Graphics Card

[Shinkotetsu]

Got a quick question about a little problem my Desktop is having with, what I think to be graphical difficulties. My PC is 2006, purchased 2 months ago, and the card is "ATI RADEON CrossFire Edition X1950 512MB GDDR4 PCI Express Graphics Card". I've noticed that lately, within the past week or so, while playing graphic heavy games such as Half Life 2, CS:S, S.T.A.L.K.E.R, there are timed periods, about every 10 or 12 minuets, where I will experience very noticeable slow down, about 25-30 fps to be exact, for a timed period of 8-10 seconds. I would just like to know if it could be the card, or the PC getting hot (which it does, I've got it out in the open with good air flow). If it's getting hot would purchasing faster fans, or a cooling system help the problem or would I need to replace the card? I know it could be a number of things, but if it's the card, I'm not really looking to forking out the cash for it again.

[Diablo]

Something that regular would make me think its your heat and your CPU or GPU throttling down.

[Ether]

I'll need you to check your PC fan speed/temperatures and record (screenshot) at two different times; one in game and one out of game. I personally use everest home addition but if you have preferences then by all means use your own.

[plasma06]

what psu do you have i think when its getting hot its busting the power to the fan and maby is not getting enough power

[Deryck]

Originally Posted by Shinkotetsu

Got a quick question about a little problem my Desktop is having with, what I think to be graphical difficulties. My PC is 2006, purchased 2 months ago, and the card is "ATI RADEON CrossFire Edition X1950 512MB GDDR4 PCI Express Graphics Card". I've noticed that lately, within the past week or so, while playing graphic heavy games such as Half Life 2, CS:S, S.T.A.L.K.E.R, there are timed periods, about every 10 or 12 minuets, where I will experience very noticeable slow down, about 25-30 fps to be exact, for a timed period of 8-10 seconds. I would just like to know if it could be the card, or the PC getting hot (which it does, I've got it out in the open with good air flow). If it's getting hot would purchasing faster fans, or a cooling system help the problem or would I need to replace the card? I know it could be a number of things, but if it's the card, I'm not really looking to forking out the cash for it again.

Try taking the side panel off and playing with it like that for a bit. If that fixes your problem then it was most likely your video card overheating. Fixing that, may require just buying higher RPM fans. Try checking and playing around with the side panel on/off or putting a fan in front of it while the side panel is off. If that works, check out Newegg.com for some better fans or even a better computer case that has better air flow.

I had a problem with cooling, where my computer would randomly shut itself down after 15-20 minutes of playing any game. Found out that it was caused by poor air flow and crappy fans. Purchased a Thermaltake Armor case, and haven't had a problem with over-heating everything stays nice and cool.

[Shinkotetsu]

psu: BFG 800-Watt ATX CPU Power Supply

motherboard: MSI K9A Platinum Socket AM2 ATI CrossFire Radeon Xpress 3200 ATX AMD Motherboard

Ether, I'll get the info on the fan speeds soon. A friend of mine said the fan on the graphics card might not be good enough ... all thought I dont exactly know how to fix that problem without replacing the card. Hoping it is the cooling, I'll try taking off the side pannel, Deryck, and seeing how it runs.

[Mark]

The card is just fine. It's probably cooling. Take some pictures of inside of your case so we can see the layout/wiring job/fan placement. Or describe it to us. I'm guessing it's overheating too.

[Diablo]

Make sure the fan on the GPU is running my last Radeon card fried itself because of a dead fan died the morning my replacement card came in.

[Irythros]

Alot of the ATI cards have fans that are way to small to support high-end gaming. I blew through 2 Radeons in 1 year due to the fan, and my brother had the same thing happen. If possible, get a temp. reading on the GPU. If its over 70 celsius then its a cooling problem.

If its between 30-52 you should run fine. 52-60 will be minor lag issues due to the core slowing. 60+ will kill gameplay. My BFG Nvidia geforce 7800 256 OC runs Stalker on nearly all low settings around 55 celsius.

Another problem may be if you run anti-virus progs while playing games, even if its like Nortons passive protection.
Stalker also kills vid cards if you goto a place like the freedom base and farm the people and start making piles of bodies+weps due to physics.

[Shinkotetsu]

This weekend, July 6th, I'll be testing new cooling methods. I'll be purchasing faster fans this week, three to be exact. The front of the case has a fan near the bottom with a mesh screen in front of it which needs cleaning every now and then, that sucks air in, and there are 2 rather larger, not huge, but rather large, (I'll get exact dimensions this weekend) fan slots in the back that are both currently occupied by some off brand I don't recognize. The internal set up has the motherboard pretty much alone in the center side of the case, just under the psu. The ONLY thing that slightly covers the mother board are the hard drive and cd tray slots, but I would say by about 2cm tops, and between the initial mother board and the closest sideing of the slots, there is enough room for me to get my whole hand between the two. The case it self is rather large, width to be more exact, and tall. It's a full metal case, no parts are plastic except for certian connections for fans and such. It's a custom case, I wanna say ATX, but when I bought the case I don't recall seeing any name brand on it.

[skimike]

Any given temperature isn't necessarily a problem provided it is within specs for your component. My pair of 8800GTX cards run at 80C each under full load which is well within the specifications of the card. You need to run something that logs all the thermals for your PC as you're playing. I believe SpeedFan will do this for you. Check out Intel's Thermal Analysis Tool (Intel TAT). Both CPU and video card are designed to throttle performance if a certain thermal envelope is exceeded. You need to identify which is responsible, if either. This does not sound like a PSU issue. Have you updated all your drivers? Do you have any virus/malware detection software installed? Do you notice any unusual hard drive activity during the slow-downs? Take the side panel off your case and have a fan blowing into it at an angle and see if the problem still occurs. Measure precisely the intervals and duration of each incident. If it is too precise, then it's more likely something kicking off in software on a schedule than it is a thermal issue.