Recommended PSU not good enough for GPU ?

[knightfightx]

Hi.

I have a ASUS GT440 1gb ddr5. (http://www.dynabyte.nl/asus-geforce-gt440-1gb.html)
When i looked at the guide, it was recommended to get an Corsair CX430W V2 PSU, so i bought it.
But now when i play a low game like counterstrike source, my GPU temperature raises from 40 to 63 degrees.
Also, my hard drive is showing a hot degree of 60. Now i have been told to get atleast 550W PSU for this card, because the wattage of this psu is on the low side for my GPU. Is this true?
If this is the case, would one of these 2 PSU's satisfy my GPU and hard disk?

http://www.dynabyte.nl/corsair-gaming-gs500watt.html
http://www.dynabyte.nl/corsair-gaming-gs600watt.html

Thanks in advance.

knightfightx

 

[ohshift]

I am confused, are you suggesting the temperatures are to blame for low wattage? A PSU efficiency *WILL* attribute to the heat generation (efficiency), however if you use ample air flow, and proper case wire (and placement) management, you will not have a temperature problem -caused- by the PSU.

 

[GI_JONES]

The power supply wouldnt really have much to do with the temp of your hard drive or graphics card, and your psu is more than adequate for that card

 

[knightfightx]

Thank you. So i wont need a new PSU then.

Well, i have 1 fan rear fan, back of the case, and i think it is blowing air into the computer starting to flow over my GPU towards the hard disks. Doesnt this fan need to blow air outside instead to the inside? If so, how do i make this happen ?
I also need to buy a second fan for the front side of my case, the place right under my hard disks. When i buy that, and fix the rear fan, if there is something to fix, will the temperature drop ? Im afraid to start my games like dues ex human revolution because the GPU temperature raises from 40 to 60+ degrees when i only play counterstrike. So i think my GPU will be overheated when i start a game that is way heavier then counterstrike.

Thank you.

larisb

 

[djscribbles]

Thank you. So i wont need a new PSU then.

Well, i have 1 fan rear fan, back of the case, and i think it is blowing air into the computer starting to flow over my GPU towards the hard disks. Doesnt this fan need to blow air outside instead to the inside? If so, how do i make this happen ?
I also need to buy a second fan for the front side of my case, the place right under my hard disks. When i buy that, and fix the rear fan, if there is something to fix, will the temperature drop ? Im afraid to start my games like dues ex human revolution because the GPU temperature raises from 40 to 60+ degrees when i only play counterstrike. So i think my GPU will be overheated when i start a game that is way heavier then counterstrike.

Thank you.

larisb

Make sure you run CS with Vsync.
Even a very basic game can bring a GPU to 100% utilization if Vsync is disabled and the game doesn't have a framerate cap. Vsync causes your framerate to be capped at your monitors refresh rate (typically 60Hz), it can eliminate some graphical glitchiness, but if you're not at 60FPS you'll likely be at 45 or 30 (because you only use frames that are done when the monitor refreshes).

My guess would be that you are running CS alot more than 60FPS (because of no vsync), and because the temps are high you think it's taxing the GPU, but in reality it's handling the game fine, but you're running full throttle with no brakes. It may be that more challenging games actually heat up your components less..


You should turn your rear case fan around so it blows outward. Just unscrew the 4 screws in the corners of the fan, flip it over, and screw it back in (The screws take a bit of turning force to go in because they are actually cutting through the plastic of the fan to make threads). It's certainly not a bad idea to put a fan on the front blowing in; usually case fans have 2 arrows around the outside edge, one shows the direction the fan rotates, the other shows the direction the air moves, use those to get it the right direction.

Edit:
Another note: Typically, a desktop GPU is designed such that it cannot fry itself just because you're settings are too high (not always, it's good to be dilligent, also laptops are another story, be careful with them ), if you get a GPU monitoring program (sorry, I don't know any good ones, I use the one that came with my gpu) you'll see it hit highs and lows, and often isn't staying at 100%. Often times it's only badly programmed games (or simple one's with no framerate capping) that will keep the GPU at 100%. Legends of Grimrock, an indy-retro-style dungeon crawler will bring my 7870 to 100%, running 500FPS...
After upgrading my wife's PC to a 7770, we learned the Sims 3 has an internal framerate cap of 30FPS, but it lets the GPU render at any speed, so once you get to 30 FPS, it renders the same scene over and over as fast as it can, hitting something like 180FPS for her. The game destroys laptops... (one more reason to hate EA, since they don't seem to care about fixing it, you have to get a 3rd party program to keep it running reasonably).

 

[Sunius]

Thank you. So i wont need a new PSU then.

Well, i have 1 fan rear fan, back of the case, and i think it is blowing air into the computer starting to flow over my GPU towards the hard disks. Doesnt this fan need to blow air outside instead to the inside? If so, how do i make this happen ?
I also need to buy a second fan for the front side of my case, the place right under my hard disks. When i buy that, and fix the rear fan, if there is something to fix, will the temperature drop ? Im afraid to start my games like dues ex human revolution because the GPU temperature raises from 40 to 60+ degrees when i only play counterstrike. So i think my GPU will be overheated when i start a game that is way heavier then counterstrike.

Thank you.

larisb

You're incorrectly assuming that more demanding games place more pressure on the graphics card. That's not the case, your graphics card is supposed to work at it's fullest every time, even at games like pinball. If that's not the case, so it's either the game, or the graphics card problem. So running more demanding games will not change the temperatures, but it will just play it at lower fps. Lastly, 60C for a graphics card is very cool, there's nothing you should be worried about.

