26 réponses à ce sujet

[CMKMStephens]

Title is fairly self explanitory. It does this over two computers:

Intel 6850 Core2 3.0ghz
4GB DDR2 Ram
Asus Striker Extreme
XFX 9800GTX
750w Thermaltake PSU
XP 64-bit

AMD 940 Quad 3.2ghz
8GB DDR3 Ram
Asus m4a7t-e
HIS 4890
620w Thermaltake PSU
Windows 7 x64 Ultimate

Basically, the graphics cards overheat until something goes horribly wrong

Naturally running the game on the second computer being the superior one first, I was suprised when the whole PC turned off mid battle. Turns out that the graphics card was bloody hot, and completely dead - catatonic with no output signal. Now this graphics card was a replacement for a card that was exhibiting the aforementioned symptoms upon arrival. I RMA'd it, got the new one, and everything was fine and dandy until DO-A brutally murdered it. But that wasn't my initial supposition. Rather, I thought that the new card was in fact, just as defective as its predecessor, and Dragon Age had simply excacerbated the symptoms. So my newest computer currently has an old 7900GTO sitting in it until my RMA is processed.

So I go and foolishly install it on my other computer. Still quite good enough for any new game. Works fine for a while until bam, loose output singal. And the graphics card is extremely hot. I put two and two together and come up with the entirely resonable hypothesis that it is in fact, Dragon Age's fault. Fortunately the 9800GTX is still alive.

So, is this a known issue, or something new? Keep in mind that this is over two entirely different system setups and operating systems.

[jsachun]

Use 32 bit windows. 64bit windows is for Workstation Apps that need massive amounts of memmory.

[Gorath Alpha]

Hardware takes care of itself, with appropriate help from the system owner.  Software cannot add to or decrease the cooling capability of hardware unless it takes control of fans.  have you been misusing a product such as Rivatuner or Speedfan? 

Gorath
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[jsachun]

Gorath Alpha wrote...

Hardware takes care of itself, with appropriate help from the system owner.  Software cannot add to or decrease the cooling capability of hardware unless it takes control of fans.  have you been misusing a product such as Rivatuner or Speedfan? 

Gorath
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Not true. 64 bit apps will always add more overhead to your hardware than 32 bit. Just compare the amount of ram the two different version of the OS uses just running background services & you'll know what I mean.
Espescially when running 32 bit applications on 64bit OS. But I won't go there. 

Modifié par jsachun, 12 janvier 2010 - 01:17 .

[CMKMStephens]

Nope. And suffice to mention, I do not have such problems on anything else, including such recently released graphically intensive games as Modern Warfare 2.

[jsachun]

CMKMStephens wrote...

Nope. And suffice to mention, I do not have such problems on anything else, including such recently released graphically intensive games as Modern Warfare 2.

Well get more ram & set up Sli or Crossfire. Cause your going to need it.

[Gorath Alpha]

CMKMStephens wrote...

Nope. And suffice to mention, I do not have such problems on anything else, including such recently released graphically intensive games as Modern Warfare 2.

You are wasting everyone's time with any silly between-games comparisons.  The only such that would have any bearing would be two games using the same engine. 

I repeat, look to your poor maintenance, or non-game software interference first.   You may quite safely ignore any non-tech person's misunderstandings of 32-bit versus 64-bit OSes as being of any influence here. 

Gorath
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Modifié par Gorath Alpha, 12 janvier 2010 - 01:38 .

[generalkorrd]

Holy cow, OP does that mean I have to stop playing DA on my e8400/790i/gtx285/ddr3pc2000 system?!?!?!?1 I already have 4 complete playthroughs, working on my 5th, and no problems. You are using some kind of rivatuner type program and messing with the fans, have a poor case, or are a complete slob and let your comp get dirty. It is definitely user error, not the fault of the game.

[Gorath Alpha]

Gorath Alpha wrote...

...  maintenance, or non-game software interference first.   You may quite safely ignore any non-tech person's misunderstandings of 32-bit versus 64-bit OSes as being of any influence here. 

A couple of years ago, I copied an article on PC cooling from the NWN2 forums on Bioware's old forum site, and with apologies to the now-forgotten author, I'll post it here (was it Kiwi?)  I don't consider the question that any game ever caused physical harm to any hardware to be worth arguing about.  It's been refuted all too many times and places already.  What can happen is a pet in the house is shedding more than usual, or is a different breed, that sheds more hair and dander, period. 

