Do all 7x cards have coil whine?

x01 · Feb 1, 2014

I just sent back a Sapphire 7870 Ghz Edition card for coil whine.

The card would admit a high pitch sound/buzzing noise depending on what was on screen. Turning on v-sync/using a framerate limiter reduced the noise, but not entirely.
The noise was definitely coming from the card and not the PSU.

The 6850HD I'm using currently makes no noise at all.

I really want to upgrade the card, but from what research I've done it really sounds like many people have similar issues with 7 series cards.

Maybe could anyone suggest a different brand or similarly priced card?
Also, I'd be interested in your experience with this.

manu2b · Feb 1, 2014

None of mine have coil whine (8 in total: 280x's, 7970 and 290x).

The only cards with coils whine I got were a GTX580 and a GTX780.

x01 · Feb 1, 2014

manu2b said:
None of mine have coil whine (8 in total: 280x's, 7970 and 290x).

The only cards with coils whine I got were a GTX580 and a GTX780.

Would you mind telling me the brand/version of your 7970?
Thanks.

manu2b · Feb 1, 2014

They are all Sapphire.

Woomack · Feb 1, 2014

All 7790/7850/7870 that I was testing had coil whine. Worst were Sapphire 7850/7870. One of reasons why is better to pay some more for non-reference card with improved power section.

x01 · Feb 1, 2014

Woomack said:
All 7790/7850/7870 that I was testing had coil whine. Worst were Sapphire 7850/7870. One of reasons why is better to pay some more for non-reference card with improved power section.

sounds about right.

Got an idea of a good non-reference 7870?

thx.

manu2b · Feb 1, 2014

^never had any 78x0 card. Only 7970's and 280x's.

Did you have coil whine with yours?

freeagent · Feb 1, 2014

Ive had a few nvidia and ati cards that had coil whine.. super annoying. I currently have a galaxy that whines. XFX, BFG, Zotac, EVGA, Sapphire, Galaxy, and maybe even an Asus.. Im pretty sure I am missing another ati label, its been awhile.. I thought I heard a dab of nail polish on the offending part helped with the problem.. Or it could have been hot glue..

Woomack · Feb 1, 2014

Reference MSI are bad lately ( so count all except lightings

). From AMD cards almost only these cheaper series. I haven't heard much from any 7970 but I don't know what about reference.
ASUS DC2 cards are great so far. All silent.
HIS R7 240/250 had no coil whine but I haven't been testing anything else from HIS in last ~2 years.
Right now best is to get R9 270X from some better, non-reference series. Even one phase more is usually helping and most of these cards are in similar price.

iLoki · Feb 2, 2014

I had an XFX Black Edition 7970 and it didn't have any coil whine. In contrast, my R9 290X does have some, but its nearly inaudible.

anthonyg45157 · Feb 2, 2014

Interesting, my xfx 7970 had coil whine, my gtx 780 lightning on the other hand has none. Or I just can't hear it.

Janus67 · Feb 2, 2014

My 7970 lightning had mild coil whine but only in extreme circumstances (1000+ fps in benchmarks etc)

peanutbudder · Feb 2, 2014

My Asus DC2 7970 had really bad coil whine when I first installed it. I just upped the voltage and left it on the Crysis menu screen, 2500+fps for two hours and never heard it again. On most cards I have owned I always hear coil whine until I break them in and the worst card was a 560ti that whined for three weeks until it finally stopped.

Woomack · Feb 3, 2014

For me coil whine stops only when I sell the card or kill it

... right now I have 2xGTX780 DC2, GTX580 GB OC and R7 250 HIS ... all nearly silent.

Bisquit · Feb 5, 2014

No coil whine here though I wouldn't recommend gigabyte since mine overclocks pretty poor and most are voltage locked.
Solid card though.
I had some coil whine with a sapphire card but that's a while back. will keep an ear open for the other pc with the sapphrie 290 tri-x, we installed it last night and most if not all is rather silent in that system.

Niku-Sama · Feb 5, 2014

my MSI twin Frozor 7870 doesn't whine at all. even over clocked. my 5770 whined pretty bad though and it was a sapphire I think

x01 · Feb 6, 2014

Got an R9 270x instead.
There is some coil whine in a few games (in window mode) but no coil whine at all in full screen with vsync (the 7870 made a constant buzzing in all situations.)

Mpegger · Feb 6, 2014

Have you tried a different PSU? Coil whine could be caused by a poorly regulated PSU output, and isn't necessarily the CPU, mobo, or video cards fault.

x01 · Feb 6, 2014

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if it was the PSU or motherboard having an issue wouldn't the coil whine come from those and not the card?

TeknoBug · Feb 6, 2014

Nope, have you had a look at the PSU?

Do all 7x cards have coil whine?

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