Graphics Card frying itself?!

S

Silent Ricochet

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Feb 15, 2008
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So I'm playing STALKER, I'm in the middle of a battle and then boom! My PC crashes. Then it says I have no Input Signal, so I knew right away it was a video card problem. Well The PC finally starts up and I read the minidump file to see that the problem was "ati2mag.sys" or something like that. Thinking it was a driver, I checked the ATI website for a new driver, 8.2 came out last month, I checked the ATI Control Center for my driver version and to my surprise my Graphics card was at 63*C....

Ok here's the deal folks. It's like 60*F in my room right now. I have both windows open, and the fan going. All the fans on my PC are working just fine. Usually when I start up my Computer it my Graphics Card usually idles at a cool 43*C and under load, barely gets above 53*C. Why the hell was it 63???? So I scan for viruses, clean the registry and all that and then install the new drivers. I restart my PC and check my temps again to see my graphics card had cooled down quite quickly to 52*C which is fine I guess.

So i go back to Stalker and play for maybe 10-15 minutes. I save and quit STALKER to go to dinner, and just to cure my curiosity, thinking the temperature thing was just a fluke, I checked my Graphics Card Temperature again. 70 FREGIN DEGREES CELCIUS?!WTF!? So I shut down my pc and let it cool off for a bit and eat my dinner and come back. The Card right now is idling at 52*C again when it shouldn't be that high in the first place, I'm not gaming. I checked upon startup to see if my GPU heatsink was working. It's spinning just fine....

So I got two questions.

* Is there a program (stable one) that can show me my GPU's Fan Speed?
* What could be causing this if the heatsink is working fine??!



HALP! What should I do!

Graphics Card: Sapphire ATI Radeon x1950 PRO
 
Try RivaTuner, also, have you dusted out your PC really good lately? Back when I had my 7800GTX's they were getting very hot just at idle, I had a layer of dust going across the hear sink, after 5 min. with a can of air I was good to go.
 
Are you 100% sure that there is no dust clogging the air in/out ports on the gfx card heatsink?
Some dont let you see inside so you might have to disassemble the heatsink to check.

If thats not the problem, a refresh of the heatsink paste might be all it needs.
 
Nenu said:
Are you 100% sure that there is no dust clogging the air in/out ports on the gfx card heatsink?
Some dont let you see inside so you might have to disassemble the heatsink to check.
Click to expand...

The fan is spinning fine. I dusted it out a month ago and from what I saw it's relatively clean and free of dust. The air that's being pushed fro the heatsink is coming out of the sides instead of the bottom of the fan. Is that normal?
 
If it gives you any idea, I have to clean the filters on my case fans atleast once a week because dust builds up.
 
lol, yep that might not help :)
Does the fan actually spin when it registers 0 RPM?
That might be a faulty or missing sensor.
 
Nenu said:
lol, yep that might not help :)
Does the fan actually spin when it registers 0 RPM?
That might be a faulty or missing sensor.
Click to expand...

Yes the fan's actually spinning.

I'm looking at Speedfan Right now and I'm having trouble understanding what all the "Temp#" things are.

Temp1: 40C (according to the BIOS this is most likely the "SYSTEM temperature)
Temp2: 56C (might be the Graphics Card?, I'm not sure)
Temp3: 46C (not sure what this is)
HD0: 32C <-- Hard Drive
Core: 44C <--CPU
 
Use the cards driver or rivatuner to monitor GPU temp.
 
Strange.. Could the rpm monitoring possibly been damaged or faulty as Nenu suggested? Fan spins, yet it doesn't show the rpms... Also, do you notice if the fans speed up as you are gaming? If not, then it's probably the reason why your temps are higher than it originally should have been.

Might want to try a quick fix, like adding a 120mm fan near it, to blow cool air to the card. Something of which a friend of mine uses ^^
 
I was gonna buy another fan (80mm is the only one that fits) but it blows directly at the GPU so i'll be getting that ASAP.

I've re-wired my PC so that there isn't more than two fans or devices on each 12V rail. I've also let my PC cool off for a bit and i pull a little bit of dust out of the Heatsink. The PC started up just fine and the GPU temperature was at 44C which is great! Except it began to steadily rise seconds after start up and idled around 49C. I performed a video Test on CounterStrike Source and i checked my GPU temperature to see it at 58C. 2 Minutes on the old source engine shouldn't raise the GPU 10 Degrees Celsius. There's definitely something wrong.

The thing is right after I'm done gaming, the temperature drops drastically and stays at 52C.... I just don't get it... I'm thinking its the Heatsink, but what would cause these sudden problems? And If I were to buy a new heatsink (which I already have one picked out) how do I install those?
 
49C at idle is fine.
58C and quite a bit higher at load is fine.

tbh 70C at load is fine, I decided to help a bit because your idle temps were a little high.
Looking good now but seriously get all the dust out of that heatsink !!
You said this earlier
I dusted it out a month ago and from what I saw it's relatively clean and free of dust.
Click to expand...

It seems that it wasnt free of dust after all ;)
There is no problem now.

ps to install a new heatsink, I read the instructions.
 
lol thanks, I'm running out after school tomorrow and picking up a big old can of compressed air and cleaning out my entire PC. if all else fails I'll buy a new heatsink if that is the problem ofcoarse...

Should I get a new heatsink or send the Card back for a refund / another card?
 
Try changing the heatsink paste on the GPU, chances are its gone a bit stale and doesnt conduct heat as well as it used to.
Also the newer pastes like MX-2 are much better.
 
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