The Doctor helps you keep your cards cool, upgrade your GPU, heal a hurting HDD, and maintain your cores
Feeling The Heat
I’ve been a PC gamer since 1998 and a reader of Maximum PC for almost 10 years. I recently built my own system, mimicking the Turbo build in your February 2015 issue. It was easier than I could’ve ever imagined, and much faster than the heavily upgraded Alienware Aurora I bought in 2008. My Core i7-5820K and dual GTX 970 Gaming 4G LE cards are a perfect combo for the MSI X99S SLI Plus mobo with 16GB of G.Skill DDR4 SDRAM. Everything is great except for the heat that the second 970 cannot dissipate. I packed all of my goodies in a Rosewill Gaming ATX full-tower case and added an extra Noctua 120mm fan on the bottom for added air flow. Without overclocking, and with all the case fans running at 100 percent, GPU number two gets up to 91 degrees Celsius. I know why it’s running hot. There’s little room between the cards. What else can I do besides water cooling to keep the temps down? –Ssgt_Frag_Factor
The Doctor Responds: Welcome to the world of multi-GPU troubleshooting, staff sergeant. Two GTX 970s become an incredibly powerful force… when they’re working together harmoniously. But a number of factors can affect an SLI- or CrossFire-equipped platform, from hardware considerations to more complicated software issues.
Axial-flow fans like the ones on your MSI cards are exceedingly popular because they’re quiet. They also exhaust all of their waste heat back into your case, though. That’s why the Doc favors centrifugal fans, which draw air in and typically push it out vents in the rear I/O bracket. Compounding the problem, your bottom card has very little room to “breathe,” and the air it’s pulling in through that narrow slit is already warm. Because MSI’s X99S SLI Plus won’t let you relocate either 970—they have to live in PCI_E1 and PCI_E3—so you’re stuck with the physical arrangement you’re currently using.
Armed with the knowledge that two high-end GPUs are heating up your PC’s internals, optimizing airflow becomes the priority. You mentioned case fans running at full-speed—but what direction are they pointing? Create a front-to-back stream with intake fans up front and exhaust in the back. And experiment with custom fan profiles for your graphics cards using MSI’s Afterburner software, spinning them up at lower temperatures. You could always try underclocking and undervolting as well. Both techniques (especially combined) will limit the heat those cards put out.
Unfortunately, your bottom board’s cooling issues are almost assuredly affecting its maximum GPU Boost frequency, robbing you of some performance. That’s not an easy conundrum to solve given your components. But the symptoms can be mitigated. The best way for others to combat this is by choosing a mobo with one extra space between PCIe slots designated for graphics (ASRock’s X99 Extreme4 is one example) and videocards that dump hot air outside of the case.
ASRock’s X99 Extreme4 lets you install two double-slot graphics cards with an extra space between them.
Time To Upgrade?
Doc, I’ve some extra cash and have been thinking about getting a Radeon R9 270X to pair with my 7870 GHz Edition. The Internet is fraught with threads on CrossFire issues, but I thought there was a driver update a while back that significantly improved the situation, in addition to the Omega driver’s features. It seems a 270X would be a relatively cheap upgrade for what could be a healthy performance boost. Also, since the 270X has faster memory, should I overclock the 7870 to match or leave everything alone? What would the Doc recommend? My system’s specs include Windows 7, a Core i5-3570K, MSI’s Z77AGD65, a Gigabyte 7870 GHz Edition card, 8GB of DDR3, and a 750W Corsair PSU. –Daniel Hill
The Doctor Responds: I’m going to share a secret, Daniel. But first let’s do some math. An R9 270X with 2GB of GDDR5 sells for $175 on Newegg. A Radeon HD 7870 GHz Edition fetches $100 to $120 on Ebay. So, you could spend $175 and build a sweet dual-card Pitcairn/Curaçao-based array. Or, you could sell the 7870, add it to your new-card budget, and snag an R9 290 with 4GB.
Now, the secret: the Doc’s lab is equipped with some very sophisticated testing equipment, which has uncovered many multi-GPU issues over the years, most involving CrossFire. To AMD’s credit, its drivers are far better now than at any time in the past. The company listened to its customers and added features like frame pacing to smooth the rate at which content is displayed on-screen. But CrossFire is a moving target, requiring profiles for new games and optimizations for new platforms, on top of the development that goes into addressing the technology’s other challenges.
Whenever the Doc can, he favors single-GPU setups to circumvent all of that. The two cards you’re considering in CrossFire will almost certainly be faster than an R9 290 in measures of average frame rate. They’ll also consume more power, generate more heat, occupy more space on your motherboard, and create more noise. Don’t forget to consider memory! At resolutions up to 1920x1080, 2GB is appropriate. Should you wish to game on a QHD or 4K monitor, though, stepping up to 4GB makes sense. The same goes for Eyefinity setups.
