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Does mining at 100% wear out your GPU?

B

brncao

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jan 4, 2013
Messages
231
I haven't been gaming for awhile since early January. When I'm in school, I let my GPU mine when I'm away. Now that spring break is next week, I decided to game a little. I've noticed the game is a little slow than usual. I'm worried that mining it at 100%, twice a week, is wearing it out. Can a GPU actually slow down?
 
Yes. Irreversible damage. Just quit mining and give all your coins to me for safekeeping :rolleyes:






;)
 
Using it for anything wears it out, its a matter of how fast.
Pushing it full tilt will wear it out faster, pushing it fult tilt all the time will wear it out even faster.
How hot it gets is one of the prime indicators of how quickly it is wearing out.

You can minimise the wear and tear by keeping it cooler and giving it a decent power supply.
Pay attention to anything that gets hot, GPU, VRMs and memory mainly.
Check for other points of heat with your finger once the cooling has been suitably improved.

This is one reason why I bought an Arctic Cooler Extreme III for my 290x, even though I dont mine.
It is to reduce temps/noise drastically, give me plenty of clocking headroom later in its life and so the card still functions almost like new after 3 years so I can give it away.
 
Wear doesn't typically manifest in linear loss in performance though, since you're saying it's "a little slow". Barring reduced cooling efficiency from worn fans, let's say, resulting in throttling, you'd usually go from the GPU simply working to not working if there was actual damage.

I'd say you should reinstall your drivers if anything, since repeated failed overclocks and instability can also result in reduced performance.
 
Wear results in more heat being generated for the same workload.
This is due to how silicon breaks down over time, small channels develop in the silicon between any positive voltage point and the ground lines.
(Negative rails will do the same but these arent used on GPUs)
These channels get wider over time letting more current flow, producing more heat. This happens faster the higher the voltage and/or the higher the temperature.

This sometimes means that a drop in clockspeed or raising the voltage is needed to keep it stable once it has worn enough.
Bear in mind that raising the voltage generates even more heat which can accelerate wear further, resulting in a runaway thermal load if better cooling isnt employed.
So best to save the worst issues by keeping it as cool as possible from the start.

Heat causes other issues as well.
It can dry out wet type capacitors earlier, cause premature failure of other components and heat cycling can cause failure of soldered joints (which is why the oven trick can fix many cards that die).
The larger the difference between hottest and coldest states, the more damage heat cycling does, so the hotter it gets the worse this is.
 
Nevermind. It's back to normal now. I forgot to restore the GPU clocks. I overclocked it before, but forgot to put it back. No wonder it was throttling lol.
 
GPUs either work or they don't (don't = completely dead or clearly dying by artifacting, locking up, etc.). You should really just kill this thread because all but the last couple of responses were really just trolling you.
 
Parja said:
GPUs either work or they don't (don't = completely dead or clearly dying by artifacting, locking up, etc.). You should really just kill this thread because all but the last couple of responses were really just trolling you.
Click to expand...

I was going to mention this last night but wanted to see how long it would go on, lol. What the trolls say is technically true but you're talking 100% usage 24/7 for at least 3 years straight. Last I checked, Intel processors were designed for 10 year, 100% usage 24/7/365 before failure.
 
It's funny but I thought about this before as well. I watercool my cards so the heat isn't an issue. Cards are warrantied for 3 years so I'll be running it full power all the time. If it goes out during that time, it will get RMA'ed.
 
I've never had a card die from pushing it "too hard". This despite doing things like F@H since they first supported GPUs.

Proper cooling goes a long way to keeping it that way. Undervolting cards and running them caseless helps even more.
 
Remember. Every CPU and GPU starts with a set amount of Electrons. Electrons are what make things work. Eventually, you run out of electrons and unfortunately, you can't just gas up again like a car. :) SO, SAVE YOUR ELECTRONS FOR WHEN YOU NEED THEM!
 
Then again, this is the mining subforum so we could all be a little biased. We're probably not too concerned about whether the GPU will last 5+ years as long as it makes ROI. :rolleyes:
 
noobthegreat said:
Then again, this is the mining subforum so we could all be a little biased. We're probably not too concerned about whether the GPU will last 5+ years as long as it makes ROI. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

I've been (ab)using GPUs for nearly a decade on distributed computing projects where I never personally received any benefit, so ROI wasn't even a factor until I started crypto mining. Never had a card die in a sample of 50+ GPUs (which granted is still a statistically small sample).

I wouldn't hesitate to buy any working video card with good fans at the right price.
 
metril said:
Remember. Every CPU and GPU starts with a set amount of Electrons. Electrons are what make things work. Eventually, you run out of electrons and unfortunately, you can't just gas up again like a car. :) SO, SAVE YOUR ELECTRONS FOR WHEN YOU NEED THEM!
Click to expand...

HODL YOUR ELECTRONS!
 
One of my cards changed from blue to burnt green. If that answers your question :)
 
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