Hot XFX 6970

[leper84]

I'm at wits end here. Here is what I have-

960T/212+ (stock clocked & locked), sabertooth 990fx, gskill 1333 4x4gb, corsair gs600 +12v 48A

I (stupidly) traded my perfectly working twin frozr 560ti + cash for a reference xfx 6970. I was using a coolermaster centurion 534 and temps were stupid high- 60c idle, 95c+ load (metro 2033 bench). So I figure I need more air and go get a HAF 922.

Temps were great- 30-40c idle, 80c-ish load. Then I decided to try and use the asus autoclock crap in uefi and everything crashes getting into windows. System restore won't work, so I redo everything.

Now the g****mn thing is back to idling at 60c and 95c+ at load. If I force 100% fan it refuses to go under 50c.

The power supply has a single 12v rail and using OCCT powersupply test and a multimeter the thing refused to back down from 12.4 vdc; so I think that is good.

OS is Win 7 64bit updated all the way. Drivers are directly from AMD.

Is it possible the guy before me just overclocked the living d**k out of this card and its leaky and about to die? Basically, could this be a software/bios/whatever issue, or should I just find an excuse for 7950?

 

[RavenSEAL]

Yeah, sounds like the card just got wrecked by the last owner. Did you get a double lifetime warranty transferred?

Also, I would go in and replace the thermal paste.

 

[leper84]

Previous owner never registered the card so I'm s.o.l. on the warranty.

Edit: Derp, forgot two screws.

Also turns out this is one of the infamous xfx revision cards with no bios switch and cheaper parts... so not surprising its crapping out....

 

[RavenSEAL]

Yeah, then going in and replacing the thermal paste with something non-conductive while re-positioning the heatsink is your best option.

Shouldn't be too difficult...check YouTube and see if anyone posted any tutorials/dis-assemblies.

 

[leper84]

Yeah last time I took a cooler off was a gts 240.... but I figured it out after awhile.

Second try was able to get idle temps down to 40c and load around 80ish, forcing a fan profile with afterburner I'm able to keep it around 70c. Tim was a good idea, had some as5 laying around doing nothing anyways.

Silver lining I've got it overclocked at 950/1450 @ stock voltage, did 15 runs of metro 2033 bench with no artifacts, crash or anything; gonna do some occt or furmark to make sure

Is there any way/program to overclock it higher? CCC and afterburner stop where I'm at.