At least in the Doc’s opinion, multi-GPU configs appeal to enthusiasts who can’t get enough speed from one card. You expect to weather occasional hiccups in the name of unmatched performance. Bargains do abound for mainstream gamers combining the muscle of capable graphics processors. The GeForce GTX 460 was notoriously attractive in SLI, for example. You’ll make certain compromises in the process though, and sometimes it’s more fun to simply enjoy a trouble-free experience on the day a game launches.
Unhealthy Hard Drive
Whenever my hard disk is active, it starts buzzing. I’m thinking that it’s going to go kaput soon. I performed a CHKDSK, but the system does not report anything adverse, saying my drives are healthy. This is an old computer (Windows XP), but I don’t have the money to purchase a newer system at this time. However, I might be able to afford a new hard disk and transfer everything to that media. Or should I buy a hard disk for the box I already have? Does the buzzing mean that the current hard drive is going to take a permanent vacation? –Eric Caruso
The Doctor Responds: The Doc maintains a multi-disk network-attached appliance with all of his important files, so he’s all too familiar with the sounds mechanical drives can make when they’re about to become doorstops. Forgive the seemingly silly question, but are you certain the noise is coming from within the hard drive, and not some piece of your chassis around it?
You already know that hard disks employ platters spinning very, very quickly. They accelerate, they decelerate, and the read/write heads dart around in there, too. All of this creates vibration, which is most pronounced when the drive is active. And if your disk isn’t properly isolated from the case holding it in place, those vibrations can turn into a high-frequency buzz. They can also negatively affect storage performance or even cause I/O errors. Depending how your hard drive is mounted in your chassis, consider installing rubber grommets to better isolate the disk from its cage.
If the issue really is internal, then the noise you’re describing might best be described as a chatter, and it indeed precedes (or is accompanied by) failure. In either case, save your personal data to an optical disc, thumb drive, or cloud-based service right away. Google will give you 15GB for free through its Drive service. Whether your hard drive is healthy or not, the Doc gets the sense you may not have your important information protected against an unforeseen disaster.
With that said, in the Doc’s opinion, an inexpensive hard drive replacement is always worthwhile, even for an old PC, if it keeps that machine running until you can upgrade to something quicker.
Deepcool manufactures an enclosure that not only minimizes vibration, but also keeps your 3.5-inch hard drive running cool.
Working Your Cores
My CPU is an AMD Athlon II X3 455. After I got it a few years ago, I was able to unlock the die’s fourth core. Problem is, with the forth core enabled, my temps skyrocket, and undervolting even to the point of instability isn’t helping at stock speeds. It was running at 65 degrees at full load originally, which I didn’t worry about because it was never at 100 percent utilization.
But now I want it to fold 24/7 and the temps are up to 69 degrees at full load. That’s 18 degrees higher than when it was a triple-core config. I don’t plan on overclocking with my current board, so I’m not sure if I should just reseat it with some AS5 or just bite the bullet and buy a cooler I can take to another system down the road. What do you think? –James Lloyd
The Doctor Responds: The Doc remembers fondly going through his first tray of Phenom II X4 and Phenom II X2 CPUs, checking to see which Deneb-based dies ran stably with additional cores or cache switched on. AMD never made it clear how many of its cut-down models suffered imperfect silicon, or if it remarked processors from higher-end bins to meet market demand for the cheaper parts.
We do know from testing that a great many of the deliberately handicapped chips only worked with certain on-die resources disabled. Those that could be enhanced in some way often demonstrated other strange behaviors—inexplicable crashes, for example, or abnormally high temperatures like you’re seeing.
That your Rana-based Athlon II X3 still operates with all of its cores enabled is definitely cool (and quite a testament to the value of those CPUs). But the Doc wouldn’t recommend spending money chasing rising temperatures. A beefier heatsink may help in the short term, but the phenomenon you’re describing will only worsen over time. And by then, even a three-core config could be dicey. Now’s the time to go easy on this aging component until it can be replaced.
Sure, if you’ve some thermal paste handy, feel free to pop your sink and reapply. Cleaning off a crusty old layer could help bring your peak temps down a bit. But then think about dialing back to three cores until it’s time to upgrade. An affordable Pentium G3258 or Athlon X4 760K would give you a lot more speed, and a modern graphics card—even a mainstream one—would augment your folding performance far more than that one missing core.
Submit your questions to: doctor@maximumpc.com
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