Problems with Diamond HD3870 - esp. fan - Graphics-Cards

I bought this card:
DIAMOND 3870PE4512SB Radeon HD 3870 512MB 256-bit GDDR4 PCI Express 2.0 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/product/prod [...] 6814103050

I'm having some issues with it. I am unable to register on Diamond's site for support. Diamond Tools won't run, saying I don't have a Diamond product installed. I've gone out to AMD/ATI and registered, but had to choose "ATI" as the brand because Diamond isn't even listed. I did log a ticket there last night, so maybe they will respond.

The issue is, the fan won't ramp up. The card gets up to 80c or more just playing Guild Wars. ATItool won't run on it either, hanging on load or showing gibberish. I've tried multiple times. Rivatune loads, and can display a lot of information about the card. It looks like the fan should be picking up by the time the card hits 60-70, but it doesn't. It just stays at 23%. I can manually force it to a higher speed, but then it doesn't vary (although the temp drops considerably).

Mobo is a Gigabyte GA-G33M-DS2R mildly oc'ed to 2.8GHz (PCI locked at 100MHz) to get 1:1 RAM.

Is there a newer version of ATITool somewhere that will work? Any other suggestions?

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------------------------------ There is ALWAYS a drone. Exactly where, or how many drones you will encounter may vary, but that there will be at least one will not.

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Try looking for some other overclocking utilities and see if you have success with those. Also, you may need to use an older catalyst driver set if your current set isn't compatible with ATI Tool, but I'm not sure if this is the problem in your case. In the worst case scenario you can either return the card or purchase a new cooling unit for your gpu.

as for the registration, i don't know if that will help much. You're probably better off just trying to solve the problem yourself, unless you decide you want to return the card.

Message edited by rayzor on 12-11-2007 at 06:00:26 PM

------------------------------ MSI P6N SLI Platinum || Q6600 B3 @ 3.0Ghz || EVGA 8800 GTX (625/1550/2020) || 4 gigs Mushkin Enhanced DDR2 800 (5-5-5-18) || 2xWD Raptors (200 gigs) 1x Seagate Barracuda (300 gigs) || HT Omega Striker Sound Card || Coolmax 700W Modular Power Supply
Reply to rayzor

See if RivaTuner can help. It supports RV670=3870/3850

Reply to WR2

I ended up using Rivatuner to create a handful of fan profiles and link them to core temps. It doesn't work perfectly (I've triple checked that everything matches and assignments are correct), but it works well enough that the card is typically 45c-55c and I can hear the fan speed varying.
AMD support said they haven't released any drivers for that particular card, and I can't even get registered to ask Diamond about it, so this workaround will have to do for now.

------------------------------ There is ALWAYS a drone. Exactly where, or how many drones you will encounter may vary, but that there will be at least one will not.
Reply to jtt283

Hey jtt283

i have the same card as you and also the same problem i'm useing rivatuner too and it looks like it helps to reduce the temps (@50% ~54°C). however i have or maybe had systemcrashes caused by the videocard after playing F.E.A.R. for a few hours. did you also have crashes? i'm useing the driver from the diamond cd because the normal catalyst from ati doesn't work (it says "AMD sample driver" or something). I thnk the crashes are caused by the **** driver. did you get any information from amd when they are going to support this videocard?

Reply to erken

I've been having some crashes too, and not always in a game. I just loaded the new Catalyst 7.12 drivers from ATI last night though, so I'll see if they're any better before giving up on this card.

------------------------------ There is ALWAYS a drone. Exactly where, or how many drones you will encounter may vary, but that there will be at least one will not.
Reply to jtt283

so you have been able to install the regular catalyst?
b/c if i try to install any other driverversion than the one on the disc it says "No ATI product detected" or something like this.

Reply to erken

Did you uninstall all of your previous video drivers?

That doesn't surprise me though; I think we're paying the price for pulling the trigger too quickly on a new product.

I'm thinking now this card is going to end up on eBay, to be replaced with an 8800.

