If I leave the card to manage the fan by itself it goes 45-50% and temp is 85-90 C.
When i increase fan to 100% temp goes down to 65C.
The fan noise is not a concern to me.
Am I assuming correctly that lower temp is better, making the card last longer?
Or is running the fan constantly at 100% going to damage the fan?
I already overclocked it to 800 (was at 750 i think).
Is the only risk in overclocking the increase in temp?
Its in an air conditioned room so the heat shouldn't be too much problem, but I don't want to OC it too much if its going to damage the card.
Im getting about 315Mhash per core.
Im using poclbm, but i just read about pheonix and modified poclbm.
Would those give me better hash rate?
Thanks and please excuse me if these are noob questions.
I have 2 HD5970 as well.
Set the fan between 80%-90% (I see no difference with 100%, expect more noise) constant.
If the core is over 100C, its bad for the card. But your main concern should be the VRM temperature, if its over 125C the card will start throttling because the card is crying for mercy. Faster fan = wears out quicker.
Again when you overclock look after the VRM temperature not going over 125C and Core under 100C. (Mine is at 980Mhz Core (@83C - 86C and VRM just cruising at 109C) and 500Mhz Mem at 1.23v for the past month because its winter here
and getting around 468ish Mhash per core)
Don't know much about miners, I just use whatever. Using Poclbm + Win7.
Use furmark as your stability test, because in a way that's how bitcoin works. It also stresses the VRM like crazy compared to playing games. Use GPU-Z to monitor your temp.