GPU temperatures in dialog.

[LordWeasel]

Anyone else getting unreasonable GPU temperature spikes during dialog?

Idle. After a few minutes in windows, typing up this post:
GPU Temp Idle: 46C (114F)
GPU Fan Speed Idle: 1920rpm

Outside dialog. Walking around inside LIMB clinic for a couple of minutes:
GPU Temp Max: 84C (183F)
GPU Fan Speed: 2700rpm

3DMark11 Benchmark tests:
GPU Temp Max: 87C (188F)
GPU Fan Speed: 2880rpm

Dialog. Spamming clinic clerk about 20 times, to get a good minute of dialog.
GPU Temp Max: 93C (199F)
GPU Fan Speed: 3960rpm
(Temperature dies back down to mid 80's and fan settles below 3000rpm seconds after dialog ends.)

Furmark 1.9.1:
GPU Temp Max: 95C (203F)
GPU Fan Speed: 5100rpm

No other game I have comes near to stressing my GTX480 temperature-wise like DX:HR does, although many of them are far more demanding. How come?

Tested:
DoF - No change
Tessellation - No change
DirectX 11/9 - No change, except that DX9 ramps the stuttering up by a factor of magnitude.

PS: Framerate is butter smooth btw, 60+ at all times. 280.26 drivers.

TEMP FIX: Using a framerate limiter does seem to put a leash on the game running completely out of control, for now :P

[Remnant]

The main difference I can think of is the DoF during convos. Try disabling it just to see if it helps, there might be an optimization issue with it.

[LordWeasel]

Nope, it's not the DoF or Tessellation. Same results.
This is so bloody weird. How on earth can it heat up my GPU without stressing it.

[Remnant]

Well it was worth a shot

Maybe someone else has an idea of what could cause this.

[LordWeasel]

Hope so.

I've read posts by people claiming DX:HR killed their graphics card, but I haven't believed them. Just hoping I won't have to eat those words now :P

[Remnant]

Yeah 93c is pretty hot, even for GPUs that are built to run like that. If you're worried, it might not be a bad idea to downclock your GPU a bit. Yeah its heresy, but could save you a nightmare.

[LordWeasel]

No change in DirectX 9 either, except horrendous stuttering (as described by pretty much everyone)

About downclocking, that's heresy indeed.

3DMark11 doesn't mistreat my GPU like this. I stood up for the porting of this game for a while, but as weirder and weirder bugs pile on, it just feels like my girlfriend has just given me 5 different STDs.

[Remnant]

I remember when Starcraft 2 launched there was an issue with the menus not being framerate capped (or something like that) causing unbalanced use of GPU resources and driving temps through the roof. I think I remember hearing about cards burning out from that so it wouldn't surprise me if DXHR managed to do it.

A contributing issue is power management in the GPU, and AFAIK nvidia is still doing a bad job of it - done in driver software rather than dedicated hardware which can react much faster to power and temp changes. This doesn't help much with software overextending the resources (furmark), but it can keep the chip from burning itself out under those conditions.

[LordWeasel]

Ran a 3DMark11 benchmark, just to make sure it didn't produce DX:HR levels of temperatures. And behold, it didn't, even if it doesn't push above 30fps stable once (averaging something closer to 22 fps).

Updated main post with results.

[LordWeasel]

Ran a Furmark, and I'm a bit surprised. Furmark only manages to push my card an additional 2 degrees (95C) before peaking. How on earth can DX:HR barely be beaten in terms of heat produced by Furmark, a program design specifically to push your card to its limits?

(Also updated main post and arranged tests in order of max temperature.)

I realize I'm pretty much talking to myself here, but someone out there must have similar issues
(And while I'm at it, why can't I change the visible title of the thread? I feel I may have been a bit unclear when starting the thread.)

[sea]

The game runs as fast as possible at all times. If you use a program like Dxtory to limit the game's framerate to 60 fps (or whatever you wish), it not only results in lower temperatures, you'll also get a more consistent image due to fewer framerate fluctuations.

[LordWeasel]

Originally Posted by sea

The game runs as fast as possible at all times. If you use a program like Dxtory to limit the game's framerate to 60 fps (or whatever you wish), it not only results in lower temperatures, you'll also get a more consistent image due to fewer framerate fluctuations.

Yeah, I just thought of maybe doing that. Been up for over 24 hours, was a bit hazy, cheers
Now I can set the fps to 59 and enable vsync aswell, without extreme mouselag. Glorious!

[ryamkajr]

It does not stress my GPU at all (AMD 5850), but there are times when the fan on my CPU spins up and it sounds like a lawnmower.

[Moork]

Originally Posted by Remnant

... A contributing issue is power management in the GPU, and AFAIK nvidia is still doing a bad job of it...

OFF-TOPIC a bit but yeah, NVidia still are doing a very bad job of power management, their latest 500 series are orders of magnitude worse than AMD/ATI's 6xxx range of cards according to tests I've seen run. They require far more power, so if you are concerned about your electricity bill or the environment, best go for AMD/ATI. You can run effectively three 6870's (6870 x2 + 1 x 6870 in X-Fire) far more cheaply than 2 570's in SLI, according to Tom's hardware , (425 watts vs. 614 watts @ load) which is just ridiculous.

[Remnant]

Originally Posted by Moork

OFF-TOPIC

If there is indeed some unknown bug that can cause over-utilization, I figure a kind warning to take precautions is perfectly in order. My comment about their power management was focused on the fact that the driver can't react fast enough to rapid changes. Under most circumstances this is fine, with fans going full blast and all. But under the wrong conditions a software driver just cant throttle it quick enough.

[LordWeasel]

I'd hate to be alarmist, but it could be enough to kill video-cards already "living on the edge".
I've not seen a single confirmation that this is in fact a bug yet though.