My GTX 1060 gets way to hot and even throttles (Cooling Advice)

[Thunder Squirrel]

Hello. As the title suggests, I've been running into issues with my 1060 running too hot, up to 82 degrees before it starts to throttle. I have tried numerous things to improve the temperatures but I'm out of ideas and need some advice. So let me start by describing my system. The GPU in question is an EVGA 1060 6gb (non SC). I'm running a Ryzen 5 1600 with the stock cooler on a mini ITX board in a Phanteks Evolv Mini ITX enclosure.

 

Now, I understand mini ITX PCs get hot, but my case has a 200mm intake fan in the front, and a 120mm exhaust fan in the back, and their seems to be plenty of airflow, not to mention the system is plenty noisy with all the fans running. I have adjusted the gpu fan curve to be much more aggressive. At idle it runs at 40% and at its hottest 82 degrees the fan is at 84%. I also changed the thermal paste since I got the card back in 2017 but that has made no difference. I also removed the plastic shroud because why not. I think the real problem is with the absolutely garbage cooler on the gpu. I mean EVGA realy cheaped out on this one and it shows.

 

So I guess the question is what should I try to bring this things temperatures down? I'm open to suggestions and would appreciate the advice.

[Grabhanem]

Did you take the fan shroud off the card?

[Letgomyleghoe]

re apply thermal past/ place a fan blowing into the heatsink

 

Just now, Grabhanem said:

Did you take the fan shroud off the card?

theres likely no fan shroud, it's a low end 1060

[Fasauceome]

That looks like an OEM card not an EVGA card, like the kind you get inside an HP desktop.

 

The heat sink is absolutely tiny, if you increase the temp target to 85 and possibly lower the power limits a little you'll probably see some more consistent clock speeds.

 

But when you say thermal throttle, what are the exact symptoms? Are you dropping below 1500 MHz or something?

[Grabhanem]

2 minutes ago, Letgomyleghoe said:

re apply thermal past/ place a fan blowing into the heatsink

 

theres likely no fan shroud, it's a low end 1060

I've never seen a 1060 without a shroud. My best guess at the card here is this one:

[Thunder Squirrel]

1 minute ago, Fasauceome said:

That looks like an OEM card not an EVGA card, like the kind you get inside an HP desktop.

 

The heat sink is absolutely tiny, if you increase the temp target to 85 and possibly lower the power limits a little you'll probably see some more consistent clock speeds.

 

But when you say thermal throttle, what are the exact symptoms? Are you dropping below 1500 MHz or something?

The reason it looks like that is because I took off the plastic cover because I was desperate to try something but yea its an EVGA card. The throttling I'm running into acts like this. If I'm running a game in a spot that has the gpu at 99%, it reaches 82 degrees under 3 minutes and at that point I have seen the clock speed as low as 1500 MHz and even a noticeable reduction in frame rate too. The boost clock for the card is 1800 MHz.

[Thunder Squirrel]

3 minutes ago, Grabhanem said:

I've never seen a 1060 without a shroud. My best guess at the card here is this one:

Yup, thats the one.

[Fasauceome]

2 minutes ago, Thunder Squirrel said:

The reason it looks like that is because I took off the plastic cover because I was desperate to try something but yea its an EVGA card. The throttling I'm running into acts like this. If I'm running a game in a spot that has the gpu at 99%, it reaches 82 degrees under 3 minutes and at that point I have seen the clock speed as low as 1500 MHz and even a noticeable reduction in frame rate too. The boost clock for the card is 1800 MHz.

if you reduce the power target you might get somewhere between 1700 and 1800 more often. Though, those low end EVGA cards aren't known for throttling badly so you might want to consider repasting the GPU, in case something is wrong.

[Thunder Squirrel]

2 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

if you reduce the power target you might get somewhere between 1700 and 1800 more often. Though, those low end EVGA cards aren't known for throttling badly so you might want to consider repasting the GPU, in case something is wrong.

I actually just replaced the thermal paste today. Everything looked right when I had it apart, but something has to be wrong don't you think?

[MoonlightSylv]

Your cases front panel seems pretty restrictive with airflow, try removing it and see if the temps go down at all.

[Thunder Squirrel]

8 minutes ago, MoonlightSylv said:

Your cases front panel seems pretty restrictive with airflow, try removing it and see if the temps go down at all.

Yeah the front panel dosnt let much air through, but I removed it and ran another test and sure enough it shot right up to 82 degrees unfortunately.

[-rascal-]

Another use with the same EVGA GTX 1060 Gaming reported similar 82*C/83*C high temperature issues.

(Linking the thread for reference, please do not revive a thread from 2016).

 

I think it's just a bad cooler vs the 2-fan ACX cooler.

The heatsink on the GTX 1060 Gaming is tiny...

[Thunder Squirrel]

4 minutes ago, -rascal- said:

Another use with the same EVGA GTX 1060 Gaming reported similar 82*C/83*C high temperature issues.

(Linking the thread for reference, please do not revive a thread from 2016).

 

I think it's just a bad cooler vs the 2-fan ACX cooler.

The heatsink on the GTX 1060 Gaming is tiny...

So realy it seems like the heatsink and fan is just not enough for this card. Is there any relatively simple way to upgrade the cooling?

[Cal-GGMU]

7 minutes ago, Thunder Squirrel said:

So realy it seems like the heatsink and fan is just not enough for this card. Is there any relatively simple way to upgrade the cooling?

Probably nothing worth the money. Simply putting a fan onit,and keeping the panel open might be your cheapest method.
Or Water cool it, but at that price youll be outspending the worth of your card

[-rascal-]

11 minutes ago, Thunder Squirrel said:

So realy it seems like the heatsink and fan is just not enough for this card. Is there any relatively simple way to upgrade the cooling?

 

You can look at aftermarket cooling options.

Use something like a NZXT G12 bracket, and use an AIO (single 120mm / 140mm should be good) to cool the card.

No need to go 240mm / 360mm / 480mm AIO...that's overkill.

https://www.nzxt.com/products/kraken-g12-white

 

Or an aftermarket cooler...like something from Arctic Cooling, for example.

The compact ones should be good enough...the 3x fans ones are overkill for a GTX 1060 IMO.

https://www.arctic.ac/en/products/cooling/gpu-cooler/

[Mark Kaine]

can't he just slap two noctua fans on it, that should improve things? 

 

Also new thermal paste for sure.