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Power Supply/Cooling Problems

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Hey everyone,

I recently installed a new hard drive, blu-ray player, and a brand new power supply for my computer. There were some issues with the graphics card and CPU temperatures at first: the fans would get really loud, temps (according to SpeedFan) would get up to 50 degrees Cel, and then crash. Sometimes, it would crash in the middle of games, but these are games that the processor and graphics card should have no problem handling.

At another point, I would turn on the computer, 20 minutes later it would shut off and would not start up again. I would then have to reach around the back, flick the power supply's switch on and off and then it would work.

My brother and I cleaned out the dust from the inside, he re-routed some of the wires to increase airflow and it seemed to work.

Recently, the computer crashes without warning and without any load intensive applications. And when I load it back up, the computer acts normal.

Sometimes, the fans get loud and the temps climb. And just now, I turned off my comp, walked away, and a couple of minutes later I'd try to turn it on and it would refuse to power up. When I pressed the button for a third time it would start up...only to turn off a few seconds later. I tried pressing the button a few more times, and THEN it turned on.

I don't know what's causing this. Is it a cooling problem? I have three standard sleeve fans on the inside. Could it be a problem with the power supply? Faulty maybe?

Here are my specs. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

Blu-ray drive: SAMSUNG Black 12X BD-ROM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-ROM SATA Internal Blu-ray Drive Model SH-B123L LightScribe Support

Hard Drive 1: Western Digital Caviar Blue WD3200AAJS 320GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s

Hard Drive 2: SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5"

RAM: Corsair XMS2 4GB PC6400 DDR2 800MHz

Mother Board: Gigabyte MA785GM-US2H Motherboard w/ MD785G

CPU: AMD HDT90ZFBGRBOX Phenom II 1090T Black Edition Six Core Processor - 3.20GHz, 6MB Cache, 2000MHz (4000 MT/s)

GFX Card: XFX Radeon HD 4870 Video Card - 1024MB GDDR5, PCI Express 2.0 x16, CrossFireX Ready

Power Supply: CORSAIR CMPSU-750TX 750W ATX12V v2.2 SLI Certified CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC Compatible with Core i7 Power Supply


Thank you.

More about : power supply cooling problems

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Power supply Master

Is this a new problem? Can you try the old psu?
Why did you replace it?

Corsair is a good brand, but every once in a while, there is an intermittent defect. I think I would rma the psu.

Another possibility is that during the installation process, something became unseated, shorted, or loose.

You could try and see if everything runs when you take it out of the case.
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geofelt said:
Is this a new problem? Can you try the old psu?
Why did you replace it?


I replaced the old PSU because I was told that I would need a more powerful one to be able to run all the items I wanted in my computer properly (blu-ray drive, 6 core processor, 2 HDDs, graphics card, etc.).

The previous PSU was a 550 W BFG.

geofelt said:
A pc with the normal components will require a 500w psu and two 6 pin pci-e connectors to run a 4870.
http://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/graphics/ati-rad...

Your original psu should have been able to do the job. Try it.


I'll give that a shot.

My brother pointed out that some of the fans would get pretty loud and their heat would jump up. And this was before we put in the new power supply. The first time he noticed it, he opened up the case and cleaned things up and moved some wires around and that seemed to work for a while. Now, it seems the fans are getting louder again.
Power supply Master

Heat will come from two sources, the graphics card, and the cpu.
If the cpu gets too hot, it will throttle itself and ultimately shut down.

Install a temperature monitoring program like speedfan or realtemp.
What kind of temperatures are you seeing for the cpu and graphics card, particularly under load?

Are all the fans working?
Are they sending air in the proper direction? What case do you have?

If the cpu cooler is not mounted well, your temperatures can skyrocket quickly.
With the power off, see if the cooler wiggles when you gently push it. It should be on solidly.
Pushpin mounts can fail if all 4 pins are not solidly through and locked.

Also, a common error is to use too much thermal material. It will act as an insulator. It is hard to use too little.

geofelt said:
Are all the fans working?
Are they sending air in the proper direction? What case do you have?