Or the PC has accidentally been moved, so it is no longer able to ventilate properly.  Perhaps some fan(s) started wearing out, but quietly, without loud squealing bearings.  There are a variety of environmental changes that can be disruptive.  I will just proceed with the discussion of better cooling. 

                                                   Keeping Cool

Although this subject is covered widely all around the internet's technical web sites, I didn't start this essay with any LINKS immediately available to suggest for references.  I've added a few, after the fact  (I hope I didn't pick one that violently disagrees with anything I've written). 

Your CPU or GPU runs too hot, and the system either slows itself down or shuts off for self-protection.  What to do?  (A short treatise on how to fix it)

The game playing community uses some PC components that will run fairly hot, in its search for better game-playing performance.  These include Raptor high rpm Hard Drives, Overclocked dual core CPUs, and really super-hot-running 3D GPUs. 

If a new gamer or new system re-builder is involved in a game PC project, his/ her experience with controlling overheating may be inadequate.  There are excellent aftermarket GPU coolers available from Arctic Cooling to replace the stock heat sink/ fan combos, and some very efficient CPU coolers for those old dinosaur Intel Prescott processors that run like miniature space heaters, but you do need to know that those aftermarket parts do exist. 

Current gaming cases feature twinned 120 mm fans to move a large air volume at a lower rpm, making less noise than smaller, faster spinning fans.  The intake is in the lower front, close to the Hard Drive bays, and the exhaust is upper rear, close to the CPU (at least, on an ATX stye motherboard).  But even those won't work if dust buildup isn't controlled, if the assorted cables aren't neatly tucked away to allow free air flow, and if the case isn't allowed to sit where ordinary room air circulation can bring it cool fresh air, and allow the hot air it wants to get rid of, to move on out of the space behind the box. 

Stuffing a game PC into a narrow cabinet intended for a cool-running business PC from the last century is a quick way to kill the computer.  Crowding the back of the case too close to a wall is equally bad. 

(My edit here: many ordinary cases have a small "lip" intake at the bottom of the front that any carpet, especially thick pile, will easily block off.  To prevent this, sit the case on something that lifts it above the carpet's blocking effect, if only a piece of cardboard slightly larger all around than the case's footprint.)

Various utilities will report temperatures and allow the gamer to keep track of his efforts to control what is happening.  These include AIDA32, ATI Tools, ATI Tray Tools, Riva Tuner, SiSoft Sandra, and Speedfan.    

For any reader wanting additional cooling information, I have now done my own Google in the subject area, and some quick scans of available material.  This article appears similar in scope to mine, although somewhat more detailed: 

http://www.compukiss.../article766.htm

Here's another: http://www.smartcomp...55r04/55r04.asp

http://www.pcnineone...o/cooling1.html

http://pcworld.about...p192id52328.htm

I hope all of the links are still good! 

Gorath
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Modifié par Gorath Alpha, 12 janvier 2010 - 03:06 .

[elys]

CMKMStephens wrote....

I think it's blood magic that killed your graphic cards.

Else it's just getting unlucky with "random" hardware failures in row, or an unappropriate PC hardware setups as suggested above eventually cooking your videocards

Modifié par elys, 12 janvier 2010 - 02:38 .

[CID-78]

DA:O is a very demanding game and is likely to overheat poorly cooled systems. this will however not kill the hardware if it's in it's right conditions. it will just end your gaming experience for a while.



if the card dies and won't startup again after it had time cooling down then you also got a hardware issue.



in both cases you should look on your cooling system while cleaning your system from any built up dust.



Been there done both just to get DA:O running smoothly.

[Valaskjalf]

probably poor airflow (dust bunnies, cramped case, poor cable job) or related.

secondary would be poor power current.



btw the guy who is talking about 32-bit vs 64-bit obviously does not know anything about computer hardware or software.

[CID-78]

yeah the ony thing that will differ is that it will require more memory to save memory pointers. anything else is all about the hardware architecture. the OS won't effect that. in most cases it's the same as 32 bit or slightly better. nothing a regular user will notice however.

[CMKMStephens]

Well I'll take the somewhat unanimous advice and give both computer a thorough going over with a can of air.

