Quick 4870 Question

You could use ATI tray tools, which is really all you need. It has fan stuff, plus profiles for OCing and 3d settings. Not very hard to set up fan settings, there is no XML or anything like that.

I don't know about the bug, as I flashed with a new bios and modded the fan speeds immediately. I suggest you do the same(at least with the fans), it will lower the temps of the card from 70-80 C idle to 45-55 under load.

The risk is you could mess up the card and you won't have video until you can figure out how to flash it (some have said get onboard video or a pci (old kind) video card.

Really, if you take the time to read the tutorials found around the internets, you shouldn't have any problems.

Thinking about it, you shouldn't even need to flash the card unless you don't want a utility program running and want the card to act a certain way "by default". Programs like rivatuner and ATT can do the same thing with software, at the launch of the 4800 cards, it was the easiest way to fan mod these cards.

CCC 8.10 gives you fan controll

improves performance in games


there is hotfix for far cry 2 also. google that

To answer your question, this is straight from the release notes for the 8.10 drivers: "This release of the ATI software driver version 8.54 introduces the ability for users to control the speed of the GPU fan when running in accelerated graphics."

Short answer, yes now you can control the fan speed from within CCC.

My 4870 idles at 72C at factory fan speeds which I hear is ok because these cards were designed for that.

The new 8.10 Catalyst Control Center does have a nice fan speed controller in the overdrive section where you can manually adjust the speed by the click of a mouse. I keep my the fan on 30% and that drops it down to the 50's at idle and it is quiet. When I game I crank the speed up to 50% and it keeps the card cool playing crysis for hours....like in the 40's-50's.

The noise level at 50% is definitely noticeable but I cant hear it when I'm gaming.

Great card for the money!

Is it advisable to keep it at one setting?

As in, could I leave the fan setting on at 45%-50%?

I usually have my sound up pretty loud when gaming, and music when not. I'm not huge on having my system uber quiet.

I'm not sure either but I don't see why not. I've left it at that speed accidentely at idle for a day once and it didn't seem to hurt anything. It is kind of loud though.

I live where it is warm all year, and I need to have my fan set at 40% or higher to keep the card 55* or less. I have profiles with ATT that automatically reduce the card's clocks to 200/300 and set the fan to 10% when I am only in 2d mode (desktop). It will auto clock/fan to my choice of profiles whenever I start a game (it does it without me touching anything).