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5070 Ti very poor idle power

C

CheteriagalenTriagalnik

Joined
Apr 26, 2025
Messages
60 (1.05/day)
I just got a brand new Asus Prime 5070 Ti, but unfortunately it suffers from a problem. Even when only hooked up to a single 1440p 180hz monitor, it idles at 35-40 watts. That's without anything happening, just desktop. Even with the monitor off, it doesn't drop under 30. Fans are off (0 RPM) and no RGB is enabled.

Most reviewers show that 15-20W is the expected idle power for this GPU, and even the most power hungry 70Tis shouldn't go over ~28.

Things I've tried so far:

- Restarting the computer numerous times
- DDU from safe mode x2
- Removing drivers with Revo uninstaller
- Installing latest GameReady drivers (clean installation)
- Switching to latest Studio drivers (clean installation)
- Rolling back to first drivers that support blackwell cards (clean installation)
- Changing Windows power blan to balanced or power saver
- Changing the power setting to "normal" from nVidia control panel (optimal power is not available)
- Switching between performance and quiet VBIOS
- Undervolting and power limiting with Afterburner and GPU Tweak
- Switting the displayport output
- Switching between 2 and 3 8-pin connectors for the 12-pin adapter
- Updating motherboard BIOS
- Lowering refresh rate on the monitor
- Windows SFC scan


In case you're wondering, my power supply is a 760 watt platinum PSU. With my previous card (GTX 1080), I had about 13-15W of idle power on the same power supply.

Anyone got any ideas on things I could try? Thanks!
 
oxrufiioxo said:
What are you using to measure power, Software reading's are not overly accurate. I've seen people claim 40w+ on a single 4k monitor and a 1440p ultrawide but with a software readings ofc.
Click to expand...

I am using software - CPU-Z, HWInfo, HWMonitor, nVidia inspector, nVidia app. I haven't heard of the 5070 Ti specifically having a temperature sensor issue like the 4060, but I have ordered a wall meter just in case. I do note that my idle temps are around 46C, which does seem on the high end and would track with a higher than average idle power consumption.
 
CheteriagalenTriagalnik said:
I am using software - CPU-Z, HWInfo, HWMonitor, nVidia inspector, nVidia app. I haven't heard of the 5070 Ti specifically having a temperature sensor issue like the 4060, but I have ordered a wall meter just in case. I do note that my idle temps are around 46C, which does seem on the high end and would track with a higher than average idle power consumption.
Click to expand...

Assuming the card has a fan stop feature that sound's about right if the fans are spinning that is a bit high.

My 4090 at 18w according to GPUZ sits at 40C with 3 T30-120 blowing air right at it due to fan stop.
 
oxrufiioxo said:
Assuming the card has a fan stop feature that sound's about right if the fans are spinning that is a bit high.
Click to expand...

Yes, it does and that feature is enabled and working. However, I've noted that pretty much all other instances on the internet I could find, of both idle power and idle temps, are lower than mine. For example, a guy I helped out with had a Gigabyte Windforce, an MSRP model with a very small cooler, who still had about 10C lower than mine, and his fans were also stopped. All of TPU's reviews show idle temps lower than mine, including the MSI Ventus, largely considered the weakest cooler of the generation (though, admittedly, only by a single degree).
 
AsRock said:
Does seem a little on the high side.



Maybe some thing to do with this ?. And not using a 12+4 + 12+4 (12VHPWR) connector ?. Maybe some one here can try it and see ?.

How ever your not the only one.
Click to expand...

This is an interesting hypothesis. Unfortunately my PSU just doesn't have a native 12VHPWR connector. If anyone wishes to do this experiment, It'd be very interesting.
 
What do you get at 60 Hz, 1080p/1440p
 
Try enable ASPM in bios and set link state pcie in windows power plan to max energy save
 
Update: I got a wall meter, will try and confirm my findings through hardware measurements just in case.


W1zzard said:
What do you get at 60 Hz, 1080p/1440p
Click to expand...
At 1080p60, I get about ~32W idle, so only dropping a few watts under the usual reading.

Contra said:
Try enable ASPM in bios and set link state pcie in windows power plan to max energy save
Click to expand...
I tried, but unfortunately, it seems that this also is not the solution. Thanks for the idea, though!

