AMD Sapphire 290 temperature issues

[svensonbanks]

Hello Folks!

Ive had the Sapphire 290 for just over 7 days now and beginning to think that the card has a fault. Before I decide to RMA I wanted to ask you if you can confirm my concern.

The problem that I have is the card running on high temps in idle/ 2D usage. Right now I am running Firefox, YouTube, Microsoft Office and Adobe Dreamweaver with two screens. With MSI Afterburner on the card has a temperature of 80c. To note, the PC has been on all day. Often the card remains between 48c - 55c. When I just leave the PC on but have nothing running, the card might go down and idle at 35c. Ive hardly tried the card under performance yet, I played Borderlands 2 the other day and it reached about 85c.

I have not oc'd the card, neither played around with CCC. Ive installed the latest drivers, that actually gave a slight improvement. However, I have noticed in CCC that the card often just sticks at 939mhz GPU clock. The memory clock never changes from 1250mhz. I have experienced 3-4 BSOD since owning this card.

Iv'e done a clean install of the drivers. Ive got a good airflow in the case (6 fans). Ive updated my BIOS. My previous card was a 6950 and never encountered a problem like this. I have regulated the fan speed manually in Afterburner to 35-40% however the card still goes up to 70c.

Here are some screens of the current state now:

Spoiler

My System:

i5 2500 (stock)
MSI Z68A
8GB ram
1 HDD
Win 7 64bit ultimate sp1
Antec Truepower 650

Anyone have an idea what's going on? This surely cannot be normal? Fellow 290 owners, what are your idle temps? Should I RMA the card?

Any advice is most appreciated!

 

[Martini1991]

I'm idling 48c at 20%.
Seen it as high as 58c with the heating on.

 

[spixelspixel]

Your gpu isn't downclocked so the temps might be normal, whatever program you're running may be making it kick into 3d mode.

 

[Kaapstad]

Is this something to do with running two screens?

 

[vUNREALv]

Right now my heating is on set to 20, my sapphire 290 is at 40c fan is at 24% 3 Screens connected.

Something is making your gpu clock run at max, out of interest have you tried flicking the bios switch on the card? If not I would I know they are supposed to be the exact same bios on both switches but I would try it just to be sure.

I would also uninstall ANY overclocking or monitoring program and make sure they are properly gone then check what your idle temps/gpu clock is in CCC.

 

[svensonbanks]

Your gpu isn't downclocked so the temps might be normal, whatever program you're running may be making it kick into 3d mode.

Any way to find out which program could be causing this?

Right now my heating is on set to 20, my sapphire 290 is at 40c fan is at 24% 3 Screens connected.

Something is making your gpu clock run at max, out of interest have you tried flicking the bios switch on the card? If not I would I know they are supposed to be the exact same bios on both switches but I would try it just to be sure.

I would also uninstall ANY overclocking or monitoring program and make sure they are properly gone then check what your idle temps/gpu clock is in CCC.

Yes, I have flicked the switch multiple times, no change. I will have a go at that and wipe the oc/monitoring software.

Cheers!

 

[svensonbanks]

Can it possibly be that YouTube is sending my 290 into 3D mode?

EDIT

Your gpu isn't downclocked so the temps might be normal, whatever program you're running may be making it kick into 3d mode.

Well indeed it seems that youtube/flash player is setting my GPU clock to max. Keeping it closed, the GPU downclocks to 300MHz. What a bummer! I would have never found this out by myself, regarding that I always use youtube! Glad I asked here first, hope this has solved it. Blimey, something such simple!

Thanks gents for the fast answers!

 

[vUNREALv]

Glad you have solved it.

If by any chance you are using Firefox if you go to settings you can disable hardware acceleration (I am sure other browsers let you do this also) this could help when watching youtube.

 

[Ian Evey]

Yeah a lot of google chrome windows open and watching a 1080 you tube clip causes my 670 gpu clocks to jump to 1006mhz, although the temp is only 40c its still using a lot of gpu horsepower for such simple things.

 

[spixelspixel]

Can it possibly be that YouTube is sending my 290 into 3D mode?

EDIT



Well indeed it seems that youtube/flash player is setting my GPU clock to max. Keeping it closed, the GPU downclocks to 300MHz. What a bummer! I would have never found this out by myself, regarding that I always use youtube! Glad I asked here first, hope this has solved it. Blimey, something such simple!

Thanks gents for the fast answers!

Try disable hardware acceleration in your browser, might stop it happening

 

[svensonbanks]

Glad you have solved it.

If by any chance you are using Firefox if you go to settings you can disable hardware acceleration (I am sure other browsers let you do this also) this could help when watching youtube.

Try disable hardware acceleration in your browser, might stop it happening

Bless! This does actually work! Thank you very much!

Yeah a lot of google chrome windows open and watching a 1080 you tube clip causes my 670 gpu clocks to jump to 1006mhz, although the temp is only 40c its still using a lot of gpu horsepower for such simple things.

Yes, quite astonishing! Poorly programed/optimised I would say!

 

[Jono8]

All sorts of things can make GPU's wake up/draw power/increase clocks. I thought my 670's were going wrong as all of a sudden i noticed them at 23% power draw and idling ( or so i thought) at 38 degrees ( they normally idle at 25/26 degrees).

Turned out i had a pdf open in that windows 8 app that opens pdf's in the background and that makes them clock up/draw 23% power! Soon as i closed it, everything back to normal.