ATI 4850 Sizzling Hot

C

Cool1Net6

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 21, 2008
Messages
299
I have a very [H]ot card...

I have a stock ATI Radeon 4850, single-slot card. I am not a big gamer and it is perfect for my setup as it allows me to play what I like; DiRT 2, TF2, SC2 Beta, Plants vs Zombies & other indie games. When I got it, ATI stupidly made it idle at 80C so I got Riva Tuner, set a custom fan speed control, and got the card to chill at 58-60C Idle and 76-80C Load. This was February.

Towards the end of April, the temperature is literately running away from me. Idle was up to 63C, then 66C, and now as I type this it is at 69C. Under load, it goes up to as high as 98C, and thats just on the menu of StarCraft II Beta. I had to take the side of my case off and get a small blower fan to blow air directly onto the entire card to cool it back down to the temps I used to see just 2 months ago, and even then load is up to 83C.

Is there anything I can do to give this card a chill pill? Its hot like that Iceland volcano.

GPU-Z Info
Riva Tuner Statistical Data
Blower Fan w/ AA Battery Size Comparison

-Cool-
 
Single slot Radeon 4850... That's what I have and it was HOTTT. Here's what I did to take care of it until i got a new cooler. First I got an updated bios that scales the fan properly with the card's temperature. I have flashed over 20 different bios's from different vendors to my reference Sapphire 4850. Here is one I recommend.

http://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/18123/ATI.HD4850.512.080702.html

There are 2 ways of adjusting fan speed. This bios uses the more traditional method of adjusting speed, scaling almost linearly as the temperature goes up. If you get a bios editor then you can choose the other method, which is the one you are currently using, which revs up the fan only when it hits a certain temperature.

You should adjust your 2D clocks to be closer to http://www.techpowerup.com/vgabios/17152/Sapphire.HD4850.512.080605.html that bios. that will give you much cooler idle temperatures, and will rev up properly in 3D.

I could edit a bios for you to your perfect temperature scaling desires, but flashing any bios is at your own risk. I'm not responsible if you screw it up.

If you dont want to deal with a bios flash then get an after market cooler. The zalman VF900 is great on mine but a VF1000 is way better. Also, an arctic cooling accelero is a great choice. all the zalman coolers run extremely quiet even on the highest fan settings.

This is what you should do. Clean out the dust in the card. Dont bother with new thermal paste. In the end its a waste of effort until you get a new cooler. After you clean out the dust, run the fan at 100% and see how high your temps get under load. When we know how bad the temps are at 100% we can really determine what you need.
 
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just flash the ASUS TOP 4850 vbios for the card, get some compressed air, disassemble the cooler, clean/blow it out, put some decent paste on the gpu and your card will be running cooler than before, that's what I did, no need for an aftermarket cooler as long as you clean it out every few months...
 
Accelero S1 V2 from svc.com - cheaper than newegg.com by a couple $.
 
A program like MSI Afterburner (works with all cards not just MSI) will allow you to set a custom fan curve that will increase your fan speed gradually as the temperature increases without having to make any bios modifications. The stock coolers are plenty capable of keeping the card cool as long as you don't mind a bit of noise.
 
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