Jumped into the captain quarters, character's textures were a mosaic of artifacts; Undocked, and it quickly increased to 119C after a few minutes.
  • Finally, computer shutdown (probably triggering a thermal safety hitting 120c). Intel i7 cores never went above 57c.


Now I'm looking for a replacement. The Radeon 7770 has a sweet spot for price/performance, plus it has excellent lower power usage and temps, fixing my main problem. The 7750 might be an option too, but not as big of a jump in performance as the 7770.

Can't recall my PSU specs, but in general the 435mt had a 360watt PSU, but no lower. If it can handle a power hungry 4850, I have to imagine a new power efficient/cooler 7770 will work without much issue. Worth a try before considering another $50 bucks for a PSU. Anything faster than a 7770, like a 7850, then I know a new PSU is needed.

QUESTION:
I hear EVE is optimized for Nvidia hardware. Is there an equivalent NVidia card in the $125 price-range that competes with the 7770, not just performance, but also power/temps?


Thanks
Hrothgar Nilsson
#2 - 2012-10-11 19:11:11 UTC
I'd recommend looking into an aftermarket heatsink and fan for your GPU.

I had a computer with a 9800GT that easily broke 100C under load, and Arctic Accelero 2 and 2x120mm fans kept it at around 60C.
Craft Matar
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#3 - 2012-10-11 19:14:35 UTC
whats your cards fan rpm running at ?
ISD Dorrim Barstorlode
ISD Community Communications Liaisons
ISD Alliance
#4 - 2012-10-11 19:14:36 UTC
Moving this from General Discussion to Out of Pod Experience.

ISD Dorrim Barstorlode

Senior Lead

Community Communication Liaisons (CCLs)

Interstellar Services Department

Beat General
Doomheim
#5 - 2012-10-11 19:14:48 UTC  |  Edited by: Beat General
The heatsink for the video card might have a Ton of dust in it.

Clean it out with a 3 dollar can of compressed air first before you go ahead and buy an entirely new video card.

If you are uncomfortable doing it yourself, take the video card out carefully and show it to a professional at your nearest tech store. I'm sure they would clean it for a fee ( or maybe even free.... Just make sure you tell them you bought it from them Blink ) Or take the entire computer if you don't want to touch anything.

And last time I checked, dell cases have terrible terrible airflow. So try leaving the side door of the case open for a few minutes and check the temps to see if its the case's fault that the GPU isn't getting enough cool air.



Edit: I just googled your case, if it is the same one I'm looking at... I'm pretty sure the case is the problem here. A new video card won't really help matters when there is barely any air going to it. Do the side panel test and let us know what happens. Good luck.
Tim Maser
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#6 - 2012-10-11 22:19:51 UTC  |  Edited by: Tim Maser
Not sure if I can check the fan's rpm for the video card. But I can definitely hear it spin faster the moment EVE starts running.

Beat General, it's a good idea to clear the dust. The can of air I had was empty. The whole case is probably due for a good cleaning. Regarding removing the case side, I always thought that's a bad idea due to it disrupting any wind tunnel effect between the intake and exhaust, possibly making cooling worse. Though, like you said, this case might be so terrible that it doesn't matter.

Not sure about an aftermarket cooler. I've built my own computer, but never removed an existing heatsink off a video card to replace it. If a good cooler is around $40-$50, then I might just invest in a new card like the 7770 that's efficient enough to not need anything added. I'm hoping the 7770 on load would be close to the temp of the 4850 at idle, plus more quiet.

I'll clean the PC tomorrow and recheck the temps. Then again with the case side off.

Thanks for the suggestions
Caleidascope
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#7 - 2012-10-12 01:53:42 UTC
Use GPU-z to watch your card: http://www.techpowerup.com/downloads/2173/TechPowerUp_GPU-Z_v0.6.5.html

Here is mine: http://gpuz.techpowerup.com/12/10/11/ccu.png

Life is short and dinner time is chancy

Eat dessert first!

Reiisha
#8 - 2012-10-12 11:05:03 UTC
The radeon 4000 series is known to be pretty unreliable when it comes to heat...

I'd just get the upgrade. Not worth the hassle trying to get it to work properly imho.

If you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all...

Akita T
Caldari Navy Volunteer Task Force
#9 - 2012-10-12 12:50:09 UTC  |  Edited by: Akita T
Radeon HD 4850 at stock speeds should only eat up 110W or thereabouts. That's not excessively much if you ask me. Even a factory-overclocked one should not eat much more than 150W, probably even less. Still decent.
Is your card a stock one or a factory-overclocked one ?

A decently built card with clean heatsink and fan should keep it idle at around 50C-60C tops (overclocked version should be the lower temp at idle, stock the higher one), not over 80C.
Full load temperatures should be around 70-80C for stock speed versions, 85-95C for factory-overclocked versions.
Single-client EVE should not be able to bring a 4850 to 100% GPU usage just station-spinning in FullHD even with every graphic detail turned to max, unless you forgot to select "interval one" or you have a monitor with a refresh rate well in excess of 60Hz.
Claimed thermal damage temperature level is either 120C or 130C, depending on manufacturer, so yes, I guess that's what's shutting it down.