 

[jsc]

A GT440 only needs about 6 amps (less than 70 watts, actually). our PSU is not responsible for the temperature rise of your GPU.

 

[benski]

You're incorrectly assuming that more demanding games place more pressure on the graphics card. That's not the case, your graphics card is supposed to work at it's fullest every time, even at games like pinball. If that's not the case, so it's either the game, or the graphics card problem. So running more demanding games will not change the temperatures, but it will just play it at lower fps. Lastly, 60C for a graphics card is very cool, there's nothing you should be worried about.

That is not accurate and it would be a horribly inefficient way for a GPU to operate.

 

[Sunius]

That is not accurate and it would be a horribly inefficient way for a GPU to operate.

However, that's it how it operates. If you have any game running without vsync, launch MSI afterburner and have it run in the background. You'll see that your GPU will be on 100% load all the time.

 

[johnners2981]

60C is not hot for a gpu

 

[benski]

That's simply not true, I don't use vsync because I have a 120hz screen, I run afterburner constantly and use the LCD screen on my G15 keyboard to monitor GPU usage and my cards are practically never at 100% usage, if they were we wouldn't need furmark and kombustor to run stress tests we could just launch any game. Games that run as you described are bugged or very old.

 

[Sunius]

Do you have CPU bottleneck? My GTX 560 Ti runs 100% on all games. And the reason why we need Furmark or kombustor is simple: one GPU operations create more heat than others.

 

[djscribbles]

Vsync on a 120Hz screen doesn't cap you at 60FPS btw. (or rather it shouldn't) Vsync literally means frames are being rendered in syncronization with your monitors vertical sync signal, which it sends after it completes a refresh. This signal is used to kick off the next render.

Some games implement a framerate cap so that you don't get insanely high framerates, so that you don't crank out hugely unnecessary numbers of frames. In the end, all rendering is controlled by the software you are running, and all games do things differently, so you can't really make a generalized statement about how the GPU should act, but if you use vsync, you'll almost never be at 100% utilization because once you finish rendering a frame, the GPU waits until the monitor displays it before starting the next; the alternative has you starting the rendering of a new frame immediately after you finish a each frame, sometimes the monitor never displays these frames, and other times it will get half of the old frame and half of the new frame (which is why vsync resolves tearing issues). (Note, this isn't 100% accurate, as buffering introduces some more complex logic, as you typically render into one buffer and the monitor reads from the other, and the vsync switches which buffer is being written to and which is being read from, so sometimes your GPU can work a little ahead, but it will still invariably reach the same state where it waits on the monitor).

While a CPU bottle neck can cause your GPU utilization to drop, typically having vsync on will keep you from always being 100%, while having it off will allow your GPU to run full throttle (though the extra utilization isn't necessarily making it all the way to the monitor)

 

[GI_JONES]

You are on the right track with the fans. The back one should blow out, and adding a front one will help. For the back fan that is blowing in..just unscrew it and turn it around. There will be an arrow on one of the fan sides showing which way the air blows...look close they are hard to see.

 

[benski]

I remember when Crysis 2 was first released it did not have a framerate cap and I would get like 1500 fps in a menu screen while my gpu fans screamed. Starcraft 2 had a similar problem until they patched it. Games like minecraft and CSS may let your GPU constantly rev at 100% but I think they are the exception and not the rule.

 

[knightfightx]

Thank you all for your replies. I have turned on V-sync in CSS, and lowered the resolution, and my GPU temperature has really dropped, it is now about 30 degrees idle and when i play CSS it is about 40-45 degrees! There is alot for me to learn from what u guys discussed, so excuse me for not understanding some parts.

I have defragmented my hard disk, and i have also cleaned my hard disk and removed 250gb of files that i do not need. I have also turned my rear case fan and when i hold my hands at the back of my case, i can feel more wind blowing out to the backside, then from the inside. This is some important basic stuff i did not know, although i thought i knew everything. I now know that the highest knowing is not knowing. Thank you.
After i did these 3 things, my hard disk and GPU are very cool, even when i tried dues ex human revolution (To overcome fear, u have to look it in the eyes right ? ;p) ! My HDD stays between 40-50 degrees as does my GPU when i am gaming, and i am so happy! My computer is very fast and cool now. I downloaded MSI kombustor and it reads my GPU always cool. I even think that there is no need for a front case fan atm ^^ it is very good now. Seems like defragmentation fixed alot.

Oh yeah i also replaced my monitor DVI cable for a VGA cable. Does this makes any difference too, or can i use the DVI cable without affecting anything ?

I would like some advice on some things i have heard about my core2quad q6600 2.4Ghz CPU. I heard that this CPU is very good for overclocking. I was thinking to overclock my cpu to 3Ghz. Any advice what might happen if i do this, or should i make a new thread for this?

My current over satisfied temperatures

I appriciate all your replies.

Regards,

knightfightx

 

[djscribbles]

Kinda a late response here, but you only needed to disable vsync, you can probably turn your resolution up and keep using your dvi cable.

The resolution may help keep the load on your GPU low, but the main problem is CS was probably running 500FPS (as hard as it could), turning on vsync dropped it to 60FPS. This one setting takes your GPU from working as hard as it possibly can all the time to only rendering once for each update of your monitor.

With vsync off, even at 640x480 resolution and all settings on low, your GPU would still get hot, and just render at 1500FPS instead of the 500FPS you saw before (I'm just making up numbers here, but it's all proportional)