GTX 580 overheating playing High Performance games

Hello Sevenforums i got this problem playing high performance games..

When i enter the following games (below) my graphic hits 75 - 85 celcius (what worries me is the world of warcraft... It's only on HIGH and it goes to almost 90 celcius)

World of warcraft (high)
Battlefield 3 (Ultra)
Guild wars 2 (Ultra)


I was reading abit about this problem on google and saw a person telling another one that was having the same problem as me that a PSU could heat up your GPU if it is just under your GPU..

- My PSU is not far from my GPU and the fan on my PSU is almost just up against my GPU so i kinda wonder can a PSU really heat up my GPU that much?

My cousin got a very tiny case for his pc, he got a gtx 560ti and hits 65 - 70 celcius and goes 50fps in stormwind with 60+ players around him and 200 - 250fps outside stormwind. in stormwind i got 20 fps and in world i got 60 - 100 fps.

I got a Evga GTX 580 1534MB myself and should be alot better then the gtx 560TI.. He also runs 20 - 30 fps higher then me in Guild wars (60 - 90fps) i am running 30 - 50fps..


Any help would help me.. I've updated my specs and i will upload a picture of the inside of my pc when i get back my phone tomorrow! :)

Battlefield runs smooth but my pc is overheating.

Thx!

- Nexuhildrix

A 580 draws more power, and delivers far more performance than a 560 so it is not thta stragnge it will run warmer.

75-85C for a 580 is normal. Now, if you simply want it to run cooler theres a couple things you should do.

1. Clean out your case with some compressed air. Clean all the fans, filters and inside of everything well to get rid of as much dust as you can.

2. Improve airflow.
You'll want to make sure you have plenty of cool air cioming in, and towards the GPU from the front of the case. make sure there are no wires etc that can obstruct the airflow.

3. And lastly, you can use a program like eVGA Precision or Afterburner and create a custom fan profile. I have mine set to ramp up on the slope type settings. At 70C its running the fan at 60% which keeps it much cooler than the default speeds. Never really goes over 65-70 under heavy load.
Just depends on how cool you want it to run, how much airflow you have now, and how much noise you are willing to add to your PC. Faster fan speeds do improve temps, but increase noise a good deal too.


Also, on framerates.
You must consider the game settings used, as well as resolution. If hes running a lower resolution, it will be easier to get hifgher FPS with less for example.

Also, depending on your monitor, Vsync should be used.

heres why.
Lets say your monitor is 60hz. This means it can only display 60FPS, no matter what. If your GPU is drawing 10,000 FPS it doesnt matter. Only 60FPs gets displayed on the screen. It is impossible to show more, unless you have a higher refresh monitor. (for example if its a 120hz it can dispaly 120FPS)

The downside here is that your GPU is going 100% full load, to a monitor that can not physically display what its drawing. You are causing you GPU to work harder, AND create much more heat that it needs to. You will also find you probably have a lot of image tearing as well.

When you turn Vsync ON, the graphics card will cap the framerates and only draw what the monitor can display.
in our previous example of a 60hz monitor, it will keep it at a nice steady 60FPS. This may actually make the game feel smoother too. Or at least seems to me it does many times,

You will have no image tearing, your GPU will be humming along quietly and running significantly cooler.

Hello thx for your reply :)

I have been following the 3 steps you left me and almost done with the dust i need some tools to take the dust behind the CPU Cooler fan. :)

It did improve my celcius abit playing wow.. i am running 65 - 75C now in WoW. No difference on the FPS tho.. But i just looked up on google how to see the FPS on your screen and i found it only 60FPS not sure if it is the screen FPS tho i will leave a Screenshot i have also taken pictures of my pc inside just cleaning dust of it..

I took all the wires and added them together and then i removed some space under my HD so now it gets a really good airflow from front.. Nothing blocking it from front to GPU or PSU

Here is the 60 FPS screenshot The funny part is that in wow it sometimes jumps to 150 fps but dosen't feel any difference from the 40 - 60 fps



Front Fan - Really hard to see but there is straight airflow through and there is no wires in the way



Does the PSU really heat up the GPU.. Would this idea work? - On the picture below you will see horrible painting sorry but my plan was to add something there at the purple that will guide the heat to the front fan so it wont heat up my GPU that much.. Is that possible or is it risky?




