Question about my new GTX570: fan speeds and overclocking

[theraker007]

Hello everyone. I recently built a new rig and everything's been great. My only concern has been my GPU temps.

When I boot up, my GPU runs at 39C or so until I start playing a game, while gaming the temps typically get into the mid to upper 60s and rarely it hits 75C (mostly when playing witcher 2 only for some reason). The weird thing I noticed was that when I finish playing games, the card cools down a bit but never returns to the pregame temps, it always stays at 60C until I turn the computer off and on again. It couldn't figure out why it was doing that.

I happened to look in the nvidia control panel and stumbled on the device settings tab where it showed that my cooling was on automatic control at 44%. So I changed it to manual control and pumped it up to 85% which was the max and instantly my GPU temps went down to 50C which is a pretty significant improvement.

SO my questions are basically:

1) Is it safe to keep it on manual at 85% indefinitely, or should I just leave it on automatic and stop worrying about the 60C idle temps.

2) If I buy a third case fan (which I plan on doing tomorrow) and mount it to the side of the case which is directly parallel to the GPU, can I overclock the video card at all? Also, what increments should I use for the graphics clock, memory clock and processor clock when overclocking?

3) For the side case fan, should I have it blow air onto the card, or out of the case?

Thanks

 

[happy medium]

#2 yes use 10mhz increments and MSI afterburner program.
#3 a side case fan will help alot and it should blow air onto the card inward.

I think your problem is case airflow.

What kind of case is it?

 

[cusideabelincoln]

The card temps should return to near pre-game levels of 39C after you exit a game. If they are not then it sounds like the card isn't downclocking and undervolting like it should when it's at idle. 60C is a long way from 39C, if you get 39C at idle before gaming you should be in the 40s after gaming.

You might try software to manually set clocks and fanspeeds. MSI Afterburner comes to mind, and you can create different profiles for 3D load and idle.

 

[happy medium]

Take the side of your case off and try it.

 

[theraker007]

Ok i got msi afterburner and set up some user defined parameters (mainly 70% or so above 60C and max above 65C). so we'll see how that helps. It is still weird though that the card isnt completely cooling off when I stop games.. yet if I restart my computer, I went from 54 at shutdown to immediately 44 on reboot

And the case is the coolermaster HAF 912 http://www.amazon.com/Cooler-Master-...2261457&sr=8-2

 

[cusideabelincoln]

Use afterburner to monitor your clockspeeds. I bet your clockspeeds aren't returning to pre-game clockspeeds.

 

[theraker007]

I'm assuiming fan tachometer is what you're referring to? It was 3870 RPM when I exited the game and it slowed to 2850, which is what it was also at when I rebooted to check. This time, I did notice post-game temperatures drop back into the 40s.. maybe the fan controls are optimized now

 

[Grooveriding]

Do you have more than one monitor ?

 

[theraker007]

no just one

 

[theraker007]

Afterburner definitely fixed it, I'm idling at 44C now after 20min of mass effect 2.. thanks guys! Am now ready to proceed with the extra fan and overclocking!

 

[Crap Daddy]

It is still high for idle. What brand is your card? I see definitely the card not downclocking. Check in afterburner your clocks at idle. I get 33C on idle with an EVGA 570 SC fan at 40%

 

[cusideabelincoln]

I'm assuiming fan tachometer is what you're referring to? It was 3870 RPM when I exited the game and it slowed to 2850, which is what it was also at when I rebooted to check. This time, I did notice post-game temperatures drop back into the 40s.. maybe the fan controls are optimized now

No I was referring to the core, shader, and memory clockspeeds. They go down then the card in idle and go to the advertised speeds when running a game, then go back down when you exit the game. If they ran at their advertised speeds all the time then you would see higher temps at idle.

With Afterburner you can force it to run different clockspeeds at idle and at load.

 

[theraker007]

ohhh ok. I have an EVGA.

Here are the speeds at boot:
Core Clock: 732
Shader Clock: 1464
Memory Clock: 1900


After 10 minutes of Mass Effect 2: Just noted the clock speeds are exactly the same.. they appear locked. But since I adjust the fans which were clearly locked too low, the game GPU temp is 56C, that's about 17C cooler than it was running yesterday. It also dropped down to 43C when the game stopped, started at 39C, pretty close this time.

