4870x2 Problem!

physichull · 4 Jul 2011 at 22:30

So today I come to turn my PC on and my graphics card starts buzzing quite loudly, over the course of a couple of minutes it gets worse adn worse and eventtually lets out a loud screeching noise, so I reach for my power button and turn it off.

I took the card out and gave it a blast with the air duster, checked the cables and put it back in. Turned my PC on and everything seemed OK for a while.

I noticed in CCC that the card was getting unusually hot ~50C idle with fan at 40%. After a couple more hours it starts making a buzzing sound again, not from the fan but more towards the middle of the card near the chips.

I restarted my computer, have reverted back to 10.4 drivers and restarted again. So far, no buzzes, but I think they will come back.

Is my card on its death bed? I tried running BC2 earlier and all seemed ok, didn't go over 79C and cooled down to around 45C idle.

James J · 4 Jul 2011 at 23:56

Cap squeeling? Saw your post in the pc games bit btw lol. Do you play with vsync on or off? On usually stops a cap squeel in its tracks whilst off can work the cards abit too hard for the power you actually need and cause the capacitors to make a loud squeeling noise. Hard to describe what it sounds like but its highly annoying.

physichull · 5 Jul 2011 at 00:06

It wasnt whilst playing a game, just idling on my desktop. It just making a low pitched rattling buzzing sound now. Nowhere near as bad as it was but still worried.

James J · 5 Jul 2011 at 00:10

How old is it? Doesn't sound good tbh

physichull · 5 Jul 2011 at 00:14

About two years but ive never had any trouble with it. Its a hot and sticky night tonight so i think that explains the temps so that isnt my concern. I will see how it is tomorrow on a cooler day. No real issues performance wise. It seems to go away if i turn my machine off for a minute then its good again for a few hours.

Ill see again tomorrow. Dont want to have to buy a new one as i was hoping to hold out till bf3.

James J · 5 Jul 2011 at 00:22

What PSU have you got? Might be worth monitoring the rails when when that sound starts to appear just to rule that out.

physichull · 5 Jul 2011 at 00:25

No idea how you do that. Psu seems fine. A corsair 650w tx.

James J · 5 Jul 2011 at 00:42

Most motherboard monitoring programs have a section for looking at the 3.3, 5 and 12v rails in a PSU and show you exactly what the voltage on each is. Its highly likely that theres a dodgy capacitor on the gpu itself though regardless of any other pc component.

Have you got another PC you can try the card in?

jimjam81 · 5 Jul 2011 at 09:57

I had same problem a year or so back, my 4870x2 was making a horrible hissing and whining sound, do the games shutdown after a while?

My problem was a faulty PSU, I got a replacement, it fixed the shutting down but the whining stayed. Got rid a few months later.

CPUID Hardware monitor will check your voltages, check them in game.

Jimz · 5 Jul 2011 at 10:59

I also have a 4870X2, i'm glad there is still people around with that card.

Its still a beast!

physichull · 5 Jul 2011 at 12:21

James J said:
Most motherboard monitoring programs have a section for looking at the 3.3, 5 and 12v rails in a PSU and show you exactly what the voltage on each is. Its highly likely that theres a dodgy capacitor on the gpu itself though regardless of any other pc component.

Have you got another PC you can try the card in?

jimjam81 said:
CPUID Hardware monitor will check your voltages, check them in game.

I have CPU-Z, so if load up my PC, will there be a tab in there that shows the voltage feeds from the 3.3, 5 and 12v rails? And if the numbers are lower, or change inconsistently I will know if it is a PSU fault or not?

Also, do I HAVE to do this in game or is jsut idling on the Desktop ok?

I'd be surprised if it was the PSU, from what I have read, Corsair PSU's are pretty good.

When I switched off my PC last night, I had reverted back to 10.4's because I wanted to anyway because they give me the least problems with black screen flickering in BC2, and there was no noticeable noise, other than a SLIGHT buzz, but that may have been there before, I don't know. I just don't get what has happened, it was fine 2 days ago.

I will check tonight, also, it is a lot cooler today so the temps will have reduced to mid 40's whilst idling. Thanks for the help so far anyway.

physichull · 5 Jul 2011 at 12:44

Can't really find anything on the net that has a similar problem, it isn't a high pitched squeel, its more a rattling, buzzing sort of sound. If it is gone tonight and temperatures are normal and games play fine, then I may just sweep it under the carpet as one of those things. Will check the voltages aswell but I really don't want to upgrade at this time! Was hoping to hang on a bit!