------------------------------ There is ALWAYS a drone. Exactly where, or how many drones you will encounter may vary, but that there will be at least one will not.
Reply to jtt283

yea i uninstalled the previous drivers...

i wonder why amd doesn't support this card makes no sense to me >.<

well i though about selling the diamond card too, but you have to know that i imported it from the USA (im from germany) because it's not yet released in germany, paid the custom fees i don't want to give up

Reply to erken

Seems to be alot of problems with both manufacturers . Neither ATI or NVIDIA has most of their problems fixed . It's still the same old .... sell them - let the public figure out the remedies all over again ! As far as the 8800 they have problems too .... I think both devices are driver /bios issues ... not hardware .

Reply to trooper1947

Since this card was an upgrade from a 7900GS, and even that was better than Guild Wars needs, I may put it on eBay and step back to a HD3850 from a better-known manufacturer. Not sure. Maybe I'll wait for one more driver release.

------------------------------ There is ALWAYS a drone. Exactly where, or how many drones you will encounter may vary, but that there will be at least one will not.
Reply to jtt283

I'd try to RMA the card back to Newegg before I'd put it on e-bay, unless the RMA period is over already. At least that might get a full return of the cash invested. After that, I'd try a 3780 from a different company.

------------------------------ Evil lurks in the databanks as it lurked in the streets of yesteryear. But it was never the streets that were evil.

Over 50. Seen it, done it, can't remember it, but I miss it.
Reply to Sailer

jtt283 wrote :

I bought this card:
DIAMOND 3870PE4512SB Radeon HD 3870 512MB 256-bit GDDR4 PCI Express 2.0 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/product/prod [...] 6814103050

I'm having some issues with it. I am unable to register on Diamond's site for support. Diamond Tools won't run, saying I don't have a Diamond product installed. I've gone out to AMD/ATI and registered, but had to choose "ATI" as the brand because Diamond isn't even listed. I did log a ticket there last night, so maybe they will respond.

The issue is, the fan won't ramp up. The card gets up to 80c or more just playing Guild Wars. ATItool won't run on it either, hanging on load or showing gibberish. I've tried multiple times. Rivatune loads, and can display a lot of information about the card. It looks like the fan should be picking up by the time the card hits 60-70, but it doesn't. It just stays at 23%. I can manually force it to a higher speed, but then it doesn't vary (although the temp drops considerably).

Mobo is a Gigabyte GA-G33M-DS2R mildly oc'ed to 2.8GHz (PCI locked at 100MHz) to get 1:1 RAM.

Is there a newer version of ATITool somewhere that will work? Any other suggestions?

I also had issues with Diamond HD 3870 video card, including no digital signal to my lcd, unable to install, without using the new card in the second PCI express slot, while using a an old video card in the master PCI express slot. I also had no luck with Diamond support. I really don't think they have anyone there for support. Here's a link to my thread about my Diamond HD 3870 issue.

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/ [...] w=0&nojs=0

Reply to ira176

I don't think I can RMA to Newegg because my wife used the box to wrap a Christmas gift, and it is gone (not her fault; I could have put it somewhere or said it shouldn't be used).
Ira, I never had missing display problems. I'm also outputing to a digital monitor through a DVI cable. I also could not sign up on their site, for the same bogus reason. I posted the lame conversation I had with a tech there in another thread.
I still have the display blank out entirely from time to time, requiring a reboot of my PC. It isn't temps; I'm sure it is the drivers because it works fine for a good while after the reboot. This happens rarely (maybe 1-2 times per day), but is still an irritant. Going to Catalyst 7.12 does seem to have made a minor improvement.

------------------------------ There is ALWAYS a drone. Exactly where, or how many drones you will encounter may vary, but that there will be at least one will not.
Reply to jtt283

Considering what I've read here and elsewhere, I've decided that Diamond is not a company that I'll buy anything from. Wonder what ever happened to the idea of customer service?

------------------------------ Evil lurks in the databanks as it lurked in the streets of yesteryear. But it was never the streets that were evil.

Over 50. Seen it, done it, can't remember it, but I miss it.
Reply to Sailer

I don't have the card but have read that their card "HD3870" has some type of different texchnology. Maybe that is what is causing the problems.

Reply to hcforde

Problems with Diamond HD3870 - esp. fan

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Problems with Diamond HD3870 - esp. fan

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