GT 640m LE Overclocking Safe or Overheat?

williamwu2k12 · Apr 7, 2013

Hi all.

I own a 2012 13 inch Sony Vaio (laptop) with an Nvidia Geforce GT 640m LE. I have heard that there are great overclocking options for this card; there's are some Sony threads with vBios flashes that come highly recommended. However, I'm concerned about the heat.

When playing Battlefield 3, the temperature of the GPU (using Realtemp) gets to about 77 degrees or 78 degrees maximum. I'm concerned that since I'm on a laptop, and there isn't as much space and ventilation, that overclocking the stock 500 mhz core and 900 mhz memory will overheat my laptop and cause problems (I've also read somewhere that there's an increase of 4 to 7 degrees, but not sure how accurate this is).

Should I be worried or should I overclock? If I overclock, how much should I do it? There are vBios flashes from 735 to 1000 and up for the core, and 1000 for the memory.

In addition, I've been tilting my computer with a book at the bottom of the screen so that the laptop bottom gets more ventilation; should I be doing this?

Thanks,

William

ayushde · Apr 7, 2013

williamwu2k12 :

Yours is a laptop gpu and usually laptop gpus are much more heat resistant than desktop ones. Your temps are absolutely fine. Anything under 85c in absolutely ok for a laptop gpu. But you may need to monitor the temps of other components which are much less resistant to heat like your harddisk. Monitor you hdd temps and make sure that it doesn't cross 55c. You may use programs like speccy to monitor your hdd temps.

And to answer your other question yes keeping a book under the laptop is a good idea. Infact I also do the same while gaming in my laptop. It helps in keeping the temps a good 2-3 degrees cooler.

Aditya Prasad · Apr 7, 2013

I'm using the same laptop with the 1000mhz/1000mhz overclock for quite some time now. It's not pleasant, the GPU keeps throttling itself after about 45 minutes of gaming. I'm trying to figure out what to do

ayushde · Apr 7, 2013

Aditya Prasad :

Why don't you do a 735/1000 MHz bios flash then ....... You may also consider buying a cooling pad

williamwu2k12 · Apr 7, 2013

Thanks for the inputs guys. Ayushde, where are you getting the temp 85 degrees from? And what should be the temperature of the gpu and the cpu when I should be getting worried?

Also, when gaming, the game usually has a decent frame rate but after a while the rest of the programs and my desktop become really really slow and when I switch out of the game everything seemingly freezes for a couple moments... Is this bad and is there a way I can fix this?

ayushde · Apr 8, 2013

williamwu2k12 :

Well the thermal threshold of the gpus and most of the intel cpus is 105c. But you must try to keep the temps below 90-95c. However on a day to day basis anything over 85-90c can shorten the lifespan of your gpu.
I monitor my temps using msi afterburner. You can also overclock your gpu with it.
And to answer your other question, I think the freezing MIGHT :heink:

be caused by the overheating of your hdd. I too used to have the same problem after hours of gaming on my laptop which had an OCed gpu. But a cooling pad fixed tis problem. Try to monitor your hdd temps while gaming and post the results here.

williamwu2k12 · Apr 8, 2013

Okay so last night, I had RealTemp open and the GPU max temp was at 83 degrees. The CPU max temp was at 93 degrees for one core and 96 for the other (I'm not sure if I'm interpreting this correctly, this is my first time using RealTemp. I'm not sure what distance to TJ Max is. Anyways, I couldn't find a hard drive temp but I'll be looking for a program to report that.

I also realized after reading a Sony manual that using a book to elevate the computer might not be the best idea because the exhaust vents are right where I put the book. LOL. I'm going to try designing something to lift the corners so that the exiting heat doesn't get blocked.

ayushde · Apr 9, 2013

williamwu2k12 :

Your Gpu temps are fine but your cpu is a bit too hot. Try getting a cooling pad.

And BTW you can use Speccy to monitor your hdd temps.

williamwu2k12 · Apr 9, 2013

Okay yeah my CPU is getting hot >.< Speccy reports that my hard drive is hovering at around 32 degrees, so I doubt that's the problem (this is cool, right?). Since the temperature is already so hot, would you recommend against overclocking? Also, since using a new stand, I've had my GPU temp lowered to about 78 degrees, and even 74 degrees at one point, and my CPU temp lowered to around 92 degrees.

ayushde · Apr 9, 2013

williamwu2k12 :

Did you take those hdd temps when the laptop was at idle??? Try to play an intense game like bf3 or anything else that puts load the hardware for around 1 hour and then post your hdd temps

And yes your cpu temps are a bit too high. Instead of a bios flash you can do a temporary overclock of your gpu using msi afterburner and then see whether your cpu temps rise any further. But DO NOT :no:

increase the voltage. Try to OC on the stock voltage.

williamwu2k12 · Apr 10, 2013

No haha this was when I was playing Battlefield 3. And yeah it was for about an hour, so those temps are accurate. Why, is that bad? Is 32 degrees hot?