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wall power meter update: I got myself a wall meter. Before plugging it in, I calculated an estimated power draw of all my system components, plus the efficiency loss of the PSU, at around 157W.


Imagine the smirk look on my face then, when upon booting up with the wall meter plugged in, I got 157W exactly. However, soon after that it fell drastically First to 136, then down to about 93-98W power from the wall.


I can't explain it. It's down 60W from where I expected it to be. This is the power consumption I expected of my CPU and GPU alone. Are the sensor readings completely wrong?
 
Last edited:
Your issue reminds me of a similar issue I had.
Searching around, some users have a high idle power usage issue, others don't, with the same GPU model. Maybe different VRM/etc. designs are used for the same model for whatever reasons (pure guessing: perhaps due to different chip bins requiring higher voltages to be stable or VRM parts availability, which makes some GPU's VRM less power efficient, especially at idle). But ultimately, if I had to guess, it's the GPU's issue, not one's PC. Send it back if you still have the legal warranty to send it back, no questions asked. Some user said:
I returned the Asus 5070 ti Tuf Gaming OC for a PNY 5080 .. PNY 5080 idling at 17W on the same exact system setup. Now this is good! Great gaming power and efficiency!
Click to expand...
Indeed, if my theory is correct, it means the PNY one can have the high idle power consumption too. Just try different GPUs out.
 
MAJOR UPDATE:

I contacted nVidia, who suggested a BIOS update and a few settings changes, but this didn't help. Then they told me I could have a hardware issue and told me to take it up with ASUS.

I contacted Asus, who told me that either something was using my GPU, or there is a hardware issue and I should send it for RMA. They informed me that they don't work directly with consumers and told me to contact the place I bought it from.

I got myself a wall meter and it more or less confirmed my findings.

I considered if I should send the card back and decided to test a few benchmarks. I was testing an undervolt with Furmark, and all of a sudden, after maybe 20 minutes, I could smell smoke from burning electronics. I have an air purifier and it instantly gave me an alert that it detected extreme levels of air pollution. I immediately shut the computer off. A little more and a fire could easily have started.

Upon inspection, the power supply smelled of burning. The GPU also had a faint scent, though I couldn't tell if that was burning or just offgasing plastic from the shroud.

I don't know what happened, but now I couldn't trust either the GPU or the PSU. I'm going to RMA the card and the PSU, too. Even if the card was faulty, the overcurrent, overvoltage and/or overtemperature protections should have been tripped. I have an expensive, high-end, platinum PSU from a reputable brand.

I got a new PSU while the RMAs go through and swapped it out. Back to my old card.

For some unknown reason, it's now idling 5-10W higher than it used to, even after DDUing and installing old drivers. Still about 10W lower than the 5070 Ti in question, though. However, I do find this odd. Why was power consumption increased on my old card?

10tothemin9volts said:
Your issue reminds me of a similar issue I had.
Searching around, some users have a high idle power usage issue, others don't, with the same GPU model. Maybe different VRM/etc. designs are used for the same model for whatever reasons (pure guessing: perhaps due to different chip bins requiring higher voltages to be stable or VRM parts availability, which makes some GPU's VRM less power efficient, especially at idle). But ultimately, if I had to guess, it's the GPU's issue, not one's PC. Send it back if you still have the legal warranty to send it back, no questions asked. Some user said:

Indeed, if my theory is correct, it means the PNY one can have the high idle power consumption too. Just try different GPUs out.
Click to expand...

This is, actually, a great hypothesis. It's definitely plausible. I'm in a discord server where two people recently bought a PNY 5070 Ti. At single monitor, one has about ~15W idle, while the other has ~28W. I don't know how many stores will be happy if you keep buying and returning GPUs, though.
 
CheteriagalenTriagalnik said:
This is, actually, a great hypothesis. It's definitely plausible. I'm in a discord server where two people recently bought a PNY 5070 Ti. At single monitor, one has about ~15W idle, while the other has ~28W. I don't know how many stores will be happy if you keep buying and returning GPUs, though.
Click to expand...

I kept returning 4090s till I got one with no audible coil whine lol....

Yeah that sounded like a scary situation.

like I said in my original post there are a lot of people with Blackwell cards that are having this issue this hardware launch is sounding more and more like a beta test as time goes on.
 
oxrufiioxo said:
I kept returning 4090s till I got one with no audible coil whine lol....

