The New GPU 'Merry Christmas' Thread

[LtMatt]

Hi matt ~50-55% fan speed is enough to keep these cards at the rated clock speed. Some things that may be of use. (Most you probably know akready but just incase)

94deg = rated clock
95deg = lower clock

The cards can hit the rated clock at 94deg provided the fan speed has some head room.

My settings for 1 card were:
90deg target
70% max fan.
Its important for powertune to know that it has some fan speed to play with.
Although at these settings the fan will sitt around the 50-55% it wont get near 70% mark in bf4 and will be at the rated clock speed.

I would be wary reducing the core voltage for gaming as the memory voltage seems tied to it and as you found out can cause instability/blackscreen.

With 2 cards you might have a small difference but I did not use a custom fan profile as i didnt need it.

Basically with a custom fan profile if your max fan speed in powertune is still 55 it could be causing a drop in clocks . As even though you have set your fan to increase via afterburner powertune will not be aware of this.
Hope some of this is of help.

See I set mine to 90% in CCC with a max fan speed of 55%.
It hit 94/95ºC, the fan got to about 36% and the cards throttled. Now as far as I'm aware 55 is not the same as 36, but didn't stop it throttling.
I'm not having a go at you, simply that in my experience the default behaviour doesn't prevent throttling and it starts throttling before the fan gets to it's upper limit. Which to me means the system is broken.

I just tried that and i got the same as GM. Fan speed 70% target temp 90C. Temps was 88c and fan speed was 40% and as soon as it go to 90c it was throttling and fan speed was around 43%.

No problem im just giving some info of my experiencd and what caused conflicts with powertune. Powertune and afterburner dont seem to work well together. Snd sometimes even though the power limit says +50% in afterburner it could be 0 in powertune.

Yes this could be the issue. However id rather use afterburner and lower voltage than use CCC and use a higher fan speed.

 

[K1LaW8tt5]

I just tried that and i got the same as GM. Fan speed 70% target temp 90C. Temps was 88c and fan speed was 40% and as soon as it go to 90c it was throttling and fan speed was around 43%.



Yes this could be the issue. However id rather use afterburner and lower voltage than use CCC and use a higher fan speed.

What happens when you set the max fan speed to 100%? your powertune settings dont seem to be sticking or something is up.

 

[LtMatt]

What happens when you set the max fan speed to 100%? your powertune settings dont seem to be sticking or something is up.

Likely afterburner interfering as i said above, can't do without afterburner though im afraid.

 

[LtMatt]

These are the best settings ive come up with so far.

I've under clocked my core a bit to match a typical 290. I've lowered core voltage as much as is stable without causing a black screen. I've lowered
Aux voltage as much as possible. It won't stick at -100 or -94 so -87 will have to do. I'd really like to get fan speed down to 55% max, but currently i don't think its possible unless i don't mind a bit of throttling after playing bf4 for a while. There is a hot spot on the side of my case that causes gpu1 to heat up about 3-6c more than gpu2 after playing for a while. If i could do something about that then i would't have this problem. Not sure what else i can do apart from remove the side of my case though, which i don't want to do.

 

[Zuma]

maybe you should just watercool it and not have to bother with fan profiles again

 

[Orangey]

You can't use CCC and AB together, gotta use AB by itself. I've never touched CCC except to disable xfire for mining.

 

[LtMatt]

-0.062mv wasn't quite stable, had to increase it to 0.056v. The game was stable but the desktop started to flicker every now and then. The voltage bump stopped that. So this is 11 minutes of BF4 with vsync off 1440P highest settings, fps 80-150, Dragon Pass map, 64 cq large. 55% max fan speed kicking in at 75c.

 

[Nickolp1974]

Nice cards matt, please tell me your lowering volts due to your psu??

 

[LtMatt]

Nice cards matt, please tell me your lowering volts due to your psu??

Want lower temps, slower fan speed. Stock is plenty of fps for my gaming needs. Tbh a stock 7990 was plenty but you know how it is.


@Googaly, heres the heaven bench. Just pipped you.

Spoiler

 

[GoogalyMoogaly]

@Googaly, heres the heaven bench. Just pipped you.

Spoiler

Yeah, I saw, not 'just' about it!
Quite a difference, I wonder if that's the 28MHz OC on the cards or the extra 500MHz on the CPU doing that (or both)?
Or maybe drivers?

I'm running Win7 too, which I think is supposed to help isn't it?

 

[LtMatt]

Yeah, I saw, not 'just' about it!
Quite a difference, I wonder if that's the 28MHz OC on the cards or the extra 500MHz on the CPU doing that (or both)?
Or maybe drivers?

I'm running Win7 too, which I think is supposed to help isn't it?

