Gah! Bloody Hot ATI Cards

WizZard

I can't play Oblivion on my new X1900XT as it crashes out constantly.
Plus, when it crashes it crashes my PC which means I've just lost a lot of other work

Card temp is 76C average and whilst logging it during playing Oblivion it reaches 115C, which I think is insane.
I'm going to try to reseat the stock cooler, and if that doesn't work I'll have to speed up my water plans.

I'm not a happy ATI customer, especially after defecting from nVidia

</rant>

conzy

Why not RMA the card?

X1900XTs are hot but they shouldnt not work.......

If you reseat the stock cooler it will void your warranty:(

WizZard

RMA's take too long. I'll contact Sapphire on the morrow....
If they cross ship I may RMA.

Kintarō Hattori

Most interesting indeed. When I was playing with my X800GT I never had any problems, but now that I'm using an X1800XT it's crashed out 2 or 3 times while playing it. Must be overheating, I have to check that out.

BadCharlie

eo980 wrote:

Most interesting indeed. When I was playing with my X800GT I never had any problems, but now that I'm using an X1800XT it's crashed out 2 or 3 times while playing it. Must be overheating, I have to check that out.

Oblivion just likes to crash.

But wizzards temp do look to be to high.

Cuddlesworth

I think once you go over 100c a bit high is a understatement.

conzy

Yup once you pass the thermal throttling kicks in, and thats probably whats crashing Oblivion.......

Contact Sapphire and ask them what to do......and will they replace it or if you can try reseating the card

DemonOfTheFall

Oblivion crashes a lot for me randomly.....

Could be down to XP x64 though.

riptide

Correct me if wrong but aren't GPU's absolute max junction temp 100-110! Wizzard, those temps seem too high.

conzy

Well Nvidia and ATI claim that ~130degrees is fine, but I wouldnt trust my GFX at that temperature, and im sure it would only last a few weeks/months at that temperature

gline

WizZard wrote:

Card temp is 76C average and whilst logging it during playing Oblivion it reaches 115C, which I think is insane.

</rant>

that is insane man, i wouldnt play anything until I got that sorted, even 76 is too high, there has to be something wrong there.
Im not sure if shappire are any good with rmaing.. where did you buy the card? the shop you got it in would be the best place to get an rma

WizZard

Got it from Komplett - who can be slow with RMAs
They're better if the manufacturer says it's a problem. That's why I want to contact Sapphire first.
IIRC 120C is the thermal throttling temp, but it doesn't kick in as it seems to crash before that

gline

WizZard wrote:

Got it from Komplett - who can be slow with RMAs
They're better if the manufacturer says it's a problem. That's why I want to contact Sapphire first.
IIRC 120C is the thermal throttling temp, but it doesn't kick in as it seems to crash before that

yeh if you can get an email from shappire saying that it is definitily a card fault then happy days. But shappire will just tell you to go to point of purchase for rma .. more than likely.. bottom line is, rmas take awhile and there is usually no other way of doing it

120 is melting temp , LOL

WizZard

gline wrote:

yeh if you can get an email from shappire saying that it is definitily a card fault then happy days. But shappire will just tell you to go to point of purchase for rma .. more than likely.. bottom line is, rmas take awhile and there is usually no other way of doing it

120 is melting temp , LOL

No RMA that I've ever done has taken much time. It's always been the fault of the product and I've gotten the replacement cross-shipped. Most manufacturers are happy to do this if they think you know what you're talking about.

gline

WizZard wrote:

No RMA that I've ever done has taken much time. It's always been the fault of the product and I've gotten the replacement cross-shipped. Most manufacturers are happy to do this if they think you know what you're talking about.

a lot wont do that to ireland though

WizZard

I've never gotten them cross-shipped elsewhere

gline

WizZard wrote:

I've never gotten them cross-shipped elsewhere

good for you

some of the companies ive dealt with wont even rma to ireland at all.... hence having to go through komplett and the likes

art

WizZard wrote:

I can't play Oblivion on my new X1900XT as it crashes out constantly.
Plus, when it crashes it crashes my PC which means I've just lost a lot of other work

Card temp is 76C average and whilst logging it during playing Oblivion it reaches 115C, which I think is insane.
I'm going to try to reseat the stock cooler, and if that doesn't work I'll have to speed up my water plans.

I'm not a happy ATI customer, especially after defecting from nVidia

</rant>

I have a HIS X1900XTX and play Oblivion regularly (and find it more than adequately stable so far, though I believe there is a particular problem that they are addressing with the next patch to do with unloading characters from memory which does regularly cause a crash). Anyhow, temp for me is around 45 idle/average and up at 65 playing the game .... So I think there's something definitely wrong with your setup I'm afraid, a 76 average is itself way too high...

stevenmu

Silly question I know, but have you checked that the fan is actually spinning ? I saw a post somewhere recently (OcUK forums maybe) about someone recieving a card and the fan cable was actually disconnected and tucked away under the heatsink.

savemejebus

art wrote:

I have a HIS X1900XTX... Anyhow, temp for me is around 45 idle/average and up at 65 playing the game .... So I think there's something definitely wrong with your setup I'm afraid, a 76 average is itself way too high...

