MSI GTX 970 Gaming 4G suddenly idling much hotter

[tAKticool]

Hi everyone-

Long post... this community has always been absolutely outstanding to me and extremely helpful and was indispensable last summer (June and July 2015) researching and learning and getting answers before I purchased and built my (new at the time) hi-performance rig, based upon an Intel i7-4790K, ASRock Z97 OC Formula, and MSI GTX 970 Gaming 4G. So not the highest performance there is but sweet for someone who never even played any video games before I bought this.

Last fall I wound up downloading World of Tanks to test out the machine, and played it some. Usually gameplay would result in temps in the 60s. If you're familiar with these MSI cards, the fans kick on at 60. I believe I posted a few times back then looking for help, because the fans would kick on at 60, get it down to 58 or so, turn off, and it would happen again. I would solve this by just running the fan manually when gaming. No problems really. The GPU usually idles in the 30s. (The motherboard runs around 28, and the GPU would always be right over it. Mid 30s to 40s if I had a few different Chrome windows full of tabs open and playing some sort of video).

About a month or two ago I noticed temps getting higher so I decided to do a major cleaning of the machine... I bought a pack of canned air, took the tower outside, and went to town, and it was amazing to me the amount of dust. My Cooler Master Siedon 240M was just caked with dust, fans had a lot, I got a lot of dust out. Spent like 10 minutes and the entire can just getting dust out of the machine (and outside so it was not just going onto my desk and room again etc.)

Fast forward... a few weeks back I decided to try out World of Warships. I am not a video gamer but once in a while, I'll try some out like this. Nothing serious. Well I am pretty sure World of Warships does not tax the system *nearly* as high as World of Tanks, because in WoT the temps for my cpu and gpu would always be much, much higher than World of Warships.... HOWEVER...

I am noticing that now in the last week to two weeks that my GPU starts at about 30C upon boot, goes into the high 30s during just Chrome browsing, and goes up to 60 during gameplay - so I'll turn the fans on 50, 60, 75 even % and leave them on- but when I am done gaming, the GPU temps do not go down- they go up to 61 and stay there unless I turn the fan on manually. I can let it run for a few minutes, bring the temps down into the 40s, but when I cut the fan, the temp goes back up to 60-61 and stays there. Again, no more gameplay, no real usage, just idling/Chrome being open.


I am not sure what's up here. I sprayed a little more canned air to test, there is no major dust problem right now. So I can't believe it's a cleanliness issue. Could the thermal paste be going or bad? I use Arctic MX-4 on my 4790K/240M and it's been great -- but Google seems to suggest MSI uses very good thermal compound and it should not be an issue. There are videos involving the replacement of it, but I wanted to check with you folks about that first. I wonder if some issue is going on I am not considering. Case in point, I am up to 38C now simply having booted up, opened Chrome, (there are other tabs open but nothing involving a video or graphics really etc.) and typed out this post.


Any suggestions or anything like that? I just checked, it seems to suggest I have a 3 year MFGR warranty, but that would suck to have to take it out, send it back, etc. I have the integrated GPU on the i7 but obviously would not want to lose my card, especially if they take it and say either "nothing wrong" after 12 weeks or whatever it takes, or give me a refurb not necessarily new etc. etc.

Ok thank you very much for all your help. I am wondering about the thermal compound the most here, but certainly would like info if there is something else I am overlooking. Thanks again as always!@

 

[tAKticool]

Just to make a point quickly- if anyone's answer is "those temps are not too bad" -- I would agree, *except for the fact* that they were always much lower since i built it in Aug '15. They have gone up over the last few months, and more so in the last few weeks... so unless the concept is "they will go up naturally with age" like a person getting older and more frail, something seems to be up. Thanks again

 

[dudio]

Is the GPU throttling down when not running 3D Apllications? I believe it should, but sounds like it isn't.

 

[nukemaster]

I have used stock thermal paste for years without issues.

Can you test with NOTHING running. Just let it idle, but do not let it shut the screen off.

You can use Afterburner or GPU-Z to see the gpu use. As time goes by more and more tasks are offloaded to the video card. A good portion of web browsing is accelerated with your video card. These changes may be the reason things are hotter.

https://www.techpowerup.com/gpuz/
https://www.msi.com/page/afterburner

I also want to add that if you have a 144hz screen it may run the gpu hotter(120 for single screens is generally fine).

 

[ss202sl]

Drivers? there are fan settings in the drivers, and possibly updating(or downgrading) the drivers may have an impact on the fan, and in turn the temperatures.

 

[tAKticool]

I actually wondered if the latest two (there was two quite close together) Nvidia driver updates had something to do with it, because I THINK it started right around then now I that I think about it?

 

[tAKticool]

I believe I might have some more information if anyone was interested , or perhaps someone else finds this thread when having similar problem-


As people with Nvidia cards may know, whenever the driver is upgraded, (and you perform a clean install, which this forum & community has always maintained was the *ONLY* way to go and very important/necessary, so I have always done that) you lose all your Nvidia Control Panel "3D Settings" -- so I guess about 2-3 driver updates ago, (there was 3 in quick succession, one about a month ago, then another only less than week after, and one just yesterday? i think?) I was looking through the options of the 3D Settings, and I came across the Power Management Mode...

Now I always have used "single-display mode" in the Multi-Display/mixed-GPU acceleration tab, because I have only one GPU and one monitor/display. (I understand that the i7-4790K has an on-board GPU integrated but it has been my understanding I cannot harness it, it's one or the other, use the GTX 970 or the onboard integrated GPU, but I can't hook them together any way, so I just virtually ignore the CPU's GPU) But on the Power Management Mode, I have never bothered to mess with it, left it at "Optimal Power" -- however a few weeks back when upgrading the driver, I decided to Google it, and a bunch of people said to change from Adaptive to Prefer Maximum Performance .... basically saying "Why buy a powerful card if not to use it ?? I want it full power all the time!!" -- so I did.

I am convinced this -- in combination with one other thing -- made the temps go up. I am certain this made the temps go up somewhat, because when I changed them yesterday and rebooted the system, the temps have been better. There is something else though- the weather! I live in the South, and it's 95F for 8 months out of the year, and then 80Fs for another 3 months.... but in the 90-95s weather, the air conditioner is constantly going on and blowing cold air to keep the set temperature of 74F (23-24C) .... but now the temps for the last month or so have been 70s to 80s... and the air conditioner may still have the setting at 74, but it's coming on *a lot less* because of the outdoor temps being much more mild. So there is a lot less cool/dry air being blown through the house. I firmly believe this has something to do with the GPU temps, I believe I noticed this last year in Nov/Dec/Jan somewhat. Then when it "gets hot again" the AC will be forced to work a lot more, thus more cold air blowing through the house, more inherent cool air going through the machine and of course the GPU. (the CPU is liquid cooled so I believe it has less of an effect on that.)



Anyway that's my own personal take , maybe someone gets in the same situation and reads this and it helps them, who knows.

 

[nukemaster]

I have never used prefer max performance except on the few games(so not a global profile) that cause the card to clock from idle to full and cause issues(those older games are far and few between).

That would cause the card to stay at a higher clock(thus use more power and generate more heat) and would increase heat output for sure.