GTX 260 GPU temps too high???

[dwluv3333]

Hi Guys,

I've got an EVGA GTX 260 896 MB OC version. It's set to 626/1053/1350 clocks when active, and 300/100/601 when idle.

Right now I'm lookin at the GPU temp - Automatic fan (40%) and 51 C idle using Windows and surfing.

Surprisingly enough, when I play a low-end game like Portal 2, this is enough to drive the card to max, which is giving me ~83C with 100% fan usage. (It went up to around 86 before the fan speed kicked into 100%).

I've never had artifacts/stability/crashing issues before. However, based on googling, I do seem higher than a lot of people's temps.

My comp is a bit dusty as it's been a decent while since last cleaning, but it's not like I neglect the hell out of it. Should I be concerned?

Thanks much all!

 

[jyjjy]

Those temps are high but not too crazy. Cleaning the card thoroughly is probably what is called for. It's easy for the fans/heat sinks on video cards to become clogged with dust that prevents proper airflow and heat dissipation. Purchasing a can of compressed air for the job is a good idea.

 

[Twoboxer]

Short answer: As long as your card hovers at a max of 85C, it's OK.

Long answer: As vid card temps increase their fans will spin faster to deal with it, attempting to balance noise and the need for heat removal. At 85C the card is willing to run the fan at max to keep it from hitting its max operating temp, which for the 260 is 105C.

The hotter the inside of your case, the higher the vid card temp will get to for any given load because the air being used to cool it is . . . hotter. Others may have lower vid card temps because of different fan profiles (eg, running the fan at 100% all the time) or because of better cases.

So, clean out your case if it need be to make sure the hot air is getting out of the case. If you want to find out how cool your card *could* run given near perfect heat exhaust from the case, take off the side cover and run the PC on its side. Compare to how hot it gets when running the same stuff with the cover on.

 

[cliffro]

Hmm, that's odd, you two guys mention 85 is acceptable, yet when mine hits 80-82c my driver crashes/recovers and forces me to restart if I want to continue playing a game, especially a demanding one since it runs @ 2d Clocks only after it recovers.

That said, a thorough cleaning with an Air Compressor has helped to reduce my temps in the past, and I just recently removed the cooler and replaced the TIM because it was idling @ 59c and room temp wise it should have been @ 47-50c max(the idle temp that is) I used Arctic Silver Matirix and it's made a world of difference. I'm idling @ 42c right now.

That's another option and don't worry, EVGA allows you to do it without voiding your warranty. It's easier than it sounds as well. Just don't forget the 2 screws on the I/O or rather the Exhaust plate like I did.

Remove the 13 bigger screws on the PCB side and the 2 I mentioned and with a little twisting remove the cooler.

 

[Twoboxer]

@ Cliffro: I assume you're talking about the 260 listed in your configuration. The card's max operating temp *is* 105C, and 80-82 should not be a problem for a card in good condition. While its possible, I've not heard of a driver doing a controlled crash at that kind of temp, so I'm curious.

Does the driver give an error message? It would seem to be at least polite for it to mention heat as the cause.

I guess I'd be concerned that its not the temperature reading itself that's causing the crash, but some failure that level of heat is causing in the card.

 

[cliffro]

@Twoboxer, Yes it is the one in my "configuration listing"

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if it were something going wrong/bad. The two games I've noticed it in most(also the ones the make it the warmest) Team Fortress 2 and Crysis 2.

I first noticed it in Crysis 2 while playing the MP Demo. In TF2 it seems less heat related as it does it enough to force me to use Nvidia Inspector to force a higher "safe clock". I can Alt+Tab out click on a shortcut on my desktop and be back in and at full FPS in under a minute. It's happened from 72 and up in TF2(which makes me assume it's not temp related in TF2)

And finally no there has never ever been an error message, other than in Event Manager Driver Stopped Responding and Has been recovered.

 

[Alsoknownasjazz]

I've also had to take my card apart to give it a thorough cleaning, and I replaced the existing paste with aftermarket silver thermal paste - twice now. Both times, I was experiencing crashes (didn't have a temperature monitor in place at the time, so I don't know what the temp was that it failed at, but the housing of the card was too hot to hold in some spots! Usually I'd see artifacts on the screen prior to the crash (the most obvious sign of GPU overheating), or after rebooting post-crash when the card had had a few seconds to cool slightly. My card is made by BFG. I assumed it was poor design of the housing, since I have not had this much trouble with other cards before or since, but if others have the issue too, maybe the GTX 260 just tends to run hot?

I'm not sure if blasting the dust out would've sufficed each time, it's definitely what I'll try next time. If you can get access to a compressor with a little more oomph than a can of compressed air, go that route so you can really be very thorough - just don't let the fan spin uncontrolled, you can damage the fan motor or bearings (if there are any) if you force it to spin too fast.

Doh, just realized I was necro'ing a thread. I'll leave it here in case anybody else is still running a 260 (I am, on a second pc, and just reassembled it yesterday...).