Not that much difference tbh 150 points or so. Likely for the reasons you mentioned. Unigine prefers W7 for sure over W8.

 

[LtMatt]

Think ive found my perfect stock settings for 290 Pro crossfire. 45 minutes of BF4 and temps peaked at 90C on gpu1 and 86c on gpu2 and stayed there with gpu1 sometimes dropping down to 89c. NO THROTTLING!

 

[GoogalyMoogaly]

I know it's fine for these cards, but 90ºC always seems too hot for my liking.
Guess I just need to change my thinking a bit...

Out of interest, with those voltage adjustments, what voltages are you running now?

 

[LtMatt]

I know it's fine for these cards, but 90ºC always seems too hot for my liking.
Guess I just need to change my thinking a bit...

Out of interest, with those voltage adjustments, what voltages are you running now?

I had no problems running my 7990 at 85c so an extra 5c is no biggie for the extra horsepower of a 290. As long as it stays at 94c or lower then i know it won't throttle. I'm going to add a spot cool fan to my system as my 600t case has a hot spot around gpu1 on the side of the case. I think with a spot cool fan around that area (exact position to be placed currently unknown) i will bring gpu1 down 2-3c and give me a bit more wiggle room while keeping the fan fairly quiet. Hopefully i can get the fan down to 55% with some more tweaking, though i think ill need the spot cool fan to achieve this. If i was limiting fps or using vsync my temps would be much lower to be fair. Its pretty hot in the room at the moment, so much so i had to remove clothing so this is a good start.

EDIT

Not 100% on the voltages, around 1.066v-1.144v.

 

[GoogalyMoogaly]

I really do think it's a pity the PowerTune 2.0 or whatever it is doesn't work as I'd expect.
If I could set it to have a target temperature of 85 or 90ºC and set the max fan speed to be 50/55/60% (or even higher) and have it get 85ºC and then increase the fan to keep it there, WITHOUT throttling, then that would be ideal. A temperature I'm happy with and running as quiet as it can do without me needing to figure out a fan curve.

 

[Zuma]

You'll need to sort out better cooling before next summer. 1 extra degree of ambient temp equals 1 extra degree of gpu temp. And you don't have many degrees to spare

 

[LtMatt]

You'll need to sort out better cooling before next summer. 1 extra degree of ambient temp equals 1 extra degree of gpu temp. And you don't have many degrees to spare

Its summer temps in the room right now.

I really do think it's a pity the PowerTune 2.0 or whatever it is doesn't work as I'd expect.
If I could set it to have a target temperature of 85 or 90ºC and set the max fan speed to be 50/55/60% (or even higher) and have it get 85ºC and then increase the fan to keep it there, WITHOUT throttling, then that would be ideal. A temperature I'm happy with and running as quiet as it can do without me needing to figure out a fan curve.

Driver seem pretty immature at the moment tbh. I'd expect things to get better over the coming months.

 

[pgi947]

I had no problems running my 7990 at 85c so an extra 5c is no biggie for the extra horsepower of a 290. As long as it stays at 94c or lower then i know it won't throttle. I'm going to add a spot cool fan to my system as my 600t case has a hot spot around gpu1 on the side of the case. I think with a spot cool fan around that area (exact position to be placed currently unknown) i will bring gpu1 down 2-3c and give me a bit more wiggle room while keeping the fan fairly quiet. Hopefully i can get the fan down to 55% with some more tweaking, though i think ill need the spot cool fan to achieve this. If i was limiting fps or using vsync my temps would be much lower to be fair. Its pretty hot in the room at the moment, so much so i had to remove clothing so this is a good start.

EDIT

Not 100% on the voltages, around 1.066v-1.144v.

It not be a better idea to bang a 230mm spectre pro or a few 120mm's on the side panel of the case?

 

[LtMatt]

It not be a better idea to bang a 230mm spectre pro or a few 120mm's on the side panel of the case?

I already have 4x120mm side intake fans as pictured here. They're setup as exhaust in the pic, but ive since changed them round and stuck a dust filter on them from DMCflex.

The red lines mark the hot areas of the case. They are not burning to the touch but there is a little pocket of hot air that builds up here. I have removed all spare pci-brackets but not much more i can do without a spot fan.

Check out this pic of a 290 and you see the problem.

The 290 dumps a bit of heat in the case. I have a positive pressure going on which obviously helps as the air gets naturally pushed out. Still if i get a spot fan on this hot area i believe temps will lower even further.

EDIT

I have considered trying to block that area off with tape or something to force all the heat to come out the rear of the card.

 

[Zuma]

As an experiment I would try putting the lower side fans on intake and the upper one on exhaust. It sounds a bit silly and I have no reason to think it would work but for the effort it would take I would try it