Safe temperature max?

**BeastG33** · March 26, 2006, 01:21 AM

I've got an X850 XT and I recently spent about 4 hours going at FEAR. Besides being a little jittery afterwards, I opened up my Catalyst Control Center and found my card to be running at 89 degrees Celcius.

I have no water cooling or anything fancy, just the regular stuff. It's very easy to OC with the Cat Center so I have both the GPS and GMS running at about 20 MHZ higher than normal.

Is 89 degrees too high? Should I worry about a burnt out card or am I still in the safe zone? Or can I keep it that way and just take breaks when I go into long gaming sprees.

**Niles Crane** · March 26, 2006, 02:05 AM

No, that's not too high, the safe temperature threshold on my Geforce 6600 is 145 degrees Celsius, it usually runs at around 40 under load.

**Timmius** · March 26, 2006, 08:33 AM

Originally Posted by Octavian

No, that's not too high, the safe temperature threshold on my Geforce 6600 is 145 degrees Celsius, it usually runs at around 40 under load.

Well 145 is definatey not a normal temperature. The maximum safe temerature of a graphics card is about 90 degrees celcius. So 89 degrees is a bit high, but it should be able to take it. But it isn't a bad idea to get a new cooler like an artic or zalman.

**BeastG33** · March 26, 2006, 10:25 AM

Okay, I'll look into some new cooling. How much would a quality, new cooler run me up? Could you possibly provide a link to one that would work well?

**Timmius** · March 26, 2006, 11:17 AM

Originally Posted by BeastG33

Okay, I'll look into some new cooling. How much would a quality, new cooler run me up? Could you possibly provide a link to one that would work well?

Well I have a zalman VF 700 AlCu. And that work really well. It's really quiet and it keeps my overclocked VC under 50 degrees. I costs about €15.
Or you could go for an artic silencer. They're also quit good and have the axtra that they blow the warm air out of your case. But the zalman does cool a little better (depending on your airflow actually). Also costs €15.

**BeastG33** · March 26, 2006, 01:22 PM

Okay thank you, both of those look good. I'm assuming they come with instructions because I've never replaced any of the original cooling before.

Also, my card idles at 60 degrees. That's too high for MSword, isn't it?

**Timmius** · March 26, 2006, 02:01 PM

Originally Posted by BeastG33

Okay thank you, both of those look good. I'm assuming they come with instructions because I've never replaced any of the original cooling before.

Also, my card idles at 60 degrees. That's too high for MSword, isn't it?

Well your card obviously generates a lot of heat so it makes sense that it idles at 60 degrees. But how is the airflow in you case? Because if that is bad, it could very well cause the very hot card. Make sure that you have good outtake fans.

Examples of a good fan setup for proper cooling:

remember the trick is not to add cool air, but to get rid of the hot air.

**Niles Crane** · March 28, 2006, 01:42 AM

Well 145 is definatey not a normal temperature.

I think NVIDIA meant 145 until the card melts.

**Timmius** · March 28, 2006, 07:21 AM

Originally Posted by Octavian

I think NVIDIA meant 145 until the card melts.

Yeah well, if it even thinks about starting to melt you are a long way from home. You are refering to the melting point of silicon (or silicium, dunno in english). But before your gpu will melt, you will have noticed a serious screw up because of electron migration. Which in turn is caused by strong field currents which knock electron out of their path.

**Zuwxiv** · March 28, 2006, 02:01 AM

Check Newegg (www.newegg.com), they have great deals and great reviews.

**Ahlerich** · March 28, 2006, 04:44 PM

when do pnp (not plug n play) transistors stop working. i thought at 100C and they are getting slower at 80+ already. but i dont know if i remember that right ..i just wonder now..little offtopic sorry

**Incinerate_IV** · March 28, 2006, 08:54 PM

How about just turning off the OC all together? With a powerful card like the X850XT, you have no need to OC, you can already run all the games at max settings smoothly, what more do you really need? Sometimes I find just a tiny OC can greatly increase the temperture of the CPU/GPU. So the safest, AND cheapest way, is to just leave your card at stock. Maby in a year or two when that card becomes slow you can OC it, but right now it will make no difference.

BTW, even though they claim the core can handle 145C, that doesn't mean it can go to 145C, the graphics card will fail way before that. Theres other factors to it too. I saw lots of pictures of the dye simply slip off the CPU/GPU because of overheating, the heat is so great it melted the solder.

**Drunken** · March 29, 2006, 09:29 AM

Can anyone tell me how to check the temperature of various compnents ?
Any programs you can recomend for it ?

Thanks

**OTZ** · March 29, 2006, 10:09 AM

If your components have temp sensors - then they should have supporting software...if not, I use Mother Board Monitor for CPU/Motherboard, and ATI Tool for the vid card...

**Drunken** · March 29, 2006, 10:10 AM

Thanks

**Gaius Baltar** · April 07, 2006, 10:01 AM

I have an NVIDIA Geforce 6800 256MB that runs on idle at about 54c. When I crank up RTW it will go as high as 68c. I have found that putting a small fan (4") on med high blowing directly onto the back of my CPU will decrease temps on the range of 10c.

One of the most important determinants of temp is ambient room temperature. If the room is AC cooled the card will run at a lower temp. If not, add back that 10c you got with the fan.

The system default setting is to warn me about over-temp at 127c, which I have never even come close to.

**westy159** · April 07, 2006, 06:36 PM

you've got me all worried though i really shouldnt be.

Geforce 6800XT 128mb (not the best but still a nice card, on par with a 6600GT i suppose except it comes with the stuff that the 6800 series was made with). Idles at 60 degrees celcius, no idea what temps are whilst gaming but i have a cheap Dell case with crappy airflow. Just a fan blowing on the CPU, the PSU has a fan and the card itself has a little fan. So nothing to keep everything else cool. Had the PC for 2 years now thugh with no poblem so i guess its ok.