gigabyte hd6950 sensors suddenly dead?

[lordofscones]

The fan on this card suddenly ramped up to 100%--noisy as anything!
After multiple restarts the fan remained at 100%. Looking in catalyst, there is no sensor information at all, except the temperature listed as -128 degrees c.
I am guessing my sensors have died and the card is maxing out the fan as a safety precaution?
Attempts to manually adjust fan speed have no affect (via several fan utilities I tried.)
There are no other graphical glitches or problems apart from the fan speed and apparent lack of sensor info.

Anyone have any experience with this, advice or information that might help?

Just some further info: catalyst drivers are up to date. Haven't checked firmware on card recently, but it would seem strange it would suddenly be affected like this. No other changes on computer recently I can think of that might affect it.

Many thanks in advance.-

 

[RCoon]

The fan on this card suddenly ramped up to 100%--noisy as anything!
After multiple restarts the fan remained at 100%. Looking in catalyst, there is no sensor information at all, except the temperature listed as -128 degrees c.
I am guessing my sensors have died and the card is maxing out the fan as a safety precaution?
Attempts to manually adjust fan speed have no affect (via several fan utilities I tried.)
There are no other graphical glitches or problems apart from the fan speed and apparent lack of sensor info.

Anyone have any experience with this, advice or information that might help?

Just some further info: catalyst drivers are up to date. Haven't checked firmware on card recently, but it would seem strange it would suddenly be affected like this. No other changes on computer recently I can think of that might affect it.

Many thanks in advance.-

Your username is awfully British. You should slink right into the TPU UK Clubhouse
With regards to the 128 degree temps, do you have any access to the GPU fan header? Should be at the far end of the card with 4 cables. You could solder that into a molex adapter and use different resistors to tame it down anywhere between 1v and 12v to control the speeds. It's done on some of the Arctic Accelero Extreme custom coolers.

EDIT: And yes, your sensors are dead, unless you flashed your BIOS.

 

[lordofscones]

Your username is awfully British. You should slink right into the TPU UK Clubhouse
With regards to the 128 degree temps, do you have any access to the GPU fan header? Should be at the far end of the card with 4 cables. You could solder that into a molex adapter and use different resistors to tame it down anywhere between 1v and 12v to control the speeds. It's done on some of the Arctic Accelero Extreme custom coolers.

EDIT: And yes, your sensors are dead, unless you flashed your BIOS.

Thanks for that. Whether or not I have have access to the fan header, I'm probably not skilled enough to fiddle with it, so I'll call it "dead".
It seems an awful waste for a whole card to now be useless because of such a tiny failure. I might try get on to gigagbyte and whinge in their ear a bit. (not that I think it will do any good)
Thanks again for your response.
(I'm not British, but was desperate for a username no one else had...and this was the first one that was accepted.)

 

[RCoon]

Thanks for that. Whether or not I have have access to the fan header, I'm probably not skilled enough to fiddle with it, so I'll call it "dead".
It seems an awful waste for a whole card to now be useless because of such a tiny failure. I might try get on to gigagbyte and whinge in their ear a bit. (not that I think it will do any good)
Thanks again for your response.
(I'm not British, but was desperate for a username no one else had...and this was the first one that was accepted.)

It's not useless at all! All you have to do is unplug the fan cable from the GPU PCB on the card and plug it into a normal molex power connector. You can buy little resistors, say 7v, and it will tone the fans down a bit.

 

[lordofscones]

It's not useless at all! All you have to do is unplug the fan cable from the GPU PCB on the card and plug it into a normal molex power connector. You can buy little resistors, say 7v, and it will tone the fans down a bit.

Ah, yes...I will give that a shot first. Thanks.

 

[Tatty_Two]

Or, as a alternative, download something like Afterburner, ensure in settings it is set to start up with windows, manually set the fan speed because often Afteburner will override CCC settings, may be a longshot but worth a try!

 

[RCoon]

Or, as a alternative, download something like Afterburner, ensure in settings it is set to start up with windows, manually set the fan speed because often Afteburner will override CCC settings, may be a longshot but worth a try!

If that doesn't work, this is the cable I was talking about, it's just a standard 4 pin fan header, you might be able to get an adaptor to plug it into a molex

 

[lordofscones]

Just as an update:
I ended up opening the card (it is surrounded by one of those plastic all-encasing sleeves) and a part (what I assume to be the sensor) dropped straight out. It was a flat little circular piece, a but like a small coin or battery. I located where it had come from (right next to the fan) and made a rudimentary attempt to solder it back into place--which failed (I can solder big clunky stuff, but this was a pretty fine job).

So I have ended up just plugging in the existing fan to a chassis fan plug on the motherboard, which seems to do the job. I'll just have to monitor the heat for a while and make sure the card doesn't melt.
Cheers!

 

[Tatty_Two]

Glad you have resolved the issue, if the solder is difficult, just get a very small piece of electrical tape and stick the sensor on......... if that does not work I still think the software control through an aftermarket app like MSI Afterburner "could" give you more control.