Yes but thats not really a fair comparison as the HIS ati cards have an arctic silencer fitted as standard iirc

WizZard

stevenmu wrote:

Silly question I know, but have you checked that the fan is actually spinning ? I saw a post somewhere recently (OcUK forums maybe) about someone recieving a card and the fan cable was actually disconnected and tucked away under the heatsink.

Not a silly question at all. I haven't checked whilst the PC is on, but I do hear a high whine on startup which I assumed was the fan on the graphics HSF. I will check that later anyway.

I've been a bit busy lately and haven't had a chance to do much checking on this at all

WizZard

Ahaha.
Canned response from ATI:

Greetings!

Based on our experience, games issues are usually due to improper system configurations, driver issues, faulty hardware or a known issue with the game and the hardware or drivers that you are using.

First ensure your system meets the minimum requirements of the game and that you have any patches from the game vendor installed.

If your computer meets all of the system requirements, please check our Knowledge Base and the release notes of the driver you are using to see if there are any known issues or solutions for the game you are playing. If you are unable to find information on the specific problem you are having in our Knowledge Base, please check with the software vendor for any known issues or problems. If the problem persists, review the full details for trouble shooting game related issues at the link provided below:

http://www.ati.com/online/customercare/solutions/gamesrevised.html

If these suggestions don't help to resolve your issues, please respond to the ticket and one of our qualified support representatives will assist you. To respond to this ticket you must visit http://support.ati.com and login to My Support.

Thank you for choosing ATI!

art

savemejebus wrote:

Yes but thats not really a fair comparison as the HIS ati cards have an arctic silencer fitted as standard iirc

No they don't. Usually HIS use Artic Coolers alright but the cooler on the X1800XTX range is the same type across the board at the moment - or at least was when I made my purchase.

I wouldn't have commented if it wasn't relevant.

art

WizZard wrote:

Not a silly question at all. I haven't checked whilst the PC is on, but I do hear a high whine on startup which I assumed was the fan on the graphics HSF.

A high whine on start up is the fan alright, same story here. But if you are getting an idle temperature of 76, I'd expect the fan to stay at full speed and the whine thus not die away? What are you using to report the card's temperatures?

WizZard

art wrote:

A high whine on start up is the fan alright, same story here. But if you are getting an idle temperature of 76, I'd expect the fan to stay at full speed and the whine thus not die away? What are you using to report the card's temperatures?

ATI Tool. See the pic I posted.

savemejebus

art wrote:

No they don't. Usually HIS use Artic Coolers alright but the cooler on the X1800XTX range is the same type across the board at the moment - or at least was when I made my purchase.

I wouldn't have commented if it wasn't relevant.

apologies, i thought you were referring to this card

art

savemejebus wrote:

apologies, i thought you were referring to this card

Ah, no problem... I was sort of disappointed when I got my card that it was using the stock cooling setup, basically, but I was too impatient to wait to see if HIS would release the "ICE" style improvement that you've linked to. Would have been ice to have gotten that version of the card alright.

WizZard wrote:

ATI Tool. See the pic I posted.

Sorry, missed that pic... Was wondering whether ATi Tool so could be mis-reporting the temps and thus masking a different problem. (Plus, I do find when Oblivion crashes, it can crash the PC totally alright which HL2 also does this for me when it crashes, a total reset is necessary...)

Anyhow, have you compared what ATiTool is reporting to what the Catalyst Control Panel thing states?

WizZard

art wrote:

Catalyst Control Panel thing states?

I don't use it. Bloatware...urgh

art

WizZard wrote:

I don't use it. Bloatware...urgh

It is extremely bloated alright but I installed it anyhow... I thought at least until I was sure everything is set up well etc - at this stage I could probably remove it alright.

Anyhow, I've downloaded Ati Tool out of curiosity, to compare the results but Ati Tool doesn't show temperatures at all for me like in your pic (my card is unlocked btw) - everything else about that screen is identical for me, just the list of temps are missing? Do you have to do something else to get it to show up temps or something?

gline

art wrote:

It is extremely bloated alright but I installed it anyhow... I thought at least until I was sure everything is set up well etc - at this stage I could probably remove it alright.

Anyhow, I've downloaded Ati Tool out of curiosity, to compare the results but Ati Tool doesn't show temperatures at all for me like in your pic (my card is unlocked btw) - everything else about that screen is identical for me, just the list of temps are missing? Do you have to do something else to get it to show up temps or something?

yeh you have to enable temperature monitoring, cant remember where the option is exactly now though

WizZard

Well, I'm feeling embarassed. :o
stevenmu was right, the fan cable, although connected - enough for the fan to spin up loudly when power was first applied to the PC, was slightly out of the socket. Thus no fan was running during Oblivion :eek:
No wonder it reached such temps!

Thanks stevenmu