I Am Sick and Tired of Overheating

[KaiserElectric]

Okay, so I have my computer here. It's a Vista with GeForce GTS 250 and it was recently replaced because my old card broke from overheating. The card has an extra fan installed as well, in addition to the stock fan is still there.

And it's f***ing happening again.
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Less than a month after I got it, every game I try to play (with the exception of Civ 5) crashes and shuts down within twenty minutes of gameplay. I know for certain this is an overheating problem, and I had my PC fixed so the air flow will direct hot air away from the card at the same time I got it. Needless to say, it didn't work.

I need some help. No one who I've worked with has fixed this problem, and I'm not throwing away money to replace another video card until it melts in my PC again.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

Is the computer in a place with a lot of airflow. Dont shove it up against a wall is what I mean. Its not good to have fans blowing hot air out if theres nowhere for the air to go. And Open a window.. That helps a lot.

What speeds does the fan run at? You may want to make it go faster with the Speedfan or other utility?

 

[Genocidicbunny]

When was the last time you cleaned out the dust?

Also, dont automatically assume its an overheating problem. Until you check the actual temperatures, you cant say anything for certain.

For that, get Real Temp, Riva Tuner or Speedfan (the first two are better for GPU temps)

 

[KaiserElectric]

When was the last time you cleaned out the dust?

Yesterday.

Also, dont automatically assume its an overheating problem. Until you check the actual temperatures, you can't say anything for certain.

For that, get Real Temp, Riva Tuner or Speedfan (the first two are better for GPU temps)

I'm trying out Real Temp just to confirm. It's currently idle at around 39 degrees. I'll play a game for a bit to test it out.

 

[tokala]

As important as the temps would be how and if the fan speed is reacting when running a game.

 

[KaiserElectric]

Okay I just crashed my computer again running a game, so I can't get temperatures. But the card does feel physicly hot.

The fan speed doesn't change ingame.

Another thing is that the games ran without crashing before when I put a fan blowing into the computer. I haven't tried it now, though.

Does anyone know how to fix this problem instead of finding out what it is?

 

[tokala]

The fan speed doesn't change ingame.

That's a really bad sign, unless it's running at fairly high speed to begin with. The 250 is a pretty powerhungry card, and the reference design has the fan running almost at max speed to keep it from overheating when running demanding applications.

Edit: For fixing it it will be useful to first find out what exactly is going wrong

If you don't have a tool that came with you video card for manually adjusting the fan speed, you can use rivatuner for that.http://downloads.guru3d.com/RivaTuner-v2.24c-download-163.html

If you still get crashes at 100% fan speed, then you have a defective card. If it's working, you can try to adjust the fan speed so that the GPU temperature stays at 80-85°C during gaming, that's safe for a GPU chip and should keep the noise down abit.

 

[Zelig]

FWIW, you can also use nvidia system tools for gpu temps and fan control, it integrates into the nvidia control panel.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

Okay I just crashed my computer again running a game, so I can't get temperatures. But the card does feel physicly hot.

The fan speed doesn't change ingame.

Another thing is that the games ran without crashing before when I put a fan blowing into the computer. I haven't tried it now, though.

Does anyone know how to fix this problem instead of finding out what it is?

You really need to get the temps. Play in a window and leave RealTemp running in the taskbar (with the GPU temp displayed). Check up on it every once in a while. Also, the card will feel physically hot even at idle temps. 39 degrees is in C, not F, which is quite warm. Just feeling it doesnt tell you anything.

The fact that the fan speed doesnt change could be a bad or good thing. Bad is that its not sensing the temperature changes and not spinning up, or its just broken. Good is that the card is not running hot enough to speed up the fan.

Lastly, you need to find out what the problem is before you try to go fixing it. You think thats its overheating, but its quite possible that its the chipset getting too hot, not the GPU. Or one of a million things (Increased usage means higher power draw which could lead to a crash if the PSU can't deal with it)

If you still get crashes at 100% fan speed, then you have a defective card. If it's working, you can try to adjust the fan speed so that the GPU temperature stays at 80-85°C during gaming, that's safe for a GPU chip and should keep the noise down abit.

You can't assume that. There are just too many variables. Once the OP gets some temperature readings, we can move on. Until then, I don't advise saying "well, its defective for sure" -- you dont have all the info.

 

[Fëanor]

Get and run FurMark, see if the temperatures shoot up to the automatic shutdown level.

But considering you had trouble with your last video card you might want to double check if the remainder of the hardware is not to blame for the crashes (for example your PSU could very well be whats to blame).

To stress test the CPU i use Prime95 in combination with a CPU temperature monitoring utility like CoreTemp

 

[AlphaShard]

I have a question that I think relates. Would getting a PCI/AGP/PCI-E video card generate more or less heat then an integrated graphics card in the motherboard?

 

[tokala]

Generally they produce more heat, but they usually also have better cooling systems to cope with it.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

I have a question that I think relates. Would getting a PCI/AGP/PCI-E video card generate more or less heat then an integrated graphics card in the motherboard?

They will generate more heat as they are not designed to be run on a passive chipset cooling system. This generally limits what kind of GPU you can stick in a chipset to the lowest of the low-end.

A dedicated GPU will have an appropriate cooling system to deal with the extra heat, so overall, you should not notice a major rise in temperatures of your PC.

 

[Zelig]

They will generate more heat as they are not designed to be run on a passive chipset cooling system. This generally limits what kind of GPU you can stick in a chipset to the lowest of the low-end.

A dedicated GPU will have an appropriate cooling system to deal with the extra heat, so overall, you should not notice a major rise in temperatures of your PC.

Well, any low end cards are going to have single slot coolers that don't exhaust any of the heat produced from the PC, so they will raise the temperatures of the PC.

 

[Genocidicbunny]

Which is why I added 'major' in there. As long as you have a proper amount of case fans (At least a pair of in-out fans) then the different wont be anything to worry about.