4870x2 past it ?

[rallyslag]

I have just gone from an e [email protected] to a 2500k @4.4 . I have retained my gainward 2gb 4870x2 golden sample becouse i thought it still had some life in it . But for some reason it is strugelling in games it used to be fine in .
Total war Napoleon,for example, used to play almost maxed out at 1920x1200 . Now i am getting artifacts all over the place and ocationally the whole screen just goes multi coloured and the fans are running flat out and its making a right racket..
Is this becouse as i suspect my cpu is pushing it to its limmit ,were as my e6600 had no chance off stressing it . Or have i got a fault in my system ???

 

[binaryknight]

maybe the heatsink just needs a good clean?

 

[arc@css]

If you are consistently getting artifacts then it might be on its way out. What are the temperature readings for each gpu at idle and load? A good clean might be a simple cure. Works wonders.

 

[~>Dg<~]

good card still tbh.

 

[drunkenmaster]

Still a good card, and yes, it could easily be because its being maxed further, but only because of the game you mention. Stuff like Total war are complete resource hogs, cpu included, haven't played it myself but lots of RTS's(real ones, the latest C&C's don't really count), Total war, Supreme commander, massive unit counts and calculations. Its one of the few games that a sandybridge will run it much faster in.

Its also possible that maybe you were using vsync before, and aren't at the moment, vsync will often drop performance significantly, obviously only in games that are capable of above 60fps, maybe way above 60fps.

A blast with compressed air to get rid of dust wouldn't hurt, if its in warranty though you might want to consider RMA'ing it rather than taking it apart. If its out of warranty, whip the sink off, the shroud, give it a good clean, redo the paste on the gpu and if you want, a quiet 120mm fan strapped on with the shround removed is pretty awesome at cooling the 4870x2. Not the prettiest looking mod but VERY effective, I ran a cheapo zalman fan at whatever was quiet, left the default fan attached, it never spun up unless I turned the fan too far down and it stalled

Performance wise, closish to a 5870 in a lot of games, bit further behind in more advanced dx10 using games, definately got some life in it yet.

 

[jorzeh]

Very good card still, They are nice with decent cooler.

 

[linaaslt]

my prewious cf setup was blowen away by one 6970, 4850cf coudn't keep up with my new(old) setup.

 

[rallyslag]

Thanks for the replies . I think i'll stick with it for a while and give it a cleen and redoo the thermal paste . As for the heat and cooler . It has heatpipe and fan 3 socket cooler already and never gets over higher 75c..

ps . i have just ran total war with gpuz and noticed that the gpu is running verry cool but the vram is getting hot . The card is factory overclocked which might be the problem. ?