What all this means your heatsink and/or fan is full dust and/or gunk.
You need to give it a thorough cleaning, preferably using a can of compressed air.
Even a mild cleaning done by blowing air with your mouth (or better, through a drinking straw, to better direct the air flow and keep some distance from all the dislodged dust) should help a lot already.

Or it could be that the oil (or whatever other fluid the fan bearings use) has leaked out almost completely, which is something quite likely to happen after 3-4 years of usage.
That would mean the fans are turning a LOT slower than they should, also making a lot more noise (at a certain RPM) compared to what they used to make. You probably can see that by looking at the RPM reported by the video card fans via GPU-z or a similar software, if the fans/card report it accurately.
The best way to see if that's what the real problem is (with the PC turned off and preferably also with the power mains de-plugged), is to simply turn the fans on the video card by hand or by blowing on them, see if they spin freely and easily, and keep on spinning for a while on their own. If they feel hard to move, or if they stop spinning almost instantly after you stop trying to rotate them, that's your problem.
Fixing that could be a bit trickier, since it would require removing the fans, opening their fluid seals, trying to clean the fluid residue left on the bearings (now probably mixed with dust and such) and filling it back up with mineral oil (NOT cooking oil, no way).

P.S.

Your current Radeon HD 4850 is about as powerful as a Radeon HD 7570 (actually, the Radeon HD 7570 should be slightly faster), but I doubt you can still find any 7570 for sale.

A Radeon HD 7750 should be already noticeably faster than what you have (at least 20%, up to 80% faster, allegedly), only cost about 90$, on top of consuming only a paltry 55W.

The Radeon HD 7770 will obvioulsy be a bit faster still (but not by that much according to passmark), cost from around 120$ upwards, and consuming about 80W at stock speeds. Factory-overclocked versions raise that power need quite fast.
Very few HD 7770 come with 2GB of RAM, and the only one on newegg that does costs 160$.

The Nvidia alternative for that right now would be a GTX 650 (no Ti) for about 120$ (basically same price), only about 10% slower than a HD 7770 raw performance-wise (probably still a bit slower even in EVE), consuming only 64W however at stock speeds (so a slightly factory-overclocked GTX 650 is about on par with a stock HD 7770 on power usage).
The GTX 650 however has plenty of 2GB versions, and they start from around 140$.

All of these cards use up less power than your current video card, so no new PSU should be needed.
Still, no idea how your old PSU weathered the past 3-4 years, the claimed 360W might no longer be quite so available anymore, you might be down to 310W, or even 290W, if not lower by now.
Picking a video card with a noticeably lower peak power usage than the old card might be a better idea either way.

In this specific case, it could just be that a 2GB GTX 650 might be a better choice, even if slightly above your desired budget with the 140$ pricetag.
Alternatively, go with a 1GB HD 7750 instead, only 90$ and noticeably faster than your old card, still not much slower than the 120-140$ cards.
Or, even better, clean your old video card and replace the fluid in the fan bearings. Costs you just a bit of time and dirt-cheap consumables which you might already have in the house.
Tim Maser
Sebiestor Tribe
Minmatar Republic
#10 - 2012-10-12 16:00:25 UTC  |  Edited by: Tim Maser
Thanks again for all the great advice and information. Definitely going to check out GPU-z to test the card again and fan rpm.

I ended up picking up a new card yesterday. While out of town and passed by a Fry's Electronics and took up the opportunity. The closest Fry's to home is 90 minutes away, while the only store locally is a Best Buy, bleh.

I was tempted by three choices:
GTX 560 2gb for $159 after rebate
HD 7770 1gb at $123 reduced price, no rebate
HD 7750 for around $90-$100 after rebate.

I compromised with the MSI HD 7770 OC edition. Only 20mhz over stock clock, plus double fan, yet reviews showed it to be near silent on load. I considered the HD 7750 to keep things simple, but a review showed that the single slot design was nice, the compact heatsink meant it ran slightly hotter and louder (or higher pitch) with the smaller fan.

I'm still going to run tests on the HD 4850.

Testing set-up:

  • EVE, maxed, 1920*1200. Will undock and fly towards a station, slightly zoomed, with the engine glow at it's brightest taking up part of the screen, to really push it quickly.
  • Will clear dust from the case and heatsinks (shouldn't be too bad since I cleaned it for new ram and SSD that was installed less than a year ago)
  • Attach a wattage meter to the AC outlet to monitor how much the PC draws on idle and load.
  • GPU-z to report temps and fan rpm.
  • Drivers are 11.8, so I'll update to 12.8 (I heard 12.7 was big for the 7000 series)



I'll run tests with the HD 4850, then the HD 7770, reporting watts used idle and load, temps, rpm, noise.

Wish I could move the dell into my Antec P180 case, but that's still houses a decent Core 2 Duo e6400 system that overclocks to 2.8ghz. I plan to get that system running again with Windows 8. Actually, it might be possible to move the HD 4850 into that system where the cooling is better and PSU, replacing the old x1600 pro that has a dieing fan.

BTW, I assume a newer card like the 7770 has modern AA that smooths alpha textures and what not, such as grass in games? Back in the early days when playing EVE, no matter how much AA you used, it couldn't help the flickering/aliasing on certain ships and stations using alpha textures, especially for Minmatar.