Yeah that sounded like a scary situation.

like I said in my original post there are a lot of people with Blackwell cards that are having this issue this hardware launch is sounding more and more like a beta test as time goes on.
Click to expand...

Full disclosure: I bought my GPU open box. I had a full 14-day right of return, with even shipping costs reimbursed and no restocking fee, plus at minimum of 1 year warranty from Amazon, even if Asus didn't want to deal with me. So maybe I was playing with fire (pun not originally intended; but welcomed), but I wanted to give it a chance. Never thought it would almost set my house on fire.

The real scary part was that I had a date, and was planning on leaving furmark running while I go on the date. I only noticed the burning when I went back to my office room, just before I was about to leave, to spray cologne and noticed the strong stench of burning electronics as soon as I opened the door. If I kept my cologne in a different room my house could have been burned to a crisp.

Blackwell seems to have so many issues. Tbh I didn't think it would happen to me. Good power supply, power cables installed properly, hell the GPU was undervolted. At the time it nearly started a fire, it was only drawing about 280W - not even the max of a stock 70Ti. Plus nearly half a year of driver updates. This generation is a trainwreck.

PS. The idle on my old card was solved by disabling "automatically manage colors for apps" under system -> display -> color management (or sometimes it shows up as "color profile"). Back to 13-15W idle. By the way, I tried this with the 5070 Ti and it didn't seem to have much of an effect. Did I just not give it enough time to kick in? At the moment, I'm not really willing to risk installing that card again.

By the way, what store let you do such generous returns?
 
CheteriagalenTriagalnik said:
Full disclosure: I bought my GPU open box. I had a full 14-day right of return, with even shipping costs reimbursed and no restocking fee, plus at minimum of 1 year warranty from Amazon, even if Asus didn't want to deal with me. So maybe I was playing with fire (pun not originally intended; but welcomed), but I wanted to give it a chance. Never thought it would almost set my house on fire.

The real scary part was that I had a date, and was planning on leaving furmark running while I go on the date. I only noticed the burning when I went back to my office room, just before I was about to leave, to spray cologne and noticed the strong stench of burning electronics as soon as I opened the door. If I kept my cologne in a different room my house could have been burned to a crisp.

Blackwell seems to have so many issues. Tbh I didn't think it would happen to me. Good power supply, power cables installed properly, hell the GPU was undervolted. At the time it nearly started a fire, it was only drawing about 280W - not even the max of a stock 70Ti. Plus nearly half a year of driver updates. This generation is a trainwreck.

PS. The idle on my old card was solved by disabling "automatically manage colors for apps" under system -> display -> color management (or sometimes it shows up as "color profile"). Back to 13-15W idle. By the way, I tried this with the 5070 Ti and it didn't seem to have much of an effect. Did I just not give it enough time to kick in? At the moment, I'm not really willing to risk installing that card again.

By the way, what store let you do such generous returns?
Click to expand...

I typically use Amazon and Bestbuy only took 3 tries and normally a mild amount of coil whine doesn't bother me but the Tuf and Suprim had an obnoxious amount even at 60-80fps. I liked them better than the card I ended up with otherwise so I was pretty bummed. I just sent the video of how audible it was they took them back no problem. To be honest out of like 100 ish cards I've dealt with over the last 10-15 years only like 10 had audible coil whine and only 3 I would classify as bad and the last bad one I had prior to this was a Sapphire Vapor X 7970.
 
oxrufiioxo said:
I typically use Amazon and Bestbuy only took 3 tries and normally a mild amount of coil whine doesn't bother me but the Tuf and Suprim had an obnoxious amount even at 60-80fps. I liked them better than the card I ended up with otherwise so I was pretty bummed. I just sent the video of how audible it was they took them back no problem. To be honest out of like 100 ish cards I've dealt with over the last 10-15 years only like 10 had audible coil whine and only 3 I would classify as bad and the last bad one I had prior to this was a Sapphire Vapor X 7970.
Click to expand...

Last gen Radeons had some major issues with coil whine from what I've read, especially with the higher end cards. Some had no coil whine at all, while others were unbearable. Tbh, I think you're fully within your right to get one that doesn't have this issue. For what it's worth, my Asus Prime 5070 Ti did not have any noticeable coil whine, at least that I could hear over the fans, which were themselves quite silent.
 
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