HD 4870 Fan-Control, Easy Workaround, Lowered My Temps 30C

Same results as OP for me....

Idle temp dropped from 81C to 51C!

That was with the fan set to 40% and hardly any increase in noise.
The change also lasted through rebooting.

This simple change is an absolute must for this card.
I didn't even consider testing any 3D until I got those temps down.

ATI needs to make the minimum fan speed 40% IMHO.
The stock slow speed just doesn't cut it for cooling on this card.
 
Is there any way to set a target temperature for the automatic fan speed control?

I'd prefer the fanspeed to be automatic and change based on overclocking and room temps and whether its idle or not. Currently setting 30% fanspeed is nice because it keeps the card nice and cool, however when I overclock this isn't enough I need more like 40-50% speed which is a bit too loud to be running all the time!

Does anyone know how to set the target temperature by hand?
 
Frostex said:
Is there any way to set a target temperature for the automatic fan speed control?

I'd prefer the fanspeed to be automatic and change based on overclocking and room temps and whether its idle or not. Currently setting 30% fanspeed is nice because it keeps the card nice and cool, however when I overclock this isn't enough I need more like 40-50% speed which is a bit too loud to be running all the time!

Does anyone know how to set the target temperature by hand?
Click to expand...

Quite a few have said automatic works, doesn't for me. You could also create two profiles, but that wouldn't be exactly convenient. Anyway this is hopefully just temporary and the OC Utility makers come up with something soon.
 
trying this out now.

edit: ok i tried this and it works great. automatic didnt work, had to use manual. with 40% there is no difference in noise yet a huge difference in temp. from about 78 to 55. thanks for sharing OP

im guessing its not safe to use this manual setting while gaming? also what is the max percent you can set your fan to? is even 100 fine?
 
Well, it's safe as long as you make 2 profiles, one for a faster fan speed to use for gaming, and of course remembering to switch to it. :) Just to play it safe, I turned down the speed of my GPU on my "default" setting, so that it wouldn't A SPLODE if I forgot to change profiles.
 
bitgod said:
Well, it's safe as long as you make 2 profiles, one for a faster fan speed to use for gaming, and of course remembering to switch to it. :) Just to play it safe, I turned down the speed of my GPU on my "default" setting, so that it wouldn't A SPLODE if I forgot to change profiles.
Click to expand...
good thinking. i too created a default profile and a gaming profile but didnt think to lower the gpu speed for safety.

so on my default profile i lowered the clock speeds all the way (500 / 790, maintaining original ratio of 1.58) and put the fan at 40, keeping temps at about 55C. and in the gaming profile i cranked the settings all the way up (700 / 1110 - again, maintaining the gpu to memory ratio) and put the fan at 60 with temps in the low 70s

hope nothin im doin is dangerous :D
 
at what ratio should i keep the gpu to memory clocks at? or does it matter? any golden rules to live by when it comes to this or something? im currently trying to keep it as close to the original ratio as possible. gpu noob here:D

thanks
 
InCogneato said:
trying this out now.

edit: ok i tried this and it works great. automatic didnt work, had to use manual. with 40% there is no difference in noise yet a huge difference in temp. from about 78 to 55. thanks for sharing OP

im guessing its not safe to use this manual setting while gaming? also what is the max percent you can set your fan to? is even 100 fine?
Click to expand...

I'm curious why it wouldn't be safe to use a manual fan speed, with higher RPM and cooler temps while gaming? Wouldn't it be safer than letting it run automatically at a low RPM and get really hot?
 
Grimspoon said:
I'm curious why it wouldn't be safe to use a manual fan speed, with higher RPM and cooler temps while gaming? Wouldn't it be safer than letting it run automatically at a low RPM and get really hot?
Click to expand...

because doesnt Automatic mean that the fan speeds up in accordance to the temperature? (nevermind the fact that the manually set speed is high or low)
 
It should speed up, but does it? That's what I'm not clear on with Catalyst as it stands. If our cards are running at 80 idle and 90+ under load - I would think that automatic or not, setting it to manual and keeping the temps under 60 would be far less dangerous that leaving it at automatic.

Maybe I'm just understanding things incorrectly...
 
Grimspoon said:
It should speed up, but does it? That's what I'm not clear on with Catalyst as it stands. If our cards are running at 80 idle and 90+ under load - I would think that automatic or not, setting it to manual and keeping the temps under 60 would be far less dangerous that leaving it at automatic.

Maybe I'm just understanding things incorrectly...
Click to expand...

well a quick test i did shows that it does not speed up at all. haha, how absurd.

anyway im loving the two Catalyst profiles idea. what a nice little program.
 
Typically I run between 45 / 50 while in game and 30 / 35 while on my desktop. I don't overclock, this is just to keep things safe and cool.
 
Grimspoon said:
Typically I run between 45 / 50 while in game and 30 / 35 while on my desktop. I don't overclock, this is just to keep things safe and cool.
Click to expand...
i'm assuming those are fan speed percentages, not temps, right? :p
 
My ears must be very sensitive, 40% drove me crazy. It was about 99 degrees in Northern California yesterday. My card was clocked at 790/1100 and 31% kept it 55 idle75 load.

