Radeon 5970 Overclocking: The VRM Temperature Bottleneck

[safan80]

This was posted in the review thread days ago 11-26
http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...239127&page=16

people have added their own screen shots 1, 2, etc to the mix including VRM temps under EK full cover block.

Anybody who has owned a 4870x2, 9800gx2, or 295 can tell you about crazy vrm temps.

[trinibwoy]

That's interesting. It's hard to imagine they weren't aware of this issue given how aggressively they marketed the overclocking abilities of the beast.

[cowie]

true^ what was the rush to get it out?

[Eastcoasthandle]

People who buy the 5970 are obviously enthusiast consumers and most enthusiast are going to OC this card. Now while I agree not everyone is going to run OCCT/Furmark repeatedly, these temp problems will show up in highly stressful games (Crysis/Dirt 2/GRID/etc)

That is mere speculation at this point because Crysis/Dirt 2/Grid/etc wasn't use, only furmark is used. Which is why he said what he said. And IMO he's right. Please don't make assumptions as we all know that those games will not stress the card like furmark does.

[Sly Fox]

People who buy the 5970 are obviously enthusiast consumers and most enthusiast are going to OC this card. Now while I agree not everyone is going to run OCCT/Furmark repeatedly, these temp problems will show up in highly stressful games (Crysis/Dirt 2/GRID/etc)

I doubt most people who buy top-end cards are enthusiasts per say. AFAIK most customers of gaming cards are still just gamers with cash to burn.

Just because everyone on XS thinks OC'ing is old news doesn't mean your typical gamer does.

*Edit* Although you are certainly right in assuming that more people will OC a high-end card than a low-end, I'd say that's probably true.

But OC'ing really is still taboo to most people. Even my friends whose rigs I've built for them won't let me show them how to OC. They just seem to think it's more dangerous than it is.

[Frontl1ne]

I'm sick of people complaining about stock coolers not able to cool their overclocks. Why is it called a stock cooler? cause it cools stock speeds.

Exactly... You don't go complain to Intel that you can't hit 4GHz on an E8400 because their stock cooler is holding it back. You don't go demand they design a better than what is required heatsink to cool the CPU at it's stock speed either.

The 5970 is designed to run at its stock speed, just like any other PC component. You want better overclocks, go and get an aftermarket cooler.

[LiberalElephant]

Exactly... You don't go complain to Intel that you can't hit 4GHz on an E8400 because their stock cooler is holding it back. You don't go demand they design a better than what is required heatsink to cool the CPU at it's stock speed either.

The 5970 is designed to run at its stock speed, just like any other PC component. You want better overclocks, go and get an aftermarket cooler.

LOL I want my E8400 to run at 5GHz on the stock cooler!

On a serious note, I would normally agree with the stock cooler comment, except that ATI marketed this thing as an overclocking beast. If they hadn't praised its monster OC capability I would be in the "buy your own aftermarket cooler and shut up" crowd.

[initialised]

hahaha Ledhed still talking about ur 295..i find that hilarious..also i find it hilarious that nvidia still has nothing and is getting crushed by the 5 series while you sit and try to pick it apart..

Not so, I've done plenty of systems with GTX295s and I find them to run cooler. The central fan design of the GTX295 MK2 provides roughly equal airflow to both cards with on venting at the rear and the other venting into the case potentially limiting the CPU/FSB/RAM OC in cases with restricted airflow. Similarly the MK1 GTX295 cools both GPUs equally albeit less effectively than the MK2.

I would normally agree with the stock cooler comment, except that ATI marketed this thing as an overclocking beast. If they hadn't praised its monster OC capability I would be in the "buy your own aftermarket cooler and shut up" crowd.

True and in most cases (prolonged GPGPU crunching excluded) it will be just fine, the scenario with games may be similar to the DX9-10 transition where once "stable" clocks had to be reigned in for DX10 apps. If it is a problem expect blocks from XSPC and EK shortly which should help and expect Powercolour to do an LCS with an EK as soon as it it able/allowed like they did with 4890 & 5870.

[safan80]

2 285s beat a 295... now if there were more 5900s in stock.

[dan7777]

2 285s beat a 295... now if there were more 5900s in stock.