When monitoring the rails, should the values be a constant 3.3, 5 and 12v, or do they vary a bit and peak at these values, depending on whether it under load or not?

James J · 5 Jul 2011 at 15:37

physichull said:
Can't really find anything on the net that has a similar problem, it isn't a high pitched squeel, its more a rattling, buzzing sort of sound. If it is gone tonight and temperatures are normal and games play fine, then I may just sweep it under the carpet as one of those things. Will check the voltages aswell but I really don't want to upgrade at this time! Was hoping to hang on a bit!

When monitoring the rails, should the values be a constant 3.3, 5 and 12v, or do they vary a bit and peak at these values, depending on whether it under load or not?

Usually constant but you can get a very small variance either side of the mark which wouldn't cause issues. Also I know you said its not the fan earlier but have you tried putting your finger onto it to stop it whilst its making the noise to rule out ball bearing rust?

physichull · 5 Jul 2011 at 16:42

James J said:
Usually constant but you can get a very small variance either side of the mark which wouldn't cause issues. Also I know you said its not the fan earlier but have you tried putting your finger onto it to stop it whilst its making the noise to rule out ball bearing rust?

Definately not the fan, with the Saphire version the fan is on the end and blows the air through 2 heat sinks and out the back. I have reduced the fan to inaudible levels so that I could hear where exactly the buzzing was coming from and it was from the middle of the card (i.e. near the chips), inside somewhere.

physichull · 5 Jul 2011 at 17:45

Home now, had started my computer and there are no buzzing issues, so I THINK it will be ok. Can't find anywhere on CPU-Z where it will give these rail voltages you speak of though? Any pointers?

physichull · 5 Jul 2011 at 17:47

Jimz said:
I also have a 4870X2, i'm glad there is still people around with that card.

Its still a beast!

It is still a beast! Eat's pretty much anything I throw at it. Struggles a bit with Empire Total War, its hard to get all the whistles and bells on the campaign map, but its fine without. It's the only game where it totally maxes the temps!

Getting a newer card in the autumn though, upgrade time for BF3 and others, so I may be back in this forum again later on in the year to ask for more newbie help!

setter · 6 Jul 2011 at 00:32

Bit puzzling mate, the temps in game arent high, (my sli 470's will run the same on stock fan). It could be capacitors giving in, ive never owned an ati card tbh.

jimjam81 · 6 Jul 2011 at 09:44

Hiya, sorry for late reply

The program you need is HW Monitor:

http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html

Took me a while to work out it was my PSU as I remember it crashing at first in Mass Effect 2. Not straight away but like 15-20 mins of play time, in other games it could last a lot longer.

The game would freeze and the GPU fan would go into overdrive 100%, It turned out my 12v rail was running dropped to around 11.2 when playing.

Try running a game in windowed mode and see if you get the sound. My PSU at the time was a Tagan 900w. 650w PSU seems only just enough considering you have an overclock, I think a 4870x2 under load uses almost 450 watts.

Also use the below link to work out how much watts is being used by your pc.

http://extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine

physichull · 6 Jul 2011 at 10:17

jimjam81 said:
Hiya, sorry for late reply

The program you need is HW Monitor:

http://www.cpuid.com/softwares/hwmonitor.html

Took me a while to work out it was my PSU as I remember it crashing at first in Mass Effect 2. Not straight away but like 15-20 mins of play time, in other games it could last a lot longer.

The game would freeze and the GPU fan would go into overdrive 100%, It turned out my 12v rail was running dropped to around 11.2 when playing.

Try running a game in windowed mode and see if you get the sound. My PSU at the time was a Tagan 900w. 650w PSU seems only just enough considering you have an overclock, I think a 4870x2 under load uses almost 450 watts.

Also use the below link to work out how much watts is being used by your pc.

http://extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine

I should hope it was ample! OcUK pre-built it for me two years ago!!

Didn't have any trouble with it last night though and the buzzing seems to have gone, so I think it was just a scare.

Thanks for the link though, I shall run that tonight to have one final check.

Am I right in thinking that the 4870x2 is still one of the most power thirsty cards around? And that most modern day cards (apart from crossfire/SLI) use much less than the 4870x2? I've seen some power comparison charts and the 4870x2 ALWAYS comes top! I just want to make sure that when I replace it in the autumn that I have a big enough PSU (will only be running a single card).

arc@css · 6 Jul 2011 at 12:06

The 4870X2 is indeed one of the most juicy cards around, though there are some that come very, very close, e.g. the 480gtx for example.