[SOLVED] GTX 970 on full load sometimes hits 94C hot spot ?

John Malik

Commendable
Dec 18, 2020
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3
1,545
Hello. I have a zotac dual fan gtx 970 and i noticed that temperatures sit between 79-80c under load which is completely normal for gpu turbo boost but hot spot reaches womping 94,9c sometimes. I changed thermal paste about 2 months ago, thermal pads were fine so i didn't replace them. Should i be concerned about hot spot? Any advise would be helpful.
 
Solution
Hello. I have a zotac dual fan gtx 970 and i noticed that temperatures sit between 79-80c under load which is completely normal for gpu turbo boost but hot spot reaches womping 94,9c sometimes. I changed thermal paste about 2 months ago, thermal pads were fine so i didn't replace them. Should i be concerned about hot spot? Any advise would be helpful.

Just wondering, what thermal paste did you use? Aftermarket thermal pastes aren't as long lasting as the OEM ones in GPU use. My KPx runs a tad (like 2 degrees) hotter than when I repasted my GPU 2-3 months ago. Der8auer also states he recommends 1-year interval for replacing GPU thermal paste with Kryonaut. The less viscous it is, the more likely it pumps out from under the...

iPeekYou

Distinguished
Jul 7, 2014
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18,790
Hello. I have a zotac dual fan gtx 970 and i noticed that temperatures sit between 79-80c under load which is completely normal for gpu turbo boost but hot spot reaches womping 94,9c sometimes. I changed thermal paste about 2 months ago, thermal pads were fine so i didn't replace them. Should i be concerned about hot spot? Any advise would be helpful.

Just wondering, what thermal paste did you use? Aftermarket thermal pastes aren't as long lasting as the OEM ones in GPU use. My KPx runs a tad (like 2 degrees) hotter than when I repasted my GPU 2-3 months ago. Der8auer also states he recommends 1-year interval for replacing GPU thermal paste with Kryonaut. The less viscous it is, the more likely it pumps out from under the cooler.

That's my guess about your hotspot. I'm not entirely familiar with how GPUs report their temps, whether as an average from its die, its case, or the hottest point of its chip; but if it's as an average of any value with you noticing a hotspot near the throttle limit, it makes sense for it to be not contacting the cooler properly.
 
Solution

David0ne86

Prominent
Mar 11, 2021
424
113
440
Hotspot will always be in the range of 90 degrees. Altho 94 might be a tad high, its not something i would worry TOO much. See how it goes, if time goes by and it keeps increasing, it might be that you applied way too little thermal paste or the opposite, and it got smushed all to the sides and left little to none on the dye itself.
 

Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
That's my guess about your hotspot. I'm not entirely familiar with how GPUs report their temps, whether as an average from its die, its case, or the hottest point of its chip; but if it's as an average of any value with you noticing a hotspot near the throttle limit, it makes sense for it to be not contacting the cooler properly.

NVIDIA GeForce GPUs feature hotspot temperature measurement akin to AMD Radeon ones, according to an investigative report by Igor's Lab. A beta version of HWInfo already supports hotspot measurement. As its name suggests, the hotspot is the hottest spot on the GPU, measured from a network of thermal sensors across the GPU die, unlike conventional "GPU Temperature" sensors, which reads off a single physical location of the GPU die. AMD refers to this static sensor as "Edge temperature." In some cases, the reported temperature of this sensor could differ from the hotspot by as much as 20°C, which underscores the importance of hotspot. The sensor with the highest temperature measurement becomes the hotspot.

GPU manufacturers rarely disclose the physical locations of on-die thermal sensors, but during the AMD Radeon VII, we got a rare glimpse at this, in a company slide, with the sensors being located near components that can get the hottest, such as the compute units (pictured below). Igor's Lab put out measurements of the deviation between the hotspot and "GPU temperature" sensors on a GeForce RTX 3090 Founders Edition card. There's a much narrower deviation between the two (between 11-14°C), and than the one between hotspot and Edge temperature on an MSI Radeon RX 6800 XT Gaming X Trio (which posts a 12-20°C difference).
link

the actual source - https://www.igorslab.de/en/also-the...e-first-measurements-and-comparison-with-amd/

I don't know about older cards as the feature to see Hotspot only got added to HWINFO in Feb so where sensors are might be the same as before? Its hard to say.
 

iPeekYou

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Jul 7, 2014
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Just wondering, what thermal paste did you use? Aftermarket thermal pastes aren't as long lasting as the OEM ones in GPU use. My KPx runs a tad (like 2 degrees) hotter than when I repasted my GPU 2-3 months ago. Der8auer also states he recommends 1-year interval for replacing GPU thermal paste with Kryonaut. The less viscous it is, the more likely it pumps out from under the cooler.

That's my guess about your hotspot. I'm not entirely familiar with how GPUs report their temps, whether as an average from its die, its case, or the hottest point of its chip; but if it's as an average of any value with you noticing a hotspot near the throttle limit, it makes sense for it to be not contacting the cooler properly.

While I respect Der8auer, Kryonaut is among the best there is. And as it thick, probably the best choice other than Conductonaut. The thermal paste GPU AIBs use is nothing special. And the best thing you can do is keep the fins blown out from dust build up. In fact some video cards contact is built so bad they overheat out of the gate. (IE: 5700XT reference design due to bad die pressure)

I've had several high end video cards overclocked for 7+ years and never suffered overheat issues.

So with respect to Der8auer, when everything you do is built around disassembling GPU's and overclocking, it's a lot like being a hammer. Everything becomes a nail even if it's not meeded.

95C is reasonable.
 
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iPeekYou

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Jul 7, 2014
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While I respect Der8auer, Kryonaut is among the best there is. And as it thick, probably the best choice other than Conductonaut. The thermal paste GPU AIBs use is nothing special. And the best thing you can do is keep the fins blown out from dust build up. In fact some video cards contact is built so bad they overheat out of the gate. (IE: 5700XT reference design due to bad die pressure)


95C is reasonable.

Not special in performance, but they tend to be thicker than our stuff. Long lasting, if not as good in thermal conductivity.

Yeah 95° is fine, just riding on the limit is all.