Laptop GPU overheating

[uchomaca]

Hi!

I've recently started having problems with severe GPU overheating with temperatures going to 100°C before great performance drop. The GPU starts heating rapidly within just few minutes of launching up basically any game. CPU temperatures are perfectly fine.

Yesterday, I solved the problem with applying thermalconducting paste to GPU and everything was smooth again, with temperatures not rising above 75°C and performance at maximum.
Anyway, today I rebooted my laptop and I'm back where I was. What am I supposed to do?

I'm using ASUS NS73-SV laptop with NVIIDIA 540M.

 

[middlemarkal]

get a laptop cooling pad like this : http://www.newegg.ca/Laptop-Cooling-Pads/SubCategory/ID-319
clean the heat sink.

 

[KryssNova]

Don't use it at Soft Surface (in that case get a cooling pad), be sure the Fans are active/working, and clean the heatsink for CPU/GPU and heat venting holes from all the dirt/dust that accumulated.
Just putting it out there, but don't OverClock it, that's rubbish on Laptop cause the GPU will run to hot.
and Fermi(gpu you have) are known to be hot, still not that hot, and over 90 degres it's way to hot so you have to do something about it.
But there could be many different causes, and I'm not sure, we will be able to help you out.

 

[uchomaca]

Don't use it at Soft Surface (in that case get a cooling pad), be sure the Fans are active/working, and clean the heatsink for CPU/GPU and heat venting holes from all the dirt/dust that accumulated.
Just putting it out there, but don't OverClock it, that's rubbish on Laptop cause the GPU will run to hot.
and Fermi(gpu you have) are known to be hot, still not that hot, and over 90 degres it's way to hot so you have to do something about it.
But there could be many different causes, and I'm not sure, we will be able to help you out.

I've ordered a cooling pad already, but I'm afraid it won't affect this massive overheating too much. I've cleaned the laptop from dust and fan is running properly. I have not overclocked at all, everything is stock. The laptop is a bit old (around 3 years already, but it still does not explain it).

 

[photonboy]

Reasons for overheating GPU:

1) You're pushing the GPU harder than you normally would.

2) The cooling fan is defective.

3. The heatpipe or other part of cooler is damaged.

4) Paste issue (not an issue since redone)

5) Airflow getting blocked.

Based on what you've said I can't see any obvious reason except for a defective FAN especially since you state it worked for a while just fine then went bad again.

Perhaps the fan isn't working as well as it used to and may even be seizing at times.

 

[KryssNova]

What Power Options setting are you using?
If on High Performance, then I would like you to go to Power Options>Change Plan Settings>Change Advanced Power Settings>Processor Power Management Tab
- there I would like you to check all the tabs,
- Tab (important): Minimum Processor State
is set to "5%" on both, you don't want your CPU running at Max performance at all times without reason.
- Tab (important): System Cooling Policy
is set to "Active" on both, you don't want for your CPU to run without cooling.
- Tab (optional): Maximum Processor State
is set to "100%" on both
If you're settings are different than those, I want you to change to those, and click "Apply".
Since the heat sink for CPU and GPU is probably connected together, it could be that the heat sums up together.
Also if you're using your own 3D settings in "nVidia Control Panel", then you want to try changing "Power Managment Mode" to "Adaptive".

Otherwise, if you already had those settings for CPU, and it supposly worked correctly before.
It could be defective Fan/s or damaged heatsink.

 

[photonboy]

VSYNC and heat:

I'm not saying there isn't anything broken, but at least with VSYNC you have some control. This creates a frame rate cap which can significantly reduce the amount of heat.

The best way to tweak would be like THIS:

1) Run FRAPS and the game
2) Turn off VSYNC
3) Tweak so you are averaging at least 10% above the target refresh (i.e. 66FPS)
4) Turn on VSYNC

By lessening the amount of processing you can significantly reduce the heat and fan noise. On a laptop, running at 90% instead of 100% is pretty significant.

Other:
Adaptive VSYNC is a great choice. It works the same as VSYNC if you can output above the target refresh but if you can't it just auto turns VSYNC OFF (so you'd synch to 60FPS with no screen tearing and slight sluggishness or else run below 60FPS but with some screen tearing (significant tearing in some games minor in others).

VSYNC OFF again though means you have no artificial frame rate cap to reduce heat.

AMD users can enable the same feature with RadeonPro per game. I think it's called "dynamic" VSync.

There's also a "HALF" Adaptive VSync method which synchs to half the frame rate instead. It can make sense especially in slower games like CIV5 or whatever. So you'd run at 30FPS on most laptops.

 

[uchomaca]

What Power Options setting are you using?
If on High Performance, then I would like you to go to Power Options>Change Plan Settings>Change Advanced Power Settings>Processor Power Management Tab
- there I would like you to check all the tabs,
- Tab (important): Minimum Processor State
is set to "5%" on both, you don't want your CPU running at Max performance at all times without reason.
- Tab (important): System Cooling Policy
is set to "Active" on both, you don't want for your CPU to run without cooling.
- Tab (optional): Maximum Processor State
is set to "100%" on both
If you're settings are different than those, I want you to change to those, and click "Apply".
Since the heat sink for CPU and GPU is probably connected together, it could be that the heat sums up together.
Also if you're using your own 3D settings in "nVidia Control Panel", then you want to try changing "Power Managment Mode" to "Adaptive".

Otherwise, if you already had those settings for CPU, and it supposly worked correctly before.
It could be defective Fan/s or damaged heatsink.

I did it and its better, but not perfect. Today i got cooling pad and temperature is much better. I think that my fan isnt OK so for now problem solved. Thank you very much guys, next week i will check my heatpumps and my fan, and will solve the problem somehow.