[SOLVED] How to test if graphics card is dying?

[mcas19]

I have a GTX 1070 graphics card that I bought when it first came out, so it's about 5 years old. I play a ton of games and recently I can't get about 30-40 fps, and during really intense times it goes down to the teens or 20s. Is there a way to test if my graphics card is dying, or if it might be caused by another issue?

 

[BogdanH]

Looking purely on graphic card, the only reason I can only imagine for losing performance is cooling. In five years, quite some dust can collect on heatsink. If you are otherwise happy with 1070 (at current market, you need to be), then I suggest you carefully disassemble graphic card, give a GPU cooler a good cleaning and apply new thermal paste -cost you nothing and you can only benefit. Saying that, I don't believe graphic card would "age" over the time.

Other issue could be.. anything: PSU doesn't perform as new anymore.. or Windows became bloated over the time -is VERY worth to make clean install before you disassemble graphic card.

 

[mcas19]

Looking purely on graphic card, the only reason I can only imagine for losing performance is cooling. In five years, quite some dust can collect on heatsink. If you are otherwise happy with 1070 (at current market, you need to be), then I suggest you carefully disassemble graphic card, give a GPU cooler a good cleaning and apply new thermal paste -cost you nothing and you can only benefit. Saying that, I don't believe graphic card would "age" over the time.

Other issue could be.. anything: PSU doesn't perform as new anymore.. or Windows became bloated over the time -is VERY worth to make clean install before you disassemble graphic card.

I actually had to do a completely clean install about a month ago due to a windows 10 update effectively corrupting my SSD. I had to wipe it and to a clean install of just about everything in order to get it running again. I'll try the disassembly and cleaning though, but I've never done that to a graphics card before. Is it hard for a first-timer to do?

 

[BogdanH]

There are probably many videos about how to do that... one of them being from Gamers Nexus.
Note: if you're not sure that you can manage that, then don't do it!! Instead, try to find someone who can do that for you (friend, service,..)