Excellent performance, too much heat - help needed please!

[astheoceansblue]

Excellent performance, too much heat - help needed please!

My machine:

i5 2500k@4.1ghz
Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro
Zotac GTX 670 Amp Ed
8gig Corsair Vengeance
Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD5
OCZ 90GB Agility 3 SSD
OCZ ZS Series 750W
Coolermaster case (I don't have the model number handy)
Lots of fans.

Firstly, let me say this:
My machine can run BF3 MP on High with 60FPS and it sits around 70 degrees.
Every single game I've ever played on this gets either max or close to max at 1080 with 60fps and 70 degress or so.

My case isn't the greatest, but it has decent airflow, two fans sucking two pulling, I have a large room fan that oscillates and pushes warm air away from my pc.

My PC is dusted regularly (it was done this evening!)

I've never had an issue with overheating before.

-

The Witcher 2
Ultra with everything max @1080 I get 30-40fps.
Turn off ubersampling and I get 60fps, but temps are high (average 75-85).
The problem is, no matter what I turn down/off, the temps don't change.
Even if I run everything low/off at 720, my GPU will hit temps of around 75-85 pretty consistently.

I get no kind of slowdown, no stutter at all, ultra smooth play on everything from low-high settings, no visual queue that there's an issue, just the heat.

I just finished fighting the Kayran, and it was lucky I was monitoring my temps, because on high settings my GPU hit 98 degrees and I could smell the heat.

I quickly shut it down, took manual control of the fan and cranked it up, turned off the most demanding settings (SSAO, AA, etc...).

90-93 Degrees.

I let my card cool off then dropped everything to low @1080 and tried again.

85-90 Degrees, lightly better, but still in the danger zone and still far too hot for the settings and my hardware.

Turning down the resolution to 720 and everything low/off was the only way I managed to defeat the boss, and I had to put it on easy (playing hard for my first run) so the battle would be over quickly and I wouldn't risk burning my card.

Even at these settings, temps reached 90 degrees.

As soon as the boss was downed, they began to drop, but I've done some testing since and, no matter where I set the video options the game is constantly hitting 75-80 degrees.

No other game gives me this problem.

-

This game is amazing, so far it's easily my favourite action RPG since Mass Effect 2. However, I'm considering shelving the thing for fear it's going to permanently damage my machine unless I constantly monitor temps - which ruins the immersion quite a bit.

I've googled this and a few people are having the issue, but most responses seem to be "get better cooling", "maintain your hardware better", etc..

The thing is, I know how to maintain my pc, and all benchmarks and performances in other applications and games are perfectly acceptable.

Does this sound like an issue with the game itself? Is there anything that can be done?

The fact that the temps hit the 80s even on lowest settings - and that no other application gives me anything close to this issue - leads me to believe it's not a fault my end, but I'm perfectly willing to accept it might be if anyone has any bright ideas?

I'm really hoping I can enjoy the rest of this game without the worry.
Thanks very much.

 

[GuyNwah]

75 to 85C isn't that bad for this game, no matter what you see in others. This game has a different engine and works differently. It could be used as a GPU torture test. The reason is, it runs the GPU at 100% load the whole time it's in 3D mode.

If you hit 95C on the GPU, I might be worried. 97C is the maximum operating temperature. But if it doesn't cross 85C, you're doing quite well.

If that's still bothersome for you, check the GPU fan profile. I like using the fan profile tool in MSI Afterburner; YMMV. You can set it so that it reaches, say, 90% at 75C and 100% at 80C.

But in general, this game runs GPUs HOT.

 

[astheoceansblue]

Thanks for the reply.

75-85 would 't bother me if:

A. That were the peak.
B. when I turned down to low it didn't stress it with the same temps as high.

I can understand this game is hard on our machines, but not that the temps are exactly the same regardless if my graphical settings.

Should I really be getting 80 degrees on the hardware listed above at 720 or less and everything set to lowest?

I use afterburner, I was testing with the fan settings set at 80%. I will try setting the profile as you suggest, but I still don't see why I'm getting the exact same temps regardless if my settings...

 

[GuyNwah]

The GPU load imposed by the engine is not dependent on resolution or eye candy settings. Turning down your resolution from, say, 1080 to 720 won't change it. It will change the frame rate instead; the engine will render frames that much faster instead of backing off on the GPU load.

Enabling Vsync, which indirectly limits the frame rate, is one way to slow the game down. Others have used this in cases where the GPU could not be run at 100% continuously.

(For the overcurious:

The power consumed by a CMOS integrated circuit (which virtually all modern chips are) is given by (there's also leakage power, but switching power dominates it):

P = C v^2 f

where C is the capacitance of the gates that are switching, v is the voltage across the transistors, and f is the clock frequency.

Since v and f don't change for any given mode of GPU operation (ignoring "turbo" clock modes and voltage boost modes for now), power is proportional to the gates that are switched on each clock; that is, the load on the GPU. To reduce power, you must reduce the load. The Red Engine in TW2 doesn't reduce the load at lower resolution.)

 

[astheoceansblue]

So there's no setting I can use to pull back on the gpu load at all? The game will constantly thrash my gpu regardless of visual strings?

And the engine is geared for 3D mode, so it will push your GPU to get maximum frames regardless of settings?

If I'm understanding this, is there no way to stop it from trying?

Apologies if I'm misunderstanding this.

I can live with 85 as the peak, that's not a problem, my worry is moments like the Kayran that push my card to dangerous temps. 98 is not acceptable.

Are there any moments further into the game that are as intensive?

Thanks.

 

[GuyNwah]

Yes, that's about right. The game does not have a frame rate limiting feature, at least none that I've ever seen.

Turn on Vsync, and make sure your fan profile reaches 100% at or before 95C. If you're using the FCR 2 mod, make sure you are up to date (FCR 2 1.1), since FCR 2 is even harder on the GPU than the base game.

 

[yandownie]

mine runs at 95c and sounds like a jet taxying down the runway .nvidia 460gtx btw warms the room up nicely in the winter though

 

[astheoceansblue]

I've managed to get it down to 65-75 with peaks of 84. Fan profiles and using a powerful room fan to increase airflow around my case. I've got everything maxed aside from ubersampling as that's the only option that drops me below 60fps, and lowest settings produces the same heat...

I think the ambient room temperatures were part of the problem last night, it was pretty hot here. Also, that Kayran fight seems to be responsible for many GPU issues, some users report their cards being damage beyond repair within seconds.

I do appreciate how well this game runs at the high end, but scaling down graphics should decrease the load and temps. We should have had that option, I hope the devs pay attention to feedback like this for TW3.

 

[tommy5761]

Also ensure that your case fans are moving the air appropriately . There have been at least 1 user said that his fans were installed backwards .