I noticed a big audible difference going from 31% to 32%. Seems to be the sweet spot on the VisionTek card. The stock settings where set at 16% and I was getting crashes and lock ups in game.

Seems like it was rushed to market with half baked drivers. One would think this would get caught within the first hour of QA testing. :rolleyes:
 
sekira05 said:
What is the stock speed set at... 5%?

With all the supposed trouble people are having with this card and the *random* deaths, I'm getting nervous about installing this next week.
Click to expand...

the random deaths are from people flashing the bios's on them and such from what i read, mainly over @ xs.
 
snoops said:
My ears must be very sensitive, 40% drove me crazy. It was about 99 degrees in Northern California yesterday. My card was clocked at 790/1100 and 31% kept it 55 idle75 load.

I noticed a big audible difference going from 31% to 32%. Seems to be the sweet spot on the VisionTek card. The stock settings where set at 16% and I was getting crashes and lock ups in game.

Seems like it was rushed to market with half baked drivers. One would think this would get caught within the first hour of QA testing. :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Agreed, at 40% it was the loudest video card I've ever heard. Minor changes in percentages appear to be associated with random jumps in volume.
 
Thanks a ton for this thread, right after installation on Monday I set the fan speed to 55% and was able to do this:

www.students.uwf.edu/cmr15/gpuoc.jpg

Not one issue and the pc has been on the entire time. I'm hoping in the near future they increase the limits on how far we can oc these things with the CCC.
 
I tested different fan settings for fun. I was gonna do Idle temps too but figured it wasn't worth it for me. (I run the fan at stock speed btw)

Room: 25c

Furmark Full Load
Fan % RPM** Temp 1 Temp 2 Temp 3
30* 1840 94 102 97
40 2700 80 88 81
50 3290 78 85 79
60 3740 75 81 77
70 4070 73 80 74
80 4330 72 79 72
90 4550 71 77 71
100 4690 70 77 70

*Manually stopped run… High temps, looked almost peaked
** Fan speed at Idle and Load varied by ~20 RPM (Load RPM Shown)
 
I can't stand a loud computer so anything set above 30% fan speed for this HD4870 is too noisy and high pitch. I wish this card had the fan from my old 8800GTS 512. Those fans, even when set high, had a nice low woosh tone to them.

Setting the fan to 30% keeps my idle temp at 60c - right where I was with my 8800GTS/9800GTX.
 
Are they going to change idle clock speed on the 4850 with next driver release? 500mhz is alot higher than 300 when I had the 3870.
 
well, i set the fan speed on my VisionTek 4870 at 35% and i'm getting ~53C at idle and at MAX 60C under load when I play Half Life 2 and Test Drive Unlimited. It dosen't seem to go over 60C even when I've been playing for over an hour. Anyone know if I still should create another profile with a higher fan speed to use for gaming just to play it safe? Also, under "Current Clock Setting" it displays 500Mhz when i"m in Windows even though I got it set to 750Mhz on over-drive, I assume this jumps to 750 when I'm gaming, right?
 
Also, I read somewhere (cant remember where tho) some time ago that turning up the fan speed on vid cards wears out the fan which may cause the fan to fail and therefore have to be replaced. Anyone know anything about this?
 
mobusta1 said:
I dont see appdata in vista. Is it hidden? If it is how do I unhide it?
Click to expand...

Make sure you're looking under Local and not Roaming, double check path. Also make sure to go into Folder and Search Options, select View Tab, then button "Show Hidden Files and Folders".
 
Greg86 said:
well, i set the fan speed on my VisionTek 4870 at 35% and i'm getting ~53C at idle and at MAX 60C under load when I play Half Life 2 and Test Drive Unlimited. It dosen't seem to go over 60C even when I've been playing for over an hour. Anyone know if I still should create another profile with a higher fan speed to use for gaming just to play it safe? Also, under "Current Clock Setting" it displays 500Mhz when i"m in Windows even though I got it set to 750Mhz on over-drive, I assume this jumps to 750 when I'm gaming, right?
Click to expand...

I hammered mine with Fur Mark for an hour. Temps never went past 89C for me with fan at 37%.So I just have the one profile temp set and no problems. Up to you though, but yes creating a second profile for gaming would be safer. And yes fans ramp-up to the higher clocks when in 3D.
 
Greg86 said:
Also, I read somewhere (cant remember where tho) some time ago that turning up the fan speed on vid cards wears out the fan which may cause the fan to fail and therefore have to be replaced. Anyone know anything about this?
Click to expand...

No, almost everything I've read says it doesn't. The only thing you'll wear out is your eardrums. ;)
 
honestjohn said:
No, almost everything I've read says it doesn't. The only thing you'll wear out is your eardrums. ;)
Click to expand...

My friend's Sapphire 4870 came with an extra fan, which I thought was pretty strange. Though I have had video card fans crap out on me before, so I guess it doesn't hurt.
 