I do not know enough about GPU overclocking to start tinkering on my own, any tips with regard to clock speeds?

 

[96Firebird]

ohhh ok. I have an EVGA.

Here are the speeds at boot:
Core Clock: 732
Shader Clock: 1464
Memory Clock: 1900


After 10 minutes of Mass Effect 2: Just noted the clock speeds are exactly the same.. they appear locked. But since I adjust the fans which were clearly locked too low, the game GPU temp is 56C, that's about 17C cooler than it was running yesterday.

What are the clock speeds when the GPU is idle? They should jump down considerably, if everything is correct.

I don't think 39C idle is bad, a lot of factors such as case ventilation and ambient temps can effect idle temps.

 

[theraker007]

What are the clock speeds when the GPU is idle? They should jump down considerably, if everything is correct.

I don't think 39C idle is bad, a lot of factors such as case ventilation and ambient temps can effect idle temps.

edit: I am mistaken, I was looking at wrong thing.. let me do this again

 

[theraker007]

yeah I just checked.. they all go right back to starting points. That's working properly.

 

[96Firebird]

Looks normal to me. Although I think your before game data is wrong, as the shader clock is always 2x the core clock. But I think if you move everything up one row, it matches the after data.

 

[Crap Daddy]

Check your clocks at idle man, that meaqns when you're not doing anything, just open the afterburner and read. They should be 51 core, 101 shader and 135 memory. That's what I have when I'm typing this and the temp is 34C with fan at 40%. Is that what you get?

 

[theraker007]

Check your clocks at idle man, that meaqns when you're not doing anything, just open the afterburner and read. They should be 51 core, 101 shader and 135 memory. That's what I have when I'm typing this and the temp is 34C with fan at 40%. Is that what you get?

For the record I added in a side case fan just now, first boot up using it, here is what I have idle:

GPU Temp: 34C
Fan speed: 53%
Core clock: 51
Shader clock: 101
Memory clock: 135
Memory usage: 90

---------------------------------

30 minutes of Mass Effect 2 and I get:


GPU Temp: 53C
Fan speed: 63%
Core clock: 732
Shader clock: 1464
Memory clock: 1900
Memory usage: 484


-----------------------------------

5 minutes after exiting game:

GPU Temp: 37C
Fan speed: 53%
Core clock: 51
Shader clock: 101
Memory clock: 135
Memory usage: 93



==================


So it's resetting back to normal properly for sure. Now, how do I go about overclocking this thing appropriately? I have never had a GPU powerful enough to OC before, and now I think I have the appropriate cooling to do so.

 

[theraker007]

Interesting.. I just finished up maybe 2 hrs of playing mass effect and I noticed this time my GPU temps stayed at 50C again.. so I looked and the suspicion you guys had earlier seems to be true now. The clock speeds are all the same as they were while in game, they did not go back down to idle speeds.

I am sure that there are no remaining processes running that would cause them to stay on without reason.

What would cause my video card to do this now when it wasn't before? And how do I fix it? I am not sure how to set custom speeds.

 

[happy medium]

Interesting.. I just finished up maybe 2 hrs of playing mass effect and I noticed this time my GPU temps stayed at 50C again.. so I looked and the suspicion you guys had earlier seems to be true now. The clock speeds are all the same as they were while in game, they did not go back down to idle speeds.

I am sure that there are no remaining processes running that would cause them to stay on without reason.

What would cause my video card to do this now when it wasn't before? And how do I fix it? I am not sure how to set custom speeds.

Now I believe that is a driver problem.

Try different drivers

 

[theraker007]

I have the latest drivers installed.. ill try the beta ones

 

[theraker007]

well for whatever reason the beta drivers make afterburner display all 0s for the clock. but I can still watch the temps, they came down appropriately at least for this time.. I'll keep an eye on it throughout the day.

 

[theraker007]

Update: something is definitely off and I can't figure out what.

If I click and drag my google chrome window wildly around the screen even for 2 seconds, I instantly get maxed out clock spikes. It is reproducible.

I have NO idea what to do now :'(

 

[DirkGently1]

Update: something is definitely off and I can't figure out what.

If I click and drag my google chrome window wildly around the screen even for 2 seconds, I instantly get maxed out clock spikes. It is reproducible.

I have NO idea what to do now :'(

That's normal. Card sounds fine to me so just use it and enjoy.