HD4870 Problems

[Fafara]

Have you checked your ram (Memtest86)? Maybe try one stick or the other?

What about other components? (list?)

Is this Memtest86 safe? will it collapse my computer just like Furmark did?

 

[Schmide]

No very safe. Just reading and writing values. Barely heats the CPU.

 

[evolucion8]

Memtest will only seek for memory errors, but I recommend you to reapply thermal paste. My brother in law had the same issue with his HD 3870 fan spinning fast and crashing due to high temperatures. Earlier sapphire models were notoriously high in temperatures and cooling issues, specially with the HD 4870 which with newer yields, the power consumption and heat dissipation lowered considerably. That's why an HD 4870 1GB will consume less power than an HD 4870 512MB, odd eh?

 

[Schmide]

(evolucion8) It's a powercolor? I'd still eliminate other factors before ripping the HSF off.

 

[evolucion8]

The HD 3870 with the issue was Visiontek, the higher idle and power consumptions with the HD 4870 were common with Sapphire and most other SKU's based on the 512MB of that card since usually Sapphire is the first releasing ATi cards which also sell to other companies.

 

[Tanas]

In May 2009 i bought a brand-new the HD4870, it worked fine until last month when my problems started. The said problem (supposedly) is overheating, i've heard things about the HD4870 having issues with heat, being it's minimum "idle" temperature 70°C, some say it can handle up to 120°C without breaking, but i don't believe that.

Anyway, when i am playing a game (e.g. Counter Strike Source) the game crashes (together with the sound that freezes as well making it unbearable to hear), but it doesn't crash to the desktop, it actually (in a way) turns off the computer but not completely, the monitor fades out and my HD4870 becomes REALLY noisy, it looks like the fan is roughly spinning at 100%.

After that i started to run the game with Everest open to watch the temps, my VGA's temp easily go up to 80°C while playing, which by default (as everyone says) shouldn't be a problem... but it is.

So, basically, the computer fades out, the VGA starts to spin really really fast and becomes really noisy, the sound freezes (like repeatedly playing the last fraction of second of the last sound played) and i have to shut the computer off by unplugging it.

Do any of you know what's causing it? do i have to buy another one?[

Thanks.

My friend....eah 4870....its like im reading my own story........Like you,I had bought eah 4070(512 vram)too (except yours on the picture has completely different cooling system than mine,which is completly stock(watch photo).)Its vent stopped spinning all of the sudden,problem was that i didnt notice Smartdoc wasnt running at that time(i use ony smartdoc to manage gpo vent),so the chip went bye-bye(before i find out what was happening it got overheated,coz i was noob at these things).....Went to the store,and waited 2! months (without the substitute card)for the new one...One year later,one day my card started to sound like the blades of the GPO vent are grinding the friggin heatsink.But now i had smart doc running and it alarms me at 90 degrees...so i opened the box and saw that the vent is spinning poorly,while in Smartdoctor it shows 100%(have it like so coz of heat issues,rather loud than sorry .I shut it down,cleaned it thoroughly(Heatsink,fan,etc...i didnt remove the sink and replace the paste coz i still have warranty..)hooked it back in (properly),and the sound still was horrendus ,but it worked and still cooled the proc. on about 70-80 degrees on load...)Now a week ago I start the computer,and when it got to the desktop i notice the quietness and check the smartdoc. just to be sure,and-VOILA!vent wasn't spinning at all,and the temperature rised to alarmingly 105c degrees,so i shut it down,and gave it another try 5 min later but the darn thing wasnt spinning,so i gave it a little push and slowly it started to spin at 50-60% so now every time i start my computer i have to MANUALLY push the vent blades a couple of times for them to start spinning....I mean its sad...THE FRIGGIN SAME THING IS HAPPENING AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!.And i dont even ever play any graphicly demanding games(DoTA WC3),I do music for christ sake.Even the stock cooler should handle the temperatures.I've read plenty of post,where ppl had to replace them under warranty coz of same issues.Ive even heard somewhere that this stock cooling system is really poor at cooling such a powerful card,so now at asus they are trying to cover it with some kind of reducting drivers and bios changes that reducts the clockspeeds and such etc....(at least what i heard im definetly not an expert on these things)...One thing is certain..The cooling is very,VERY poor,the fan is even poorer,so i would strongly advise to NOT TO BUY BELOW SHOWED GRAPHIC CARD...So tomorrow as we speak im taking this piece oh s..t back to store and demand some nvidia card or something.......Sorry for such long post,but I'M ANGRY!!!!!!!!

hope the picture link works

 

[3DVagabond]

My friend....eah 4870....its like im reading my own story........Like you,I had bought eah 4070(512 vram)too (except yours on the picture has completely different cooling system than mine,which is completly stock(watch photo).)Its vent stopped spinning all of the sudden,problem was that i didnt notice Smartdoc wasnt running at that time(i use ony smartdoc to manage gpo vent),so the chip went bye-bye(before i find out what was happening it got overheated,coz i was noob at these things).....Went to the store,and waited 2! months (without the substitute card)for the new one...One year later,one day my card started to sound like the blades of the GPO vent are grinding the friggin heatsink.But now i had smart doc running and it alarms me at 90 degrees...so i opened the box and saw that the vent is spinning poorly,while in Smartdoctor it shows 100%(have it like so coz of heat issues,rather loud than sorry .I shut it down,cleaned it thoroughly(Heatsink,fan,etc...i didnt remove the sink and replace the paste coz i still have warranty..)hooked it back in (properly),and the sound still was horrendus ,but it worked and still cooled the proc. on about 70-80 degrees on load...)Now a week ago I start the computer,and when it got to the desktop i notice the quietness and check the smartdoc. just to be sure,and-VOILA!vent wasn't spinning at all,and the temperature rised to alarmingly 105c degrees,so i shut it down,and gave it another try 5 min later but the darn thing wasnt spinning,so i gave it a little push and slowly it started to spin at 50-60% so now every time i start my computer i have to MANUALLY push the vent blades a couple of times for them to start spinning....I mean its sad...THE FRIGGIN SAME THING IS HAPPENING AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!.And i dont even ever play any graphicly demanding games(DoTA WC3),I do music for christ sake.Even the stock cooler should handle the temperatures.I've read plenty of post,where ppl had to replace them under warranty coz of same issues.Ive even heard somewhere that this stock cooling system is really poor at cooling such a powerful card,so now at asus they are trying to cover it with some kind of reducting drivers and bios changes that reducts the clockspeeds and such etc....(at least what i heard im definetly not an expert on these things)...One thing is certain..The cooling is very,VERY poor,the fan is even poorer,so i would strongly advise to NOT TO BUY BELOW SHOWED GRAPHIC CARD...So tomorrow as we speak im taking this piece oh s..t back to store and demand some nvidia card or something.......Sorry for such long post,but I'M ANGRY!!!!!!!!

It sounds like a bad fan bearing. Possibly, running it at 100% constantly made it die an early death. One would think it would be designed to be able to handle that, but it's not really surprising. I would try for another replacement. I wouldn't expect the retailer to take it back though, Especially running it in a non-stock configuration, and I wouldn't continue running it like it is. One day the fan is going to stop and it's going to go Chernobyl, like your last one.