And okay I'll do overclock on MSI Afterburner then. What's the difference between that and the Bios flash, and what are the advantages of each (in short, why did the makers of the Bios flash create it instead of using the overclock program)?

Thanks for all your help btw!

ayushde · Apr 10, 2013

williamwu2k12 :

Well then your hdd temps are excellent . Infact these are the lowest temps I have ever seen for a laptop in load. Do you live in a cold country???

And to answer your other question, the main difference between a bios flash and a software overclock is that a bios flash overclocks your gpu by altering the video bios whereas in msi afterburner you overclock your card via the windows.

A bios flash can be risky at times and in some rare cases can even make your card unusable. Also in some cases a bios flash is permanent and you wont be able to roll back to the original bios incase you run into some temp problems in the future.

Softwares like msi afterburner and evga precision are much safer alternatives to overclocking. However be sure not to raise the clocks too high and always run a stress test like furmark or msi kombuster after you OC to be sure that it is not artifacting. If you see any sort of artifacts immediately lower the clocks. Also make sure that the temps of all your components including the cpu and gpu don't go too high.

williamwu2k12 · Apr 10, 2013

Wait. So you're saying that 92 degrees for CPU, 74 degrees for GPU, and 32 degrees for hard drive are all low temperatures for a laptop in load? LOL I thought 100 degrees for CPU was max? And I live in California, United States, so it's around 18-20 degrees here right now.

Okay so basically overclocking should be safe since these are low temperatures?

I'm going to use msi afterburner then.

ayushde · Apr 10, 2013

williamwu2k12 :

Your cpu temps are a bit too high for a daily basis. So first do a temporary overclock using msi afterburner and see whether your cpu temps rise any further. If they do then I would suggest you to go against overclocking.

The temps of your other components are fine. Do post your temps after your first temporary OC.

williamwu2k12 · Apr 11, 2013

I don't see any difference in temps. In fact, I don't see any difference in performance either :/ The maximum overclock I can do is +135 for the core, but for the memory, apparently I can overclock that to a max of +900? This doesn't make sense. To be safe, I overclocked to +135 for the core, and +100 for the memory, so total of 635, 1000. Not much noticeable difference in the performance in Battlefield 3.

Temps are still the same, in fact they might even be a little lower, which is surprising. I'm getting around 73, 74 degrees where normally they average around 75. For the CPU, I'm getting around 90 degrees, where normally I get around 92 degrees. I'm not sure what's happening. In addition, the frame rate seems to have dropped a little. A few days ago, I was feeling an average of around 45 fps, now I'm feeling around 40. However, it's more solid, no more jumps.

At 45, it used to jump up to 70 fps in places where there was no battle, and then it would drop all the way down to 30 or 25 or 20 during heavy combat. Now, the fps is more stable, achieving a maximum of around 50 or 55 fps and a minimum of 30 fps.

Again, I'm not sure what is happening. I think it may be a driver issue. Is it possible for the driver to get corrupted after some use? I did a clean install of the Nvidia Geforce driver 314.22, which also had the Nvidia update (which I didn't have before). Maybe it's because I've been messing with overclock and other settings?

ayushde · Apr 12, 2013

williamwu2k12 :

Try to monitor your gpu usage using msi afterburner while playing bf3. If you see the usage below 99-98% then probably its a driver issue since your temps are fine. Some drivers are less resistant to overclocks and do not scale properly when a card is OCed. So either try to roll back to a different previous driver. Try this on 2-3 different drivers before coming to a conclusion. Hope it helps and do not forget to post the results here....

williamwu2k12 · Apr 12, 2013

Okay I'll post back soon

To be honest though, it's weird because before, I wasn't actually satisfied with the 45 fps but huge jumps, but now, at an average of 40, it's not that bad. Before, I had noticeable issues with lag. I'm not sure whether it's my eyes that suddenly stopped noticing the fps difference, or whether the huge gap between fps max and fps min makes it unbearable to play.

and189 · May 10, 2013

Hey guys...

You may use this solution for overclocking your 640mle -> http://forum.notebookreview.com/sony/677079-sony-vaio-s-bios-mod-gt640m-le-176.html#post9190763

I have done it on my SVS 1511 and it works fine. With this mod you can oc your graphic card with a max of 405mhz instead of 135mhz in stock version.

GT 640m LE Overclocking Safe or Overheat?

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