On the following links there will be before and after cleaning and a few pictures of my pc inside, the fans i got in the case and the side !

http://i47.tinypic.com/dcf1xh.jpg
http://i49.tinypic.com/2ik4pyp.jpg
http://i48.tinypic.com/dsnz5.jpg
http://i45.tinypic.com/2gso93b.jpg
http://i48.tinypic.com/mubrme.jpg
http://i46.tinypic.com/2hwjwuo.jpg
http://i48.tinypic.com/23wl0no.jpg



There u go. I really hope you guys can help me out THanks! ¨

Cheers

Perhaps others have a different opionon on the matter of PSU adding heat but heres my take:

In short, No.
In your last picture there, the fan on the PSU is pulling air IN from the inside of the case. It blows the warm air out in the back of the case.

The 580 should be pulling air IN from the inside of the case as well, right below the GTX 580 logo.

So the 2 together should be creating a decent airflow between the PSU and GPU.

Also, I wouldn't think your power supply would be working that hard to create any significant heat anyway. 1050 watts (of a good brand like Corsair) is far more power than needed for a single GTX580, bit overkill actually. So it shouldnt be even breaking a sweat to run everything at full load, even overclocked.

Honestly, I do not think the Power Supply would be causing heat issues unless its defective. And if that was the case youd know by now, or at least I would think so.




Personally, I would work on cleaning out all the dust and optimising the airflow.
Even if that means investing 10-20 $$ on a more powerful front intake fan.

If your case has a place on the side panel for a optional fan, you may consider adding one there, pulling air from outside and blowing between the PSU and GPU.

And try turning on Vsync as mentioned before will help alot with heat in games where its capable of drawing 100+ FPS



Now, having said all of that (sorry I get off track and long winded sometimes) I would simply use eVGA Precision and make a custom fan profile.
65-75C is not at all bad for a 580. That fan profile with a bit higher fan speeds will drop to 60-70C or better. If the added noise doesnt bother you.
My 570 @ 60% doesnt bother me any as everything else covers it up. Although we all have different expectations on whats acceptable.

The refresh time simply means what the display is capable of showing. In other words, at 60hz it can only display 60FPS.

The FPS reading you see at 150FPS is what the 580 is actually drawing and sending out to your display. They are different numbers representing different things.


So, in the simplest terms, your 580 is drawing, at times, 150 frames per second and sending them to your display.
Since you display can only physically show 60FPS, the rest just gets thrown away.
(Those extra frames that get thrown away are essentially work done by the 580 thats wasted)

This is what causes image tearing. It's most noticeable when you turn. You may notice for example the image at the top off the screen is off from the bottom half for a second. Or literally see the tear line run across the screen when you turn.

Some people never noticethis happening. Others like me, its all I see and drives me nuts. Everytime it happens it draws my eyes directly to it. On the other side of the coin, some say with Vsync they get mouse lag or other issues.

Personally Ive never noticed any negatives in using it like this.
Thats not saying it doesn't happen .. only that I never noticed it. I do notice the tearing though.

This is why I suggest Vsync. It limits your card to drawing 60FPS and sending them (In sync) to the display. Even though it has far more power to do more, it can use that extra power to do other things.
For example, render frames ahead, Add filters such as Antistropy or AntiAlaising. And it will be able to do this extra work while still maintaining a steady framerate.
It also can help with maintaining a minimum FPS.

For example, without Vsync lets say it averages 60FPS. But will spike at 175FPS at times, and sometimes drops to 40FPS.
With Vsync you may see something more like ... 60FPS constant with occasional drops to 50 or 55FPS.


Make sense?
Again, there are a few who see this opposite as I do and will say never use Vsync. But I personally feel it should always be used as the advantaged far outwiegh the disadvantages. The only real way to know if its something that suits you as well is give it a try. Your GPU will not need to work nearly as hard either.