295 still eats through any game maxed well... mine does roll on fermi next year they will take back the crown im sure...

[safan80]

295 still eats through any game maxed well... mine does roll on fermi next year they will take back the crown im sure...

Not at my res.

[jaredpace]

yeah a 295 chokes on 50% of games on a 30", and more if you use lots of AA

[initialised]

295 still eats through any game maxed well... mine does roll on fermi next year they will take back the crown im sure...

Is that why nVidia are pulling out of PC gaming and going for the GPGPU, IGP and Netbook market instead?

[dan7777]

@ my res 1920x1200 the 295 is perfect most people use 1680x1050 or 1920x1080-1200 we are not all rich!!!! 30" lmfao way 2 much

[Serra]

I'm sick of people complaining about stock coolers not able to cool their overclocks. Why is it called a stock cooler? cause it cools stock speeds.

Only comment that makes any sense.

Arguing that all hardware can overclock and they should be able to handle [insert arbitrary over-stock speed here] without cooler modification is silly at best.

[Aerwidh]

I'm sick of people complaining about stock coolers not able to cool their overclocks. Why is it called a stock cooler? cause it cools stock speeds.

Well said!

[Chumbucket843]

Is that why nVidia are pulling out of PC gaming and going for the GPGPU, IGP and Netbook market instead?

pulling out of pc gaming. lol. graphics is still nvidia's bread and butter and simultaneously they are making their hardware do more. judging by the specs of fermi it should be a beast at high res.

[annihilat0r]

Anandtech is wrong. I have been reading the XS forums lately and no one talked about the possibility of AMD actually doing something wrong. Those who kinda mumbled it were silenced by the masses. Therefore, there is no problem with the thermal design of 5970's.

[gumballguy]

Eh?

Couldn't care less about overclocks, the vrm cooling has killed many a card over time. And thus it needs to be fixed.

VRM cooling has been a botch job by ATI for far too long. If I want to oc it I will replace the cooling, so before anyone replies to me, please dont pretend I'm talking about overclocking when I'm not.

[gumballguy]

PS: Throttling to default clocks is ok imho, the 'non oc' setting. But legionhardware showed it drops from stock 725 down to 550. Thats unacceptable. They kept it at 650 by fixing it at 650 prior, in catalyst. Now, they did use furmark. But IF (read it again, thats an *IF*) it did this under dnet I'd consider that unacceptable. GPGPU, if it takes off, may well render their cooling method unacceptable. It might have been an acceptable cooling solution two months ago, it might not be in 12 months time. Think about that. Also, I don't really care if you wont have your card in 12 months time, lucky you its nice to brag about frequent upgrades isnt it, but your situation shouldn't affect the definition of reasonable cooling.

[Manicdan]

haha how can you read that article and say there is no thermal problem when OCing? It's freaking obvious in their article...

I mean look:



I would hate to see the OCCT GPU test results, I guarantee that app will produce at the very least 5C hotter temps than FurMark and normally like 10C, especially on dual GPU cards.

umm i hate to break it to ya, but in that chart your showing, the highest temp on the VRMs for a game when OCed is 14C less than furmark without being OCed, and 24C less than OCed on furmark

thanks for proving my point that games dont stress these cards nearly as much as furmark/occt. the only exception is dnet, which im betting performs much better than any other nvidia offering even when throttled.

[jam2k]

Lol, I stopped reading when I saw "Furmark".

[generics_user]

for god's sake just turn that dam fan on 100% while ocing

it's just like those people who were complaining abour fried vrms when overclocking their 4870s without thinking of vrm temps


seriously my 4870 with stock cooler + stock fan control will fry @ 4890+ speeds but with 100% fan vrm temps go down from more than 130°C (furmark) to low 80s


anand is just too stupid to push their stock cooler to 100% when overclocking and is making this up so they get more hits...

i mean they complain about the fact that their card doesn't run overclocked speeds properly when using the stock fan control amd designed for speeds aroung 750mhz ; i bet that they would have no problems if they set their fan speed to 100% like every other review site out there does

[Manicdan]

this thread is one giant ATI flame bait

[Shadov]

this thread is one giant ATI flame bait

If I start playing FurMark then maybe it will matter and it just seems to me that someone is just looking for attention / hits.