Modded 3870x2 cooling

[firebird]

I modded the cooling on my Sapphire 3870x2. Check it out.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/maudite

 

[dagger]

I modded the cooling on my Sapphire 3870x2. Check it out.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/maudite

Lol, 1337.

The hardware is all there, but how well does it work in reality? That's going to be some strange airflow and with high dependence on heatpipes.

 

[a 6pack in]

yea.. lets see some feedback on the temp

 

[firebird]

I thought you'd be able to read the description of the image set; it's all described there.

Anyway, the ATI drivers never controlled the fan properly. At idle, the card would be in the low 70's with the fan @ 25%. Under load I never saw the fan go above 35% and the card would easily break 100 while playing The Witcher @1920x1200 at stock speeds.

So I got RivaTuner to contol the fan speed. I needed to keep the speed at 45% to keep the card under 85 degrees while gaming. At this speed the fan noise is unbearable. That's what led me to the mod.

Now I let the coolers do the speed control. At idle they run ~43 degrees and are not noticealbe, and using The Witcher for comparison, I saw a max temp of 73 degrees. The fans spin up when needed and do get mildly loud, but no where near what the stock fan was.

I played for an hour or so last night with the cards core OC'd 25 mhz and memory OC'd 50 mhz and never broke 73 degrees.

Ambient was about 70 degrees F.

 

[a 6pack in]

wow thats good to hear man.

im ordering the asus 3870x2 w/ the 2 fans on board.

i figure i got this nice 790FX chipset.. i might as well use it to its potential

 

[dagger]

73 degrees on load is a bit high considering the amount of cooling hardware that went in.

Run this:
http://downloads.guru3d.com/download.php?det=1717

 

[firebird]

So I download the fur rendering program, install it and run it. Set the res to 1920x1200 fullscreen, and when I started it my second display went black so I couldn't see my monitoring software.

Program is running stress test between 35 and 45 FPS and I can hear the video card fans spin up. I walk away and when I return a few min later both displays are black. Mouse is moving, keyboard is responding, fans are still spun up but no response. So I reboot and am greeted with a 3 beep (2 short 1 long i think) from the mobo. Power system off...

After Vista logon screen I get nothing but 2 blank monitors. Reboot and they are still black. Reboot in safe mode and remove fur burger software and then system boots just fine.

<shivers> Not liking that program and I have no idea how hot the card got.

Any other ideas on how to kill my system?

 

[dagger]

So I download the fur rendering program, install it and run it. Set the res to 1920x1200 fullscreen, and when I started it my second display went black so I couldn't see my monitoring software.

Program is running stress test between 35 and 45 FPS and I can hear the video card fans spin up. I walk away and when I return a few min later both displays are black. Mouse is moving, keyboard is responding, fans are still spun up but no response. So I reboot and am greeted with a 3 beep (2 short 1 long i think) from the mobo. Power system off...

After Vista logon screen I get nothing but 2 blank monitors. Reboot and they are still black. Reboot in safe mode and remove fur burger software and then system boots just fine.

<shivers> Not liking that program and I have no idea how hot the card got.

Any other ideas on how to kill my system?

Rofl, sorry to have not warned you. I didn't think you'd walk away with it running. Keep an eye on that temp and whatnot...

Looks like it didn't premanently kill your card, this must be corrected immediately. Here, this will help.
http://www.daionet.gr.jp/~masa/rthdribl/

 

[firebird]

So maybe I was a bit harsh. Maybe the Dirty Bast!@# Scotch Ale had something to do with it. Anyways, after I got my system back up and running I re-installed the fur burger program and ran it in windowed mode. I was then able to see the monitoring tools on the other display.

What I saw (with Rivatuner, GPU-Z, and Speedfan) was 73 degree max reading in both GPU-Z and Rivatuner, and about 50% CPU usage.. However, the program seemed to be only utilizing one core. the other core (according to GPU-Z) showed 0% utilization and 44 degrees. The core in use read 73 degress and 50+ amps! I don't think my PSU can provide that off of one rail so I think the reading is skewed.

