measure PCIe voltage or graphic card temperature

Question

I just burned my graphics card, replaced it with the same model and it is getting very hot again(>70°). It is passive cooled, I repaired PC case airflow but am afraid it might overheat again. It's a Gigabyte GV NX84S512HP with Nvidia 8400 GS.

1. Are 90°C OK for GPU idle? What is the maximum?
2. How Can I test PCIe voltage in order to decide whether to throw away the mainboard or Power supply?

Answer 1

With GPU's as well as CPU's 100C is the limit. you can reduce the voltage core of your video card with EVGA voltage tuner. this can reduce the heat. BUT the REAL way of reducing the heat to 40C idle is to remove the heatsink for the card and re-apply a good heatsink compound. Artic Sliver 5 is nice but you have to be careful for it is conductive. so ONLY on the dark part of the GPU. Others will work fine. as long as its not the orginal gunk they use.

Answer 2

With respect to temperature, you can measure that at specified intervals using tools from nvidia. In Windows use ntune, in Linux run nvclock -i. Is 90°C too much? Maybe, it's certainly getting to that point. I've got a fanless 6600 in a machine with almost no airflow that tends to stick around 63°C. So, this is something that you should be a little concerned about.

Unfortunately, I can't help much with testing voltage of PCIe devices other than saying to plug in kill-a-watt and test it with the component plugged in and removed.

Answer 3

I have a passively cooled Gigabyte Radeon 4850 and it gets just above 200F sometimes and continued to run fine. I really was quite amazed as I know many cards would die at that temperature.

Answer 4

I use the Sensors-Applet from sourceforge for tracking my passive cooled nVidia 7950GT in Ubuntu.
It keeps showing a 50-60C range the 'slowdown' default temperature is 130C. I have the nVidia-96 drivers installed at the moment.

In Windows that same system seems a bit cooler.

On a different laptop hardware the same Ubuntu runs somewhere in 40C range on nVidia 4200Go.

I don't think these are temperatures to worry about (my system has not been unstable on them).
However, 70C seems a bit high (yet, mark the slowdown threshold for my first card says 130C).

You could use FurMark to track your hardware further (look it up in the search box).
Would also suggest checking your thermal paths -- is there sufficient ventilation around the card?

Answer 5

I've got the exact same graphics card in my HTPC. It runs at about 75C idle and I just did a 10 minute Furmark Stability Test where it reached 114C. So I would say your temps are normal for the card.

Answer 6

NVidia GT200 chip slows its clock rate only over 105°C. Soo, 100°C is really OK, I guess. Man, even automotive grade CPUs are only qualified for <95°C...

Answer 7

My ATi 4850 is working on 75 idle and around 105-108 when gaming. Been working for a year now like that. Fan is screaming but hey whatcha gonna do, turn my speakers little louder and all is well. I cant touch the card with my bare hand i get burned. I'm keeping my feet warm now, cus its winter and all that... Well i better be off before i start ranting, all well to you all...