Does your graphics card have coil whine?

ltnmzh · 10 Jun 2013 at 17:33

EVGA 680 Signature2 - No (btw it's an extremely quiet card!)
MSI Cyclone II GTX550Ti - some

Kei · 10 Jun 2013 at 18:59

spixelspixel said:
My 7770 has those open coils, was considering varnishing them as I heard it can resolve it but it looks like there's already a coating of some sort on it. Almost all newer high end cards have closed coils though so there's nothing you can do.

Could you edit the post to include your power supply + motherboard.

My 6950 has enclosed coils. Adding additional varnish fixed the noise issues i was having. You can see the varnish on the coils in this image.

Added extra info to my post above.

spixelspixel · 10 Jun 2013 at 19:08

Kei said:
My 6950 has enclosed coils. Adding additional varnish fixed the noise issues i was having. You can see the varnish on the coils in this image.

Added extra info to my post above.

Interesting, any idea how the varnish helps?

This thread is hilarious http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2251088

He drilled the coils open on a brand new 670 to apply varnish. It didn't work so then covered them in glue which melted when the card heated up. All for nothing, card still whined afterwards

LtMatt · 10 Jun 2013 at 19:23

Kei said:
My 6950 has enclosed coils. Adding additional varnish fixed the noise issues i was having. You can see the varnish on the coils in this image.

Added extra info to my post above.

Blimey that paste looks older than my soiled brown and yellow poker dot y fronts.

Kei · 10 Jun 2013 at 19:29

The varnish is applied to coils as standard anyway. It acts as insulation for the wire used and it also minimises coil vibration by effectively gluing them in place.

Coil whine/hum is caused by
a) loose windings in coils, or coils that are not firmly secured in place, or
b) magnetostriction in magnetic material, or loose laminations in iron, or not fully compressed gap in pot cores. (potted coils are like those you see on most gpus) These issues can be exacerbated by mechanical resonances near the operating frequency.

I don't think extra varnish will always work. It depends whether the noise is coming from the whole thing or the coil inside. Mine must have been the whole thing as adding varnish worked.

As for that paste, that's what PK-1 looks like after just over a year of hovering between 75-93 degrees. Since watercooling the card, it's much better topping out at 56.

humbug · 10 Jun 2013 at 19:39

LtMatt said:
Blimey that paste looks older than my soiled brown and yellow poker dot y fronts.

To much information

Gregster · 10 Jun 2013 at 21:43

Sin_Chase said:
I would suggest the OP is listening with a stethoscope and does not have what 99% of the percent of the population would call coil whine....or you know.......has tinitus.

Agreed.

No coil whine here. I had it on one of my 680 Lightnings after changing the coolers for waterblocks but that soon went after a couple of hours hard benching.

spixelspixel · 10 Jun 2013 at 23:39

I'm not listening with a stethoscope and I don't have tinitus. I'm simply in a reasonable quiet room with a quiet pc. No matter what graphics card I use, immmediately after starting heaven or any game,it starts making noises that I consider coil whine. An example is posted in the OP.

It's not bad enough that I'd want to return the card, but its 100% there and noticeable. I'm not the only person who complains about this either, not sure why most people in this thread seem to think its almost nonexistant.

I've seen so many people complain of coil whine on various cards they've owned, for example

I returned 2x HIS 7970 Ghz edition for coil whine

I sent 2x HIS 7970 and a Gigglebyte back for coil whine

All my cards whine to some degree. XFX 7970. Asus DC2 7970, MSI TF3 7950, MSI TF4 GTX 660TI.The nvidia one whines the loudest. Changing from Corsair TX 750 to Seasonic X-750 didn't do anything.

We either have different opinions on what coil whine actually is or something else it at play.. but please don't make it seem like I'm crazy cause I'm not

humbug · 10 Jun 2013 at 23:44

Stop Whining, spixelspixel

spixelspixel · 10 Jun 2013 at 23:45

humbug said:
Stop Whining, spixelspixel

I can't help it.. I know what I hear

Something Else · 10 Jun 2013 at 23:59

No coil whine that I can hear same for when I had the sapphir 7850

Current system

Sapphire 7970
2500k
Asus maximus V gene z77
8gb 2133mhz viper venom ram
Seasonic x 850w

BluD · 11 Jun 2013 at 00:20

You live next door to a shop Spixel? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mosquito

spixelspixel · 11 Jun 2013 at 00:36

BluD said:
You live next door to a shop Spixel? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mosquito

Yes, the shopkeeper stands outside my window 24/7 waiting for a game to launch then switches on his mosquito device. Thanks for finally solving this.

eztiger · 11 Jun 2013 at 10:12

Yes

PowerColor HD 7950 PCS

Seasonic 500W

Had coil whine out of the box. After a few benchmark passes it's 'gone'. I'm sure it's still there but I can no longer hear it at normal seating distance.

Whether this behaviour (whine going away after a few stress tests) can be explained or not I don't know - but there it is.

So not really an issue all in all.

spoffle · 11 Jun 2013 at 10:30

spixelspixel said:
I didn't say they did, please don't take take it off topic

You did, in another thread you were aggressively telling everyone that they did have coilwhine as if it was a fact, and you weren't accepting anything but "yes I do" as being valid.

se_vietboi · 11 Jun 2013 at 10:56

spoffle said:
You did, in another thread you were aggressively telling everyone that they did have coilwhine as if it was a fact, and you weren't accepting anything but "yes I do" as being valid.

I agree with this. Spixel you said you are 100% sure every card has coil while and that you "don't believe" people who says their card has none.

spixelspixel · 11 Jun 2013 at 10:59

spoffle said:
You did, in another thread you were aggressively telling everyone that they did have coilwhine as if it was a fact, and you weren't accepting anything but "yes I do" as being valid.

I'm just going based on my own experiences and various reports I've seen from others. Pretty much everyone is telling me that I'm hearing things which I ain't and that coil whine isn't normal which I think it is (to a certain degree) I have to defend my opinion. I do accept that some people's cards don't have bad "coil whine" but it's pretty much impossible for any modern gaming card not to have it to a certain degree. The perceived loudness of it obviously is subjective like many things. Okay I'll stop rambling on now..

So yeah, nobody likes being told they're wrong so obviously arguments happen but there's no need to bring it up unnecessarily in a different thread.

esoteric · 11 Jun 2013 at 14:03

Going by that Youtube link yeah I think my 780 has coil whine even at idle. It's a consistent noise at an inconsistent frequency. I started noticing it a few days ago and when seeking out what was making the noise I traced it back to my PC. The noise it kinda sounds like blowing into a bottle. Like this creature is doing on Youtube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApdZJmjvYXk

This vid I looked at of a Titan coil whine, he's saying coil whine is the ticking, like a sound as if something was blocking the fan. Also in this vid I can hear the bottle blowing noise - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sY7af_tz4uo

NightSt@lk3r · 11 Jun 2013 at 14:15

1. NO

2. Gigabyte 7950 WF X3 - Gigabyte H55M-UD2H - Corsair HX650

3. Front 140mm 600rpm, Rear 120mm 800rpm + Corsair H100i with fans at 1000rpm.

My previous Gigabyte 7850 WF X2 never had any coil whine either.

flinco · 11 Jun 2013 at 14:23

Never experienced it on a 6800gt, 8800gts, 4850, 5770, 5870, 6950, gtx670.

Actually I have heard it once, on the first benchmark level of 3dMark, but thats just when the fps in is in the 1000's.