I let this run for a bit, moved to the 2nd display and took a screen shot of the graphs. Then I was greeted with the "black screen of death" again. At least this time after pressing "esc" I heard the fans spin down and I was able to reboot ok.

 

[firebird]

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me"
-Some gullable person

So I download this new system killer. Read over the website and readme and don't see anything alarming. Double click on the executable and......red bars on both displays and a system lock. Whodathunkit?

Maybe I just don't know how to use the program, but it sounds like the program at least needs to open before I adjust settings. Correct?

 

[dagger]

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me"
-Some gullable person

So I download this new system killer. Read over the website and readme and don't see anything alarming. Double click on the executable and......red bars on both displays and a system lock. Whodathunkit?

Maybe I just don't know how to use the program, but it sounds like the program at least needs to open before I adjust settings. Correct?

Hmm... both should work fine. Maybe it has some problem with driver? Or dual gpu? Oh, and yeah, the Fur does not take advantage of dual gpu. It's opengl and old and whatnot. Sorry for not realizing this eariler.

 

[firebird]

Well, I figured out how to use it...drag the .ini to the executable. Anyway, here is what I ran: Fullscreen yes

WindowModeSize 1024 768
FullscreenSize 1920 1200

Model skullocc.pvi
LightEnvMap grace.lem

GlareType 2
SoftGlare Yes
Halo No

DepthOfField 4
MultiSampleType 8

AutoGlare yes
AutoMaterial Yes
AutoLightEnvMap Yes

I still only had 1 GPU used, and it's max temp was 68 degrees.

 

[dagger]

Well, I figured out how to use it...drag the .ini to the executable. Anyway, here is what I ran: Fullscreen yes

WindowModeSize 1024 768
FullscreenSize 1920 1200

Model skullocc.pvi
LightEnvMap grace.lem

GlareType 2
SoftGlare Yes
Halo No

DepthOfField 4
MultiSampleType 8

AutoGlare yes
AutoMaterial Yes
AutoLightEnvMap Yes

I still only had 1 GPU used, and it's max temp was 68 degrees.

Ah, I though that one would support dual gpu as it's directx based. Oh well. You can always loop 3dmark and whatnot...

Here's something else. I've heard of it, but haven't actually used it myself. So... err... be careful.
http://freestone-group.com/video-card-stability-test.htm

And don't forget ATI Tool's built in stress tester. I've used it on x1950 on my old rig, which has since died. Not sure how well it'll work on newer card.

 

[firebird]

This program ran for a few min and then locked up the PC. I saw a max of 68 degrees on (1) GPU.

I'm going to have to call Uncle on this series of stress tests. So far nothing has got it over 74 degrees, and the only program to fully utilize both cores is the games I play. CoD4 and The Witcher.

I will keep looking for programs that really stress the GPU. I know Jericho is really hard to get good FPS on my system, so maybe I'll try that. Crysis only gets up to 68 as well....

 

[dagger]

This program ran for a few min and then locked up the PC. I saw a max of 68 degrees on (1) GPU.

I'm going to have to call Uncle on this series of stress tests. So far nothing has got it over 74 degrees, and the only program to fully utilize both cores is the games I play. CoD4 and The Witcher.

I will keep looking for programs that really stress the GPU. I know Jericho is really hard to get good FPS on my system, so maybe I'll try that. Crysis only gets up to 68 as well....

If all the stress programs either lock up or crash your pc, there may be some problem with you rig. You might consider looking into it. Those programs can't be all bad.

 

[firebird]

Well...

I am using Vista...
I can run OCCT for ever and remain stable as well as Prime95.
I can play games for hours on end without issues....
I've rean 3dmark06 and Vantage several times and had no problem...

Maybe those programs don't like Vista and the 3870. Most are several years old.

 

[firebird]

I changed my bottom front intake to an exhaust after I noticed a large hot spot around the video cards. My temps are in the 60's now for the x2 and 50s for the 3870.