GTX 970's rear V-ram chips and heat.

[P39Airacobra]

I have never saw anything more insane in my life! How could they just leave those V-Ram chips on the back of most 970's with nothing to cool them? They get hot enough to burn you. It's no wonder some people report issues with crashes sometimes, I would say that might be why. So far my card is doing very well, It is a EVGA 970 SC ACX 2.0, You know the one with the cooler that EVGA was too cheap to use a heatplate for proper contact to the GM204 chip and heat pipes. I love this cards performance. And I honestly feel this is the best GPU I have ever owned. But does anyone else think the backside V-Ram Chips will eventually become burnt on these cards? Or is it normal to let them get that hot?

 

[yh125d]

More 970 models don't have a backplate than do. If you're not overclocking memory a lot they're not needed, and if you are you should buy a model that does have one. I don't really see any reason to doubt the manufacturers designs.

Why is this bothering you so much?

 

[RaulF]

Uuuuh i can run with this one.


Have you seen Titan X? From what i have read is even more "insane" than the 970.

 

[happy medium]

But does anyone else think the backside V-Ram Chips will eventually become burnt on these cards?

I thought that was the last 500mb of memory thats slow and not used much? J/K

 

[P39Airacobra]

More 970 models don't have a backplate than do. If you're not overclocking memory a lot they're not needed, and if you are you should buy a model that does have one. I don't really see any reason to doubt the manufacturers designs.

Why is this bothering you so much?

Because I have a 970 in my rig. (I wish people would actually read the posts) And I noticed it when I had my side panel open, First I noticed there was the usual normal heat, And I was not concerned about that since all my other GPU's did that, My old 5850 would really get warm too. But I was curious how hot the V_ram chip was, And I touched it gently and it was hot. I just don't want it to burn up on me.

 

[happy medium]

And I touched it gently and it was hot.

SO your saying your gpu was just sitting idle and you touched a ram chip and it burnt your finger? or you were gaming opened up the case touched a ram chip and it burnt your finger? or it was hot but didn't burn your finger in either case?

edit: hows your case airflow?

 

[96Firebird]

Touching something that is 70°C is going to feel hot.

 

[yh125d]

Because I have a 970 in my rig. (I wish people would actually read the posts) And I noticed it when I had my side panel open, First I noticed there was the usual normal heat, And I was not concerned about that since all my other GPU's did that, My old 5850 would really get warm too. But I was curious how hot the V_ram chip was, And I touched it gently and it was hot. I just don't want it to burn up on me.

Hot to your finger does not mean hot to electronics. As so many 970s do NOT have backplates, I am confident that they are not required, and would not worry about it one bit.

 

[LTC8K6]

A chip case at 51C will give your finger a 2nd degree burn in 2 minutes, yet we don't consider 51C hot for a chip.

At 55C the burn will occur in 17 seconds...

At 60C it's 3 seconds...two more seconds and it's a 3rd degree burn...

 

[Zstream]

I had multiple video cards with the same problem. They all experienced issues until I added my own backplate. I will never buy a video card without a proper after-market cooler.

Oh... they do burn your finger. It's not warm/hot, it's scorching!

 

[kasakka]

Backplates often have no cooling effect anyway and are there mostly to keep the card from bending under the cooler or just for looks.

970 is fine without backplates.

 

[imaheadcase]

Everything inside a PC is hot, that is just what heat does. My motherboard chipset will burn you, gpu side will burn you, heat sink near base will burn you.

Hell, i remember my old X-Fi soundcard chip on top would burn you.

 

[flexy]

The MEMORY chips on those cards (EVGA SC ACX2.0) is *not* a problem, believe me If you really want to know where the fun is with those cards, it's the VRMs... those little suckers:

Let's just say, the ACX2.0 cooler especially with the default fan curve....is not exactly the "best" cooler out there....

For your memory chips, you can always get their backplate...not that I think you would gain anything from it but at least THAT would be covered (oh, the pun...) if you think memory temps is a problem.

And: SIDE VENT in case.....140mm fan right onto the card...

 

[poohbear]

The G1 gaming has a backplate. But then again it's vram is over clocked to the limit!

 

[futurefields]

didn't even bother to put the backplate on my EVGA 970 SSC ACX 2.0+

temps never go above 65 with a simple fan curve

 

[ShintaiDK]

A chip case at 51C will give your finger a 2nd degree burn in 2 minutes, yet we don't consider 51C hot for a chip.

At 55C the burn will occur in 17 seconds...

At 60C it's 3 seconds...two more seconds and it's a 3rd degree burn...

Super info. Pretty much shows the fault of using the "human compare" to chips.

 

[StrangerGuy]

Hot to your finger does not mean hot to electronics. As so many 970s do NOT have backplates, I am confident that they are not required, and would not worry about it one bit.

Yeah, what do those stupid EEs know about when designing a video card.

 

[P39Airacobra]

Ok I was just worried about how hot they got, I would hate to have the thing mess up after all the money I paid for it, This is the most money I have spent on a GPU since the ATI 5850, And I owned nothing but cheap GPU's after that until I got this one. So to me this is allot of money to loose on a part. Thanks for the answers, Maybe later I can just put some ramsinks on them so it won't bother me as much. I love the thing and have enjoyed it so far. This is the first time in a long time I have been able to max games and actually see 60fps. And Witcher 3 has been fun too.

 

[futurefields]

Don't worry about it man, that's why we have product warranties. You have a new EVGA card right? 3 year warranty?

They will take care of you if it breaks.

 

[IEC]

Silly.

VRAM cooling is generally the last thing you need to worry about with GDDR5.