Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
No way to monitor. I've just tested the OC config without any modifications in fan speeds. They are audible, but really really low. Temps did not went higher than 80.5°c while playing PES2010 for 10 minutes.

After playing the MacFan readout for the fans was 1341 / 1279 / 1600
 
Then, shoudn't u use 1600/1600/1800 in MacFan instead of 1800/1800/1600 ?

I think there was a typo - third readout was 1100. It's way lower than the other two.

Here's more: I've run into a few problems that seem to be linked to voltage issues. Splinter Cell Conviction and MW2 - again. Going down to 750/1073 might have fixed that.

Btw - temperature-wise, going from stock fan speeds to little higher speeds of 1600 / 1200 / 1100 will result in a 4-6°c cooler readout, at least in my environment (it's warm right now).

Please note that MacFanx64 doesn't seem to be reading the fan speeds out correctly all the time or it doesn't set them right. I get a lot of error messages momentarily. And no, I can't be bothered to do my tests more scientifically :cool:
 

Attachments

  • stresstest161611.jpg
    stresstest161611.jpg
    782.5 KB · Views: 140
I think there was a typo - third readout was 1100. It's way lower than the other two.

Here's more: I've run into a few problems that seem to be linked to voltage issues. Splinter Cell Conviction and MW2 - again. Going down to 750/1073 might have fixed that.

Btw - temperature-wise, going from stock fan speeds to little higher speeds of 1600 / 1200 / 1100 will result in a 4-6°c cooler readout, at least in my environment (it's warm right now).

Please note that MacFanx64 doesn't seem to be reading the fan speeds out correctly all the time or it doesn't set them right. I get a lot of error messages momentarily. And no, I can't be bothered to do my tests more scientifically :cool:

It seems that 750/1075 (GPU) and 1600/1600/1400 (fans) is the sweet spot :D

Thank u all for ur tests !
 
aye, 750/1075 hasnt given me any problems yet.

allthough i tend to run the fans a little bit higher, cause with sound on, you can barely here the fans anyway.

also fan 1 can reach about 4000rpm
fan 2 can reach 5xxx rpm
and fan 3 2xxx rpm

so i have fan 1&2 at about 2000rpm
and fan 3 at 1700-1800

I cant even hear them when playing, also it helps on cooling, which again may help the life of the hardware.
 
3. I have the i5. After playing sc2 the CPU never reaches 65 C. The i7 reaches high 80's easily. So I would not overclock the i7. The i5 could reach higher clocks. But there isn't any point due to gpu bottleneck. Please note that with a much higher CPU temp the whole iMac gets hotter.

Has anyone had a play with overclocking a 27" with the i7 to see what (or would it not be a problem) effect the extra cpu heat will effect the gpu temp?
 
Has anyone had a play with overclocking a 27" with the i7 to see what (or would it not be a problem) effect the extra cpu heat will effect the gpu temp?

^^ what he asked. I will be purchasing a new i7 2.93 in the next few days and would love to know about OC opportunities. Although in the previous post reaching high 80's C on stock configuration might keep me from exploring these opportunities
 
The PCIe bus itself starts you off with 75W. Any additional connectors would be beyond that. 75W for a 6-pin connector and 150W for an 8-pin one.

My GTX 460 requires 160W and the 768 MB version is 150W. There are still two 6-pin connectors for an additional 150W beyond bus power. I suspect it was for the sake of simplifying production and allowing overhead for an overclock. (I get to 835 MHz from 715 MHz without breaking another 2° C in load temps.)

It's possible that a future lower voltage GTX 460 might have a single 6-pin connector. It only draws just over 1 V as it is. Then again that's what GF106 (GTS 450) is for.

Those numbers sound reasonable, I thought the same way as well. The only issue is that iMacs are not meant for overclocking thus it might be only PCIe powered, making 75W the maximum and that could cause issues when achieving certain clock speed in GPU.
 
just did the mafia 2 demo benchmark, gained 9fps over stock clocks, and beileve me, you are going to notice it, great game also. loved the first one
 
just did the mafia 2 demo benchmark, gained 9fps over stock clocks, and beileve me, you are going to notice it, great game also. loved the first one
How many FPS are you getting at native res? What's the in game settings? Is everything maxed? Thanks!
 
Honestly

I don't see an OC tool a point on OSX. Cause the games that are available for osx runs fine (steam games, wow without the need for OCing)

The only game that require OC is SC2, but that run so horrible in OSX atm.
 
