4870 temps

[Bergkamp]

Just got my 4870 yesterday and I'm wondering about what temperature the card feels it should be idling at.

At the moment if I put the fan on 100% and cool it down to lower than 60C, as soon as I put automatic back on it drops the fan speed to under 10% and lets the card heat up to around 67C before it stabilises it by putting the fan to around 23%.

I know I can set it manually to keep it cooler but why would the card be happy to have itself idle at 67C?

 

[Bergkamp]

Load temperatures are ranging high 70s to mid 80s and the fan sets itself to 67% and never seems to go much higher than that. Not too worried 'cos the temps are within range, but I'm just curious why it seems happy to leave the idle temperature so high.

The temps are probably higher cos I had to put in a new power supply and it has a lot more spare leads than my old one and the case is somewhat crowded. Also, the gfx card doesn't vent the air out the back.

 

[Bergkamp]

Looks like the ambient temperature in the case is just a bit too high, but I suppose these things will happen when you dare upgrade a Dell system.

Anyway, does anybody have one of those cheap system exhausts? Do they actually have any impact? They're only a few quid so I'll try anyway though it'd be good to know what to expect.