I believe all the fans are working. I put my hands near the two that are blowing air out and they seem to be doing just that.

This is what my current temps are reading via Speedfan:

Temp 1: 41 degrees Celsius
Temp 2: 39 degrees Celsius
Temp 3: 43 degrees Celsius
Core: 29 degrees Celsius

PC Wizard is reading the CPU at 29 degrees Celsisus, and the GFX card as 63 degrees Celsius.

When I ran Left 4 Dead 2 just now, the fan got really loud and Temp 3 read as 54 degrees Celsius. Core read at like 30-something.

My case is a NZXT Beta Series CS-NT-BETA-B Black Steel / Plastic ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
Power supply Master

Graphics card is too hot if its at idle. A 4870 should be idleing in the 40c's range.

Check your graphic card temperature when you game. It could be the source of your problem.
Power supply Master

Your temps are good. Is the original psu working for you now without problems?
I think you want the front fan to be an intake, and the rear fan to be an exhaust.
Dangle a piece of tissue in front of the fan to verify the airflow direction.

Are all of your drivers up to date? Particularly the graphics driver?

lilotimz said:
Graphics card is too hot if its at idle. A 4870 should be idleing in the 40c's range.

Check your graphic card temperature when you game. It could be the source of your problem.


geofelt said:
Your temps are good. Is the original psu working for you now without problems?
I think you want the front fan to be an intake, and the rear fan to be an exhaust.
Dangle a piece of tissue in front of the fan to verify the airflow direction.

Are all of your drivers up to date? Particularly the graphics driver?


All right, sorry for the late response; didn't get to switch out the new PSU for the old PSU until yesterday.

Okay...even with the old PSU we were getting the same temps. But it seemed like it was all situated in the graphics card. When I booted up a game (Left 4 Dead 2, again) SpeedFan read Temp 2 and Temp 3 in the 50s (Celsius).

Strangely enough, I played the game for a good while and it never crashed on me. So I guess it's safe to say that the heating problem is all GFX card based?

To answer other questions, we updated to the most recent 4870 drivers: no change in heat. And, with regards to my fans, I have one in the front that pulls in air, one on the side that PULLS IN air, and one in the back that works as an exhaust.

Also, I've heard that sometimes thermal past can be the problem, either too much or too few. The GFX card does get pretty loud when running a game too.

Thank you all again.

Okay. So, we just applied some Arctic Silver 5 thermal compound to the GFX card. The old paste was crumbly, and this is the first time we've applied some since the card was purchased (late October 2009).

I take it this is supposed to take a few days for the effectiveness to kick in? Any thoughts or comments would be appreciated.

Thank you.

lilotimz said:
itll take a few days. If the GFX still idles in the 50-60 ranges... then something is wrong with it.


Cool. Thing is, it never idled around 50 - 60 o Celsius, that's what it shot up to when I was playing a game or using Skype video chat. Most of the time it just idles around the 40s according to SpeedFan.

PCWizard gave me higher readings though (50 - 60), so I don't know which one to trust.
Power supply Authority

^ Yes
On cpu temps, look at the indivual core tempers (Not sure if you can on AMD, I have Intel).
While no change in status between using two diff PSUs and the fact that the Corsair's are great PSUs. Still a good idea to verify the voltages. Check voltages by monitoring them while running Prime 95 (prime 95 will also very memory and cpu stability).

Okay, it's been over 200 hours since we applied Arctic Silver (again, this paste is a few months old) to the graphics card -- the website said it would take 200 hours to "settle in." NOTHING happened to the temperatures

PC Wizard STILL has it at 64 degrees at idle, 80 degrees playing games (it also states that the GFX Load goes up to 98 - 100 %). Speed Fan STILL has it idling at 40 degrees Celsius, upwards of 50-55 degrees while playing games.

Also, the fan is still really loud when I play. When it's idle, it becomes much more quiet.

I don't know what to do now. Any advice would be helpful. Thanks again all.
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