High Ambient Temps?

[Reckman]

Hey has anyone had experience running cards at highish ambient temps, say 75 to 85 deg F

Getting into summer, wondering about mining outside

[Isokivi]

I worked with similiar conditions last summer it's a long and rambly thread, but Im sure if you bother to read trough it you will atleast avoid some of the mistakes I ended up fixing and working around. I believe the peak ambient temp's I delt with were around 90-100F.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=76008.0

[Reckman]

I worked with similiar conditions last summer it's a long and rambly thread, but Im sure if you bother to read trough it you will atleast avoid some of the mistakes I ended up fixing and working around. I believe the peak ambient temp's I delt with were around 90-100F.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=76008.0

cool thanks, i had seen it but glazed over it with the title refering to the artic

[Bitsaurus]

I was mining in an commercial office last year (cubicle style). I had to close the door to the room and ambient temps went over 90F on most days.  One day it hit 123F in that room - was painful to walk in there.  Needless to say one of the newer 6950s I had died after just 3 months.

[scifimike12]

This is where undervolting comes into play.  Less heat = lower fan speeds (usually) = lower power bill

[Bitsaurus]

This is where undervolting comes into play.  Less heat = lower fan speeds (usually) = lower power bill

I think the lower power is mostly from lower thermal resistance unless you have 3 or 4 fans running

[zvs]

This is where undervolting comes into play.  Less heat = lower fan speeds (usually) = lower power bill

i had all my fans set to 100% constantly last summer.  ambient temp in room probably peaked to around 120oF (outside temperature + 10-15oF).  this in a room with a sealed off door (foam around it etc), closed vent, etc.  i'm sure some of the air escaped via the vent & some spots in the foam, but not a whole lot.  one window w/ a ~$150 industrial fan blowing in from the bottom of the window (and then having to block up the other parts of the window so no air escapes out the bottom) & about 6-9 inches to vent out the top of the window.  

i suppose back then i didnt mind going back and forth as often, so at night i'd switch the 5830's and 5870's to 1.063v (or in a few cases 1.15 or 1.163v) and then during the day they'd mostly be at 0.95v, a couple 5870's couldn't run worth a shit at 0.95v so I left those at 1.063v.  the sapphire xtreme 5830's though, you can still get like 260mhash from those at 0.95v, 300mhash at 1.063v.  

you'd be surprised at how high you can get some of those 5830's and 5870's @ 1.063v.   the best 5870 I had ran stable at 960 core @ 1.063v, best 5830 was 940 core.   i had a couple of 5830's that could do 800 core @ 0.95v...    most of that stuff back then has already been sold, though.  i had to start restocking late last year after all these asic delays (but, then, stuff was also really cheap then... like two 5970's for $500 and such)

[Bitsaurus]

120F ambient.... almost as bad as me 

[ryantc]

I am feeling the summer now.....and summer + scrypt coin is really a bad combination.
some of my cards are hitting 80C today

Is water cooling a solution?

[Reckman]

80 C is fine imo

water cooling is stupidly expensive

[Reckman]

working on an outdoor system like isokiv did, hopefully wont kill my hardware

itll be nice to be free from the noise and heat though

[YipYip]

80 C is fine imo

water cooling is stupidly expensive

Agreed 80 c is fine

85 c is the limit ..anything above that and the cards are slowly dying

90+ is death to gpu's

Also check the VRAM temps  (use GPU-z)  they will kill cards quicker than GPU temps ..they must also be below 90 c

[zvs]

120F ambient.... almost as bad as me 

texas summers are hot 

been lucky so far this year, march and april were both below normal, and this start of may is awesome.   the forecast calls for the record low here (tyler, tx) to be broken three days in a row. 

that being said, on either the 6th or 7th of this month, i'm probably going to ship off about 1/2 of them to someone else (free elec, and 50-50 split)... the rest, I'll probably look to trade up to 7870's and 7850's, that way they'll still have good resale value when nobody wants GPUs for mining anymore (right now 5830, 5870, and 5970 sell used for way too much).   buy 7870, take the time to do the mail-in rebate, take the time to sell the games coupons, take the time to sell a used 5870 = 7870 for 5870 and probably a little profit besides

to last poster:

VRMs are rated much higher than GPUs for temp, they should be fine up to 100oC, though i wouldn't want to run them that high (i dont mind 90oC for VRMs)

[ryantc]

80 C is fine imo

water cooling is stupidly expensive

I am so paranoid  , so I try to keep temp below 80.

yesterday I tried to lower cards voltage, and surprisingly I can run all my cards @ 1.05v when mining scrypt coins compare with 1.065v while mining BTC, so that give 4C lower on each cards.

water cooling is expensive, but if you do it the cheap way it won't bite you too much.  I managed to do it like this:

I played swagbucks and other mobile apps that will allow you to exchange amazon gift cards for about 3 month (from Jan to Mar) , so I end up with about $120 in my amazon account and it covers an Koolance 450 water pump and triple bridge
Now I have enough for a 360 rad and some tubing, fittings, but I still need to spend about 200 for 3 GPU Core water blocks, too bad no sellers at Amazon carries that

So I am waiting for the next BTC price surge....... hopefully before summer is coming

[Kluge]

80*C might be okay for a 2-hour gaming session every couple days, but I sure wouldn't want an expensive GPU running like that 24/7. Heat's a serious danger -- heat and time is a dramatically more significant danger. Exposing GPU to significant heat ultimately reduces MTBF by increasing electromigration. I don't have enough info to know how non-linear heat increase and MTBF reduction is over time, though. I ate the power cost when I was GPU mining and set up some window fans in Summer to keep them around 72*C.

Like someone else said - undervolting's a good solution. A lot of the time, you can keep stock clocks and reduce the voltage a bit while keeping it stable for a few degrees less heat as well as a boost in power efficiency. Aside the cost reduction by increasing efficiency, you're also effectively extending the life of your card, which can be significant if you have a very expensive and efficient (where you pay more up-front for paying less long-term) newer card.

[ryantc]

geeee........... I can see two VRMs temp on each card and one of them is 95......
what can I do to lower it?  can I stick some heatsink on them?

[YipYip]

geeee........... I can see two VRMs temp on each card and one of them is 95......
what can I do to lower it?  can I stick some heatsink on them?

EMERGENCY EMERGENCY ...ALERT ALERT

Yeah ummm u need to fix that ASAP !!!

U need to undervolt the shiz out of the card ... !

[ryantc]

 

I did some work while I was watching the big bang theory,

1. take off all reference card plastic shell.
2. stick heatsink on all the VRMs with 3M 467mp 200mp adhesive (hope they won't fell off while I sleep)
3. put a 20' fan behind the open air miner
4. set the fan to 70%

all set and go......

now the GPU temps are 68, 70, 67
and VRM1 temps are 69, 65, 71
and VRM2 temps are 73, 69, 76

I guess this solution can work till the summer comes.

[YipYip]

I did some work while I was watching the big bang theory,

1. take off all reference card plastic shell.
2. stick heatsink on all the VRMs with 3M 467mp 200mp adhesive (hope they won't fell off while I sleep)
3. put a 20' fan behind the open air miner
4. set the fan to 70%

all set and go......

now the GPU temps are 68, 70, 67
and VRM1 temps are 69, 65, 71
and VRM2 temps are 73, 69, 76

I guess this solution can work till the summer comes.

Send us a pic dude

[DrG]

96F high today here in SoCal.  Going to be hotter tomorrow.

ASICs plus inferno heatwave = Goodbye GPU miners