Some Radeon RX 7900 XTX MBA reference cards are experiencing 110C hotspot temps

[AaronK]

Why it matters: Hardwareluxx reports that some of AMD's Radeon RX 7900 and XTX reference models are experiencing serious thermal issues involving GPU hotspot temperatures, or the maximum temperature read by the sensor. Extremely high hotspot temps are not good and can result in lost GPU performance from thermal throttling or worse.

Reports indicate some reference cards are hitting hot spot temperatures of 110C. This is something you never want to see, especially from a $1,000 GPU.

It's worth noting that Hardwareluxx only shared temperature issues involving the 7900 XTX, so we don't know if the RX 7900 XT is suffering from related problems. Given how similar these GPU models are, it wouldn't be surprising if the XT model is also problematic.

Temperature problems are reportedly only affecting AMD's reference cards at this time, not aftermarket cards featuring custom cooler designs. But to be clear, it is a problem that extends to AMD models and partner models that sell the MBA model with the reference cooler design.

Hardwareluxx shared temperatures from several AMD RX 7900 XTX reference cards and more than one exhibited hotspot temperatures of 110C. Thermal gaps between the GPU average temps and hotspot temps were also high, up to 54 Celsius on the upper end.

The rest of the cards turned in substantially lower hotspot temps. Unsurprisingly, temperature margins were also reduced with a temperature delta between the average GPU temp and hotspot temp ranging from 22C to 28C.

In our testing of the RX 7900 XT and 7900 XTX, we saw much more reasonable hotspot temps. Our XT averaged 65C with a hotspot temperature of 77C after an hour of gameplay in a 21C room. The XTX performed similarly, maxing out at 67C average with a hotspot temp of 80C in the same environment.

The wide temperature variance appears to be completely random. We don't know what's causing the unusually high thermals, but suspect it could be a cooling issue where the baseplate on the reference cooler is not making full contact with the GPU die and the memory controller dies. This would result in heat getting trapped and cause hotspot levels to soar.

Hardwareluxx said AMD is currently examining the problem. With any luck, they'll get to the root of the issue soon and come up with a solution for impacted users.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/97053-radeon-rx-7900-xtx-mba-reference-cards-experiencing.html

 

[passwordistaco]

I could get my AIB 6900 XT to 110C hot spot temp before I put a water block on it. Under what conditions is this happening with the 7900 XTX?

 

[Ohnooze]

I believe the 110c is the max temp before the card throttles back or shuts itself off. My 6800xt never even gets close but my 5700xt did get to around 100c for the hotspot.

 

[Beerfloat]

I think this is acceptable if you consider the $200 saving.

 

[toooooot]

Interesting. So it appears rumors about hardware defects were true.

 

[EdmondRC]

Another reason to wait. There is a reason almost all hardware has multiple revisions. Rev 1.0 typically means it's more expensive and more chances of failure.

 

[Theinsanegamer]

I could get my AIB 6900 XT to 110C hot spot temp before I put a water block on it. Under what conditions is this happening with the 7900 XTX?

This is likely a voltage control issue, a bit of extra voltage is all it takes to spike temps. Might be related to their new WHQL driver they released specifically for the 7900 series.

Interesting. So it appears rumors about hardware defects were true.

It's far too early to tell, more likely its a software or firmware issue. The only type of hardware issue I can think of that would cause overheating would be bad fans/fan controller.

 

[JamesonMtl]

I have this problem on my reference 7900 XTX card, junction temp go to 110° and stay there.
The only option is to changing orientation of the card : if I flip the computer case so the card is vertical, problem is solved. Normal temp (below 90°) and normal frequency.

Lots of similar experience for another user forum reddit.

 

[DukeJukem]

Hey amd can you just make consistently good products for once in your existence? these cards or overheating and have terrible coil whine that sounds like a mandrake from the first harry potter. no wonder nvidia still beats you while charging way more. I'd pay more too for not having to deal with an annoyingly whiney brick that heats the house.

I don't care if there is an abundance of users who AREN'T experiencing these issues too. it doesn't matter. these are $1k products. make them perfect or go away. nvidia doesnt have these issues. they simply dont. all those 4090 fires? user error. plug the cable in right and dont bend the hell out of it. its common sense. sorry not sorry. nvidia has a severely RARE driver thats truly causing "widespread" issues? they release a hotfix in 1-3 days max instead of taking weeks to fix the issue.

if I spend $1k on something and its hotter than the sun and sounds like a screamin meemie...I'm out man. I'd rather wait another paycheck or however long it is to put a 4080 or 90 in my rig considering they shut up and stay quiet and run at 60-70c even when pushing 500+ fps depending on your fan curve and case cooling capabilities. simply a way better product that yes...you pay a little more for.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that nobody truly loves amd and we just want them to stop sucking and get their crap together in order to achieve lower prices from the other big dawgs. pretty sure if there were a $1k card from amd and a $1k card from nvidia that offered the exact same performance...people would grab the nvidia one because amds rep is still in the dirt and it always will be until they actually drop a card that beats team greens best without sucking when it first releases, which may as well be never. I dare say people were excited for intel to do well in the gpu business because amd wasn't dethroning nvidia fast enough. perhaps im way off.

just do better amd. people are tired of seeing this whole "almost had it" crap from you. what's the point of competing if you never win? you should have released the 7900 xtx as a 4090 competitor and threw as much power at it the same way nvidia did and charge $1200 for it...because you'd actually win for once. the 7900 xt should be where the xtx is. I think you didn't release a 4090 competitor simply because you couldn't make one, not because you were trying to be the good guy and save people money on electricity like u said.

