8800ultra 109c temp

Ok, so I'm having a slight issue with this new 8800ultra.

The quality is much better, I could tell visually in like 3 games that there was less shimming and smoother. I ran into a slight problem though.. it seems the the card idles around 85c and gets upwards of 110c according to riva turner. I tried setting the fan speed to 100%.. but there was no change in sound on the fan or anything, it's still quiet. I set it to 25-60% (anywhere in that range) and it sounds almost as if the fan is off. 100% sounds like my 2900XT when it had 15% fan usage, I'm confused on why the card is so hot, even when no activity is being done and why it's overheating in d3d apps with no oc!

It is crazy that the idle temperature is over what people are seeing for load temperatures.

Further inspecting shows that the fan is moving.... but I still have very high temperatures and I cannot seem to speed up the fan at all, even when the card is on high temperatures.

What should I do? The back of my computer is getting very hot, including my sound card and the metal. Guild Wars crashed after about an hour of playing and I assume it is from the overheat.

I have the latest 163.71 beta drivers right now on Vista x64.


Also, I am not sure if it is relevent but I only scored 400 points higher on 3dmark06 than the 2900XT.

Poor case ventilation?

unblocked 120mm yate loon intake, with 120mm yate loon exhuast.

CPU blows sideways through a scythe infinity and through the exhaust.

DA750 PSU intake and exhaust

All wires are managed through the use of a modular PSU, rounded cables, and twist ties...

CPU temp is - 42c.....

I opened up my case to see if I could get a better feel of what's going on... I have cool temperatures in front of the card, cool temps above the card and at the top of the case... cool temps in front of the card on the bottom, but then when you get anywhere behind the card where it exhausts or below the card (and on my sound card) the temperature is HOT.

My sound card is picking up residual heat from the video card and the PCB board is super hot! The back of the computer where it exhausts is super hot too!

Seems like the card is causing all of the heat problems... but I am curious as to why. Perhaps it has really high voltage?


Taking off the side of the case also reduced my CPU temp to 35c, where it usually idled around 29-30c with the 2900XT.

I really think the 8800 ultra is creating heat around itself and heating up the rest of the computer instead of exhausting it out the back with high fan speed like it should.... this is weird.

Did the GPU temps drop with the case open?

Yes, from 80c to 69c. (still warm imo) at idle.


Any recommendations? A pci slot cooler I don't think would do anything but make it more crowded and just disperse the same heat throughout the case. Speedfan and rivatuner won't tell me the GPU voltage for some reason.

Still, why so hot at 100% fan speed, and why is the fan so quiet at full speed?

I remember reading somewhere that the heatsink may not be seated properly or something like that? Not making full contact?

Second that. I have no experience with the 8800 cards, but a card excessively overheating sounds like the heatsink isn't mounted properly. If you have a tube of arctic silver 5 you could remove it carefully, clean it properly and apply a tiny bit of AS5 then reseat and see what happens to temps.

Might void the guarantee though, so if it's another poor specimen you might want to rma or swap it at place you got it instead?

I would say the HS is seated just fine. He saw an 11°c drop when he removed the side of the case. It is a case air flow problem.

@op Does the back of your case have plenty of space from the wall/desk/etc? It could be that it cannot exahust the heat properly. What is your room temp? Post a pic of the inside of the case, it will help us diagnose your airflow problem.

Case airflow may be a problem but I am leaning more towards the HS and or fan not working properly.

You should definitely hear more noise from the fan at 100% over 15 - 20%

I can't hear my 8800 GTX's fan @ 100% over my TriCool's on 2 and YateLoons on 12v. Bring up Riva Tuner's hardware monitor, post your fan speed when it is on 100% duty cycle. Should 2500 RPM +.

His 2900XT never got that hot so i doubt its case ventilation. Its a card issue.

wow 109... geez. Mine is the msi oc version of the ultra and my problem is that mine is in a lian li pc-V1000 which is basically an upside down backwards mobo mounting scheme and as such, there is ZERO air flow that goes up to the top of the case to ventilate that card.

It would run for about 5 or 10 minutes with the case panel attached and then eventually artifact and lock up.

I pulled the side panel off and managed to get to around 20 minutes of playing time in obilvion or stalker and then artifacts.

Monitoring the temps, they shoot up to the high 80's *C so i used riva tuner to set fan speed @100% all the time. This worked sort of as sometimes it would lock up and sometimes it wouldn't and it seemed that oblivion and stalker were the only 2 that could get the thing to get hot enough to lock up.

My temp solution at the moment is one of the antec goose neck fans clipped onto the side of the case blowing in air at the card. Temps stay in the mid 70's *C under load and low 60's idle.

My permanent solution to this is to either back the clock speeds down (haha yeah right) or go by home depot, buy either a 92 or 120mm hole saw and open up a fan hole in the top of my case to blow down at the card.

There's plenty of room for either so now the question is whether to use a smaller fan with more rpm's or larger fan with lower rpm's. I want as little noise as possible and I have a pretty quiet version of each size fan I could use but not sure if the 120mm fan would flow that much more air or not...

I've got until 4pm to decide.

Riva tuner seems to be lacking most of the options I saw with my 2900XT.


I don't see any of the current voltages or fan speeds.

All I see are the clocks, fan speed %, and temperature. (only one temperature, no ambient or anything specific).

I took some pictures of the wire management, it appears like there is a slight crowded problem at the level of the CPU, but there are no fans at that level so it's actually quite cool in that area. The intake comes in just above the bottom hard drive and I have cleared that area completely of wires and can feel the air coming through to the VGA.

The current air temperature in this room is a comfortable 71-72 fahrenheit and stays that way throughout the day every day.


I personally think the problem lies directly in the design of the heatsink and fan combination. The box that surrounds the heatsink should be completely flush and without holes for ventilation so that all heat is drawn from the front intake and flushed straight out the back. This card is designed in a way that heat can escape through ventilation holes in the box and just flow directly into my case. Since I have a sound card a couple slots down from the video card, that blocks the flow for this excessive heat and it just makes a little pocket between the video card and the sound card of large amounts of hot air. Soon after that the video card is taking in it's own hot hair and slowly heating up the pocket without ever cooling down. I attribute this to poor heatsink design.

I would take the HS off and see if it is contacting the GPU properly. Its possible its on an angle and not hitting the entire surface. WHile you have it off put some AS5 on.

I was tweaking with the Riva tuner plugins a bit and the power setttings. I found a .dll worth implementing and now I have fan speed RPM and fan cyle %'s displayed along with ambient temperatures. I was still unable to find GPU voltage. Here are some idle temperatures and fan speeds with the side of the case off. Still seems high.

Default fan:




100% Fan:

it is high still, both gtx's and both gts's I had idle at 50c average with 85% fan speed and usually never hit 75c with OC's....
I know those temps are nowhere near normal and something is wrong, might be a contact issue. These cards dont run hotter than gtx by much. When i had mysecond gtx my buddy got an ultra and they were within a couple degrees with 85% fan.

good idea on the thermal paste.

I saw a review of the thermaltake 8800 cooler and when they took off the stock HSF, thermal paste was only covering like half the GPU...

Space pictures:










Edit: Ok, that's what I needed to know. I will take the card out, take it apart, and apply some paste and get some contact.

Horribe horrible setup.. You must give it to me