Honestly

I don't see an OC tool a point on OSX. Cause the games that are available for osx runs fine (steam games, wow without the need for OCing)

The only game that require OC is SC2, but that run so horrible in OSX atm.

that's true. Oh well, i guess all I can do on the mac side is to cool the machine a little better with MacFan. I'll leave the better games for booting into windows
 
that's true. Oh well, i guess all I can do on the mac side is to cool the machine a little better with MacFan. I'll leave the better games for booting into windows

Dont use macfan under osx, use istat, or smc fan control
 
Henrikrox, Saschke, Hellhammer et al., thank you so much for all of your hard work! I'd like to 3rd that request for i7 OC.

I don't have mine yet, otherwise I would OC it myself. I went ahead and ordered the i7 given the benchmarks noted at Barefeats.com, which showed ample gain for a $200 upgrade. Now I'm wishing I went with the cooler i5!

In the 1st test I found, they used the retail boxed CPU cooler and got temps to 91 C with stressing the CPU.

However, in the 2nd test I found, temps recorded with stock cooling were roughly the same between the 2 processors. They reviewers only noted a difference when properly cooling, and even then only 5-10 degrees w/ the max i7 temp being 64 C in their test. So, I'm not sure we can necessarily apply this to the iMacs, that are essentially one giant heat sink.


Hellhammer, any thoughts on attempting an OC on the i7? Do you think it'd be safe to try a similar 750/1150 OC? It seems that this would warrant real world testing.
 
Hellhammer, any thoughts on attempting an OC on the i7? Do you think it'd be safe to try and similar 750/1150 OC?

i7-880 is 3.06GHz and it's 95W as well so at least that could be achieved but seriously, you won't benefit from such minor OC. That chip has potential to OC but I wouldn't hassle with the CPU as it won't help much, if at all in gaming. Sure you could OC it to somewhere around 3.4GHz and keep fans at high speed but that's not ideal and again, it won't give more than a frame or two in gaming.
 
i7-880 is 3.06GHz and it's 95W as well so at least that could be achieved but seriously, you won't benefit from such minor OC. That chip has potential to OC but I wouldn't hassle with the CPU as it won't help much, if at all in gaming. Sure you could OC it to somewhere around 3.4GHz and keep fans at high speed but that's not ideal and again, it won't give more than a frame or two in gaming.

I'm not interested in OC'ing the CPU only GPU but...

Would the hotter i7 have much effect on OC'ing the GPU?

(e.g. warmer cpu = warmer internal temps = warmer GPU? = less OC)
 
I'm not interested in OC'ing the CPU only GPU but...

Would the hotter i7 have much effect on OC'ing the GPU?

(e.g. warmer cpu = warmer internal temps = warmer GPU? = less OC)

yes, the CPU and GPU are both on the same heat sync IIRC - so the heat added to one effects the other.
 
I'm not interested in OC'ing the CPU only GPU but...

Would the hotter i7 have much effect on OC'ing the GPU?

(e.g. warmer cpu = warmer internal temps = warmer GPU? = less OC)

Of course the internal temps raise when CPU temps raise because iMac is AIO and there isn't much airflow to move the hot air away. GPU temps were fine at 750MHz so you COULD OC the CPU and still have reasonable temps. You can always speed up the fans as well. How much would you OC the CPU?

yes, the CPU and GPU are both on the same heat sync IIRC - so the heat added to one effects the other.

Nah, they have their own heat sinks, they are as far away as possible from each other

http://guide-images.ifixit.net/igi/CWT1ibtCyOjyJFYW.huge
 
I am running bootcamp windows 7 64 bit. I installed 10.7 drivers and oced to 725/1025. I ran gpu-z and I reached temperatures of 80-85 while playing SC2 native res ultra (shaders high) with avg. 50 FPS. It ran well however I noticed at the beginning of the game when signing in when the battlecrusier hovers over the screen, there are black polygon lines stretched across then dissapear randomly.

Is 80+ degrees pushing the GPU too much?
I tried changing fan speeds in macfan however whenever I go through the process it always notifys me it cannot recognize my machine and gives me a -1 fans instead of three. I change the values anyways to 2000 2000 1800 (what settings should I set my fans?) but still I don't recieve any drop in temp.

Help? :D

PS. How long can I expect the fans to run after a gaming session? After my intial SC2 test my fans are still running 20 minutes later... Hope im not frying my poor GPU
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.