 

[VaRmeNsI]

Reminds me of the 7990 toaster oven.

Power limiting might be a good temp fix.

 

[oasked]

Not a problem on my Sapphire MBA 7900XTX, so it appears to affect only certain cards - but I have heard of others with this issue

 

[yesnt]

Interesting. So it appears rumors about hardware defects were true.

Assembly defect more like.

 

[passwordistaco]

I have this problem on my reference 7900 XTX card, junction temp go to 110° and stay there.
The only option is to changing orientation of the card : if I flip the computer case so the card is vertical, problem is solved. Normal temp (below 90°) and normal frequency.

Lots of similar experience for another user forum reddit.

Sounds like a vapor chamber issue.

 

[ShadowDeath]

I believe the 110c is the max temp before the card throttles back or shuts itself off. My 6800xt never even gets close but my 5700xt did get to around 100c for the hotspot.

My 5700XT will get hot if I left it stock. I think the temps issues for those was because AMD was generous with voltage. The stock core voltage was 1.1v (1100mV). I reduced mine to 1v (1000mV) and that took care of most of the thermal issues. For stability I restricted the max clock speed to the default game clock speed.

I think they did a bad job of binning RDNA1.

 

[Watzupken]

Hey amd can you just make consistently good products for once in your existence? these cards or overheating and have terrible coil whine that sounds like a mandrake from the first harry potter. no wonder nvidia still beats you while charging way more. I'd pay more too for not having to deal with an annoyingly whiney brick that heats the house.

I don't care if there is an abundance of users who AREN'T experiencing these issues too. it doesn't matter. these are $1k products. make them perfect or go away. nvidia doesnt have these issues. they simply dont. all those 4090 fires? user error. plug the cable in right and dont bend the hell out of it. its common sense. sorry not sorry. nvidia has a severely RARE driver thats truly causing "widespread" issues? they release a hotfix in 1-3 days max instead of taking weeks to fix the issue.

if I spend $1k on something and its hotter than the sun and sounds like a screamin meemie...I'm out man. I'd rather wait another paycheck or however long it is to put a 4080 or 90 in my rig considering they shut up and stay quiet and run at 60-70c even when pushing 500+ fps depending on your fan curve and case cooling capabilities. simply a way better product that yes...you pay a little more for.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that nobody truly loves amd and we just want them to stop sucking and get their crap together in order to achieve lower prices from the other big dawgs. pretty sure if there were a $1k card from amd and a $1k card from nvidia that offered the exact same performance...people would grab the nvidia one because amds rep is still in the dirt and it always will be until they actually drop a card that beats team greens best without sucking when it first releases, which may as well be never. I dare say people were excited for intel to do well in the gpu business because amd wasn't dethroning nvidia fast enough. perhaps im way off.

just do better amd. people are tired of seeing this whole "almost had it" crap from you. what's the point of competing if you never win? you should have released the 7900 xtx as a 4090 competitor and threw as much power at it the same way nvidia did and charge $1200 for it...because you'd actually win for once. the 7900 xt should be where the xtx is. I think you didn't release a 4090 competitor simply because you couldn't make one, not because you were trying to be the good guy and save people money on electricity like u said.

This is a very fanboyish rant to me. Factually, cards from both camps run extremely hot. You think the RTX 4090 is not running hot? That's because they slap one giant cooler on it to tame the heat. Lower temp readings have no bearing on the actual heat output. At the end of the day, if its using 450W, it will dump out 450W of heat, regardless of what temps you see on the temp reading. And factually, the RX 7900 XTX may not come up tops in terms of performance, but at the price point, it is outperforming the RTX 4080, while beating even the RTX 4090 in some cases. Both are quite a fair bit more expensive. It is very foolish to favor any companies because the truth is that they can't care less about you. If AMD is not there to compete, the RTX 4080 may have ended up at 1599, while the RTX 4090 at a price that you won't bother to consider. So be careful what you wish for because Nvidia will not offer you some loyalty discount.

 

[Nobina]

AMD being very understanding of the current gas crisis situation during winter, thanks AMD!

 

[Someone8MyPosts]

My 6700xt does this whenever AMD wants to update Adrenalin or it wants to forget settings, which happens often. I have to keep going through and either adjusting settings to something more reasonable, or I have to import my settings, whichever works. How hard is it to just keep settings where they are instead of focusing so much on new features and new cards? AMD, your software is the one thing holding you so far behind your competitors.
The cards shouldn't get anywhere near the max temp, due to changes you make on a regular basis to the software.