Graphics Gainward 670 making weird noises during bf3

hi

its a new 670, and it works just fine, yet during bf3, and only bf3 when spanking the graphics, it makes a weird noise. The only way to describe it is like a noise a little electric motor makes, you know like cheap ones in little toy cars?

And it only does this during intense graphic uses.

appears to work fine, plays all games and things fine, what do you think?

 

Send it back. My gtx 670 (evga) is silent at 40% fan usage, and louder at 70%. I assume it does the same noise when stressing it with a benchmark program or something>? Silly question; you removed all the selophane sticker things from the cards fan etc when you got it?

 

Coil whine? Haven't had a card do it in bf3..

 

the fans are under the gainward style radiator, so i assume so.

Im gonna bench mark and see what happens. And yeah, its literally like a coil whine..

 

SCORE
26350 3DMarks
SM2.0 SCORE
10230
HDR/SM3.0 SCORE
13090
CPU SCORE
6825

using 3dmark06.

Its making the noise again. is this a good score? is the card working ok? seems to be? A little worrying.

And can any 670 owners tell me what power connectors to use? im currently using the 6 pin pci e cable and the 2 4pin to 6 pin connector that came with the card?

 

Assuming it is coil whine which seems likely then there is no harm in keeping the card it doesn't mean it's going to fail or anything. Could send it back if it is annoying but not sure if they have to accept it.

 

Every card I've ever owned has done it at some point.. just not in bf3 so far!

 

I would send it back. It is not something they state on the spec sheet and it would drive me crazy as I like quiet cards. Thats a lot of money to spend on a new card and be unhappy with it.

I would tell them the situations in which it makes the noise when you return it so that they can test it properly. You don't want them sending it back to you stating nothing wrong when they have only logged on to windows or ran bf3 for 5 mins when it takes 10 mins to start etc...

 

What fps are you getting in BF3?

I sometimes get some coil whine and I have found the solution is to cap the FPS to stop it maxing out my card.

I would still suggest trying to get a replacement though as long as it's free

 

Actually capping the FPS usually was the solution. Solved my GPU whine in SC2.

 

Is there not some nvidia utility that will put in adriver level fps cap? Can't remember it's name right now.

 

Does it go away or change if you turn on vsync in the game?

 

Coil noise.

The easiest (not cheapest) solution is often to try a different PSU.

I haven't managed to make your old 580 squeal in anything yet touch wood. My 280s were noisy buggers though!

 

Is it a phantom by any chance? mine makes the same noise i think

 

That's a fair comment. If I remember you could actually do that in call of duty 4 whilst in game.

 

Nvidia Inspector was tool i was thinking of. There's also an adaptive V-sync in the control panel which turns v-sync off if framerate goes below you refresh rate.

 

I got the 580 to squeal in 3d mark 2003 with vsync off, 5000fps Cheesecake!

Don't ask me why I run old benchmarks like that, it goes back to my ti4600 days

 

Would suspect the Molex to 6 pin adaptor myself, have seen using those introduce coil whine, get a PSU which has two fully wired native 6+2 connectors, could also be a dodgy GPU as has been said, but i'd change PSU anyway

 

Coil Whine could also be solved by changing the harmonics, so find the component at fault and alter it a little, a dab of hot-glue could do it.

Only do this if you've decided your warrenty isn't needed, however.

For reference; I know how annoying Coil Whine is. My previous motherboard used to do it if I started pushing the processor near max, didn't have make a screech.