But contrary to generalkorrd's post, I am not a total slob and keep my computers in a good condition, it seems peculiar that everyone is assuming otherwise in varying degrees of civility. The cable management is good but not amazing (i.e, you can still see the cables), but they are out of the way, and the airflow is good, unhindered, and bolstered by additional fans. And no, I do not have rivertuner or anything similar interfering with the fan control, it's just the Nvidia drivers (the latest) and the ATI on the other computer currently out of action. But still, a can of air might blow out some suprises.

Modifié par CMKMStephens, 13 janvier 2010 - 03:27 .

[Grammarye]

Nobody has so far mentioned v-sync as far as I can see. If you have v-sync off, your graphics card is essentially instructed to generate as many frames as possible every second, i.e. working at maximum capacity and maximum heat. If you have v-sync on, your graphics card is instructed to lock its frames to your refresh rate, which means it won't work as hard and therefore won't get as hot.

An interesting little aside to note about this is that with a typical 60Hz refresh rate, with v-sync off, you'll get roughly 60 frames a second on-screen (no matter how many the card generated) instantly presented - if the card is halfway through a frame whilst your screen is refreshing, you'll get the top half of the screen as one frame, and the bottom half of the screen as the next frame. This is classic screen tearing.

With v-sync on, you'll still only get roughly 60 frames a second on-screen, but each frame will be 'held' for the duration of the refresh. The upside: no screen tearing and much lower temperatures. The downside: if your card struggles and can't quite meet the frame rate of 60 fps at times, you'll find you get a much lower apparent frame rate, and if the game is single-threaded and thus waits for each refresh cycle in graphics before doing anything else (e.g. mouse handling) you may find the game feels a little more sluggish. It's personal preference, but I find running with v-sync on I barely notice these things.

jsachun wrote...
Use 32 bit windows. 64bit windows is for Workstation Apps that need massive amounts of memmory.

Right,
because games don't use any memory at all... A 32-bit process is limited to 2GB available address space, and a 32-bit OS is limited to roughly 3GB physical RAM. This ignores that any graphics RAM you have might well take up address space. Using a 64-bit OS for gaming is not only sensible, and considerably superior, but also entirely irrelevant to the issue of overheating...

Modifié par Grammarye, 13 janvier 2010 - 08:45 .

[jsachun]

Grammarye wrote...

Nobody has so far mentioned v-sync as far as I can see. If you have v-sync off, your graphics card is essentially instructed to generate as many frames as possible every second, i.e. working at maximum capacity and maximum heat. If you have v-sync on, your graphics card is instructed to lock its frames to your refresh rate, which means it won't work as hard and therefore won't get as hot.

An interesting little aside to note about this is that with a typical 60Hz refresh rate, with v-sync off, you'll get roughly 60 frames a second on-screen (no matter how many the card generated) instantly presented - if the card is halfway through a frame whilst your screen is refreshing, you'll get the top half of the screen as one frame, and the bottom half of the screen as the next frame. This is classic screen tearing.

With v-sync on, you'll still only get roughly 60 frames a second on-screen, but each frame will be 'held' for the duration of the refresh. The upside: no screen tearing and much lower temperatures. The downside: if your card struggles and can't quite meet the frame rate of 60 fps at times, you'll find you get a much lower apparent frame rate, and if the game is single-threaded and thus waits for each refresh cycle in graphics before doing anything else (e.g. mouse handling) you may find the game feels a little more sluggish. It's personal preference, but I find running with v-sync on I barely notice these things.

jsachun wrote...
Use 32 bit windows. 64bit windows is for Workstation Apps that need massive amounts of memmory.

Right,
because games don't use any memory at all... A 32-bit process is limited to 2GB available address space, and a 32-bit OS is limited to roughly 3GB physical RAM. This ignores that any graphics RAM you have might well take up address space. Using a 64-bit OS for gaming is not only sensible, and considerably superior, but also entirely irrelevant to the issue of overheating...

 For all you dummys out there this is how it works. 64 bit integer processing means lager data processing per cycle. More data equal more bandwidth. More bandwith eqauls more power or energy. More energy or more power equals more Heat being produced. I gave up on 64 bit OS when it was frying my $ 5000+ computer and I saw no real gain in performance. I'm glad I had fans that vaccumed my whole room though or I think I may have started a fire. 

Modifié par jsachun, 13 janvier 2010 - 09:20 .

[bradley02391]

64 bit OS makes cpu run more smother they dont overheat them or overheat the computer, most cpus are made to run 64 bit OS now days and are much better in performance wise.

[jsachun]

bradley02391 wrote...