I tried it the first time and for some reason my temps were goin up, hit 90s from low 80s and i was freakin out. by the time i put my fan speed to 65 temps had reached 101. For some reason it didn't work the first time, so i deleted the profile and hit restore defaults. When I went to make a profile and edited it, the speed was set to 0 :(
I hope I didn't do any major damage.
After setting speed to 65, temps dropped from 101 to 60 in less than a minute.
Thanks a lot for this, I was at the original link when I first tried it, but actually got it to work when I clicked the [H] link in google :)
 
Injection of <3 said:
The fan at 100% cools really well. Couldnt break 60C after 10 mins of furmark (99% gpu load).
Click to expand...

Never mind the fact that it's loud enough to wake the dead at that setting.

chomnom said:
I tried it the first time and for some reason my temps were goin up, hit 90s from low 80s and i was freakin out. by the time i put my fan speed to 65 temps had reached 101. For some reason it didn't work the first time, so i deleted the profile and hit restore defaults. When I went to make a profile and edited it, the speed was set to 0 :(
I hope I didn't do any major damage.
After setting speed to 65, temps dropped from 101 to 60 in less than a minute.
Thanks a lot for this, I was at the original link when I first tried it, but actually got it to work when I clicked the [H] link in google :)
Click to expand...

Thermal failure won't occur until well over 100C in these cards. As long as it didn't stay there for long, the GPU and the other components should be fine.
 
I've got a new Sapphire 4870, and can control the fan using the manual option, but I have yet to get this hack working using the Automatic option. I'd really prefer to have my card monitoring itself automatically, but I want the minimum RPM to go up from 20 to 30. Yeah, 20. That's insanely low for a 4870.

I have OC'd mine to 790/1100 but I don't think that the VRAM needs to be quite so fast. I'm thinking about stepping it back to 790/1000 for the sake of reducing heat generation.

Any thoughts on either of these things?
 
Running dual OEM/ATI 4870s. (up from dual 3870 X2s that heated the damn room and would not OC).

Overdrive: 7900/1100 (no locks for over a week)

No Hack:
80C idle :eek:

Hack:
100% fan speed 49/50C idle

35/8% was the volume sweetspot for volume with my rig as well with idle temps at 58/59 idle and 73C under load (WAR beta).

Set to 50% is sounds like the old 2900HD I had in there, but I can get 53/4C idle, at 100% I can't seem to get lower than 46/47 (temps read for each card).

One plus side due to this it dawned on me that I was only overclocking one card (just put them in) - that's fixed now ;)
 
Mine was set at 4 by default on my Visiontek 4870, cranking it up to 100 has dropped my idle to 32 from 59, but it's just too loud. It looks like a value of 35 will be my number to where it blends in with the other fans, idling at 40 . I haven't tested it's load temps out yet.

Thanks for the info, big help
 
Maybe I'm just stupid.....or an ATI noob......or whatever.
But.....if you have Crossfire you need to haack the profile twice.
I was stupid and thought that following these great instructions BOTH my cards would speed up......oops.

Anyway......if you want to have both cards running cool, you will need to modify the profile under "fanspeedalgorithm_0"
and "fanspeedalgorithm_1"

the changes are identical, and in the same lines.......you just need to do it twice.

I'm just slow.:eek:
 
Anybody know why a profile to adjust the fan speed would'nt be created AFTER opening up CCC- enabling Overdrive- going to profile manager- and creating a profile- then checking the box for (All CCC settings prior to save) then activate? I did this in an attempt to create a profile for the purpose of adjusting my speed to 38%, but when I open C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\ATI\ACE... all I have is the.xml profile which is named default...NOT the name I gave it. I'm using the 8.8 driver. The card in my application idles at 76 degrees C and tops out at 83 degrees C...



<Profile>
<Caste name="Graphics">
<Adapter name="PCI_VEN_1002&amp;DEV_9440&amp;SUBSYS_05021002&amp;REV_00_4&amp;B71B61B&amp;0&amp;0008A" />
<Groups />
</Caste>
</Profile>
 
magoo said:
Maybe I'm just stupid.....or an ATI noob......or whatever.
But.....if you have Crossfire you need to haack the profile twice.
I was stupid and thought that following these great instructions BOTH my cards would speed up......oops.

Anyway......if you want to have both cards running cool, you will need to modify the profile under "fanspeedalgorithm_0"
and "fanspeedalgorithm_1"

the changes are identical, and in the same lines.......you just need to do it twice.

I'm just slow.:eek:
Click to expand...

Good point. This was mentioned earlier in the thread a few times and I never bothered to add it. Will do so now for newcomers.
 
milkweg said:
Appdata is hidden in Vista by default.
Click to expand...

You're absoluely correct as I just did a side by side with Windows Explorer and Explorer2 which is what I use for File Management. Apparently Explorer2 uses the default setting of "Show Hiiden Files and Folders" which is what led to the confusion. I wish I had realized this sooner as it actually belongs as a step in process rather than a troubleshooting tip. Changing main post to reflect this.
 
Think I need to improve my airflow. I had it set to 40% manual and it was getting up to 80C again in furmark. Nothing close to the other temps.

Is it safe to overclock with overdrive on the stock cooling you think?
 
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