64 bit OS makes cpu run more smother they dont overheat them or overheat the computer, most cpus are made to run 64 bit OS now days and are much better in performance wise.

So you'll telling me People Break 3D mark world record using 64bit OS & not 32Bit. If you knew anything about latency and what it means, you'd see how useless 64bit OS is without true apps that support it.

[Welnic]

jsachun wrote...
 For all you dummys out there this is how it works. 64 bit integer processing means lager data processing per cycle. More data equal more bandwidth. More bandwith eqauls more power or energy. More energy or more power equals more Heat being produced. I gave up on 64 bit OS when it was frying my $ 5000+ computer and I saw no real gain in performance. I'm glad I had fans that vaccumed my whole room though or I think I may have started a fire. 

At least you know who your target audience is for your advice.

[jsachun]

Welnic wrote...

jsachun wrote...
 For all you dummys out there this is how it works. 64 bit integer processing means lager data processing per cycle. More data equal more bandwidth. More bandwith eqauls more power or energy. More energy or more power equals more Heat being produced. I gave up on 64 bit OS when it was frying my $ 5000+ computer and I saw no real gain in performance. I'm glad I had fans that vaccumed my whole room though or I think I may have started a fire. 

At least you know who your target audience is for your advice.

So you don't agree I take it.

[Gorath Alpha]

No one will, who actually understands how the two really work.

G

Modifié par Gorath Alpha, 13 janvier 2010 - 04:19 .

[Tosheroon]

Gorath Alpha wrote...

No one will, who actually understands how the two really work.

G

Sandal might.

[Gorath Alpha]

In an ideal (virtual) world, we would have the option, as in NCIS, of popping an idiot (or idiotic act) in the head when that happened. What would be the non-flammable equivalent in a forum environment, I wonder?

[Tyrax Lightning]

Sounds like you're not under-fanned, but it still might be worth a try to run your puder on idle with your Case open to monitor your Fans & see if any have died. Some Fans die quietly rather than noisily.

I agree on the Aftermarket CPU Heatsink. Stock Coolers aren't good enough for PC Gaming, even if you're not OC. Games make CPUs have to work their bums off, & if you love your puder, you will NOT tell your puder to entrust it's life to generic Stock crud. (CPU Manufacturers need to quit wasting our purchase price on Stock Coolers & weak stuff Thermal Grease that's only worth throwing away!  They need to charge us for just the CPU, & pack just the CPU, & let US pick our own Heatsink & Grease.)

This looks unmentioned, so i'll do it. If your still using the stupid, crudtakular IDE for anything, seriously consider upgrading to SATA stuff. IDE Ribbon Cables suck. They take up large amounts of space in the case, & that also means they make your Case Fans work hard to move that air through the Case. SATA Cables on the other hand, are skinny, sleek, & easier to work with. Because they're skinny, they're almost out of Case air-flow's way, so that enables Case Fans to maintain more cooling with the same amount of energy.

That's all I can think of atm. Hope I helped. (Oh, almost forgot. I've heard of unconfirmed intel of some having success at opening their GPUs up & replacing the Thermal Grease with powerful Grease, like Arctic Cooling MX-2, & experiencing successful Graphics Card temp performance boost, but this skill is beyond my current Padawan skills, so consult a puder Yoda before attempting this.)

Edit: I accidentially caused confusion with the word 'Intel'. When I say 'Intel', I mean Intelligence, as in military terminology, not 'Intel' as in the puder company.  (I was raised by an Army dad.)

Modifié par Tyrax Lightning, 13 janvier 2010 - 06:04 .

[RinpocheSchnozberry]

CMKMStephens wrote...

Well I'll take the somewhat unanimous advice and give both computer a thorough going over with a can of air.

But contrary to generalkorrd's post, I am not a total slob and keep my computers in a good condition, it seems peculiar that everyone is assuming otherwise in varying degrees of civility. The cable management is good but not amazing (i.e, you can still see the cables), but they are out of the way, and the airflow is good, unhindered, and bolstered by additional fans. And no, I do not have rivertuner or anything similar interfering with the fan control, it's just the Nvidia drivers (the latest) and the ATI on the other computer currently out of action. But still, a can of air might blow out some suprises.

Any update? 

You could also try going naked for a little while.  Pop the cover off of your PC and maybe even point a real fan straight at it.  Not elegent, but if you can suddently play for 30-45mins or more you know you are about to get into the market for a third party card fan.