7900XT Reference card should i bother with a repaste or leave as is?

[Bagzie]

Hey there , I recently purchased a 7900XT reference card in the UK from a store called CEX , Its a used card but comes with a 2 year warranty from CEX themselves.

 

I've read alot online about AMD and there junction temps and there was a few folk saying they got better results after a repaste , The card itself has no warranty void stickers on the screws or anywhere i can see actually so shouldn't have to worry about that.

 

I have an ASUS AP201 case with plenty of fans and good airflow.

 

Picture is off the card after running cyberpunk for about 2 hours with RT Ultra @ 1440p with XESS on ultra quality (I get 65-75 fps like this and is my preferred quality to fps ratio in this game.

 

Card is undervolted with a higher power limit and memory clock but its stability is rock solid its just the junction temp that worries me a little bit.

 

its worth noting i play with a headset on and cant hear the pc whatsoever so the fan speed seems fine to me.

[YoungBlade]

The max junction temp for the RX 7000 series cards is 110C, so you're still 17C away from that. As long as the card isn't thermal throttling, which it shouldn't be if that is actually the maximum temperature it reaches, then I don't think a repaste is necessary.

 

If it makes you personally feel better about things, that's fine, but do remember that there are some minor risks associated with a repaste, the most likely being tearing a thermal pad, which could harm VRM or memory temps as a result, or doing a poor mount on the GPU die, which could result in worse temperatures than what you have now, and needing to do it all over again. Basically, I'm arguing for "if it ain't broke, don't fix it."

[AlTech]

18 minutes ago, Bagzie said:

snip

I'd personally repaste it, I don't know how hot the 7000 series cards get generally but that feels a little hot.

 

I typically replace the thermal paste of used GPUs I buy just to be safe.

[Bagzie]

Thanks guys.

 

This was a worst case scenario for it since its overclocked and boosting pritty high so i think following blades advice im going to leave it be as is and just monitor it in the future incase it gets worse.

 

I'll maybe think about repasting once my bank account recovers from the £2000 hit it took this week.

 

I've also found if i run the card at its default 308w power limit i don't see higher than 84c on the junction whilst only losing around 120mhz on the core clock so i think thats the way to go.

 

Thanks AITech and YoungBlade for helping me out.

 

 

[Sawa Takahashi]

I may be a little late but I feel like rambling today

 

Unless you are really short on performance, I suggest you do not raise power limit over 100%. You can lower the limit to 85%-95% without a major impact on performance. Undervolting is a really good idea because as long as the card is stable, you cut your power dissipation by a lot without affecting performance at all.

And always when you think temps are too high, you can edit the fan profiles to make them spin sooner and faster. Downside is the noise. It's up to you to find your comfortable balance between the two.

[Bagzie]

10 hours ago, Sawa Takahashi said:

I may be a little late but I feel like rambling today

 

Unless you are really short on performance, I suggest you do not raise power limit over 100%. You can lower the limit to 85%-95% without a major impact on performance. Undervolting is a really good idea because as long as the card is stable, you cut your power dissipation by a lot without affecting performance at all.

And always when you think temps are too high, you can edit the fan profiles to make them spin sooner and faster. Downside is the noise. It's up to you to find your comfortable balance between the two.

In the end sawa this is what I did , I backed the power limit back to zero then fine tuned the undervolt so its getting pretty good clock speeds in games.

 

The 360w option is there if I need it but I'm much more comfortable with 62c on the gpu and 84c on the hotspot which is what I'm getting now.

[Bagzie]

I'm back again folks , despite me saying i was going to leave as is i decided to just go for the repaste and see the results.

 

Very impressed actually this is the result of the repaste.

 

The hotspot temperature dropping 10c whilst lowering the fan speed by 100rpm is exactly what i was looking fo

 

I did notice when looking at the OEM paste that where was definately some bare die towards the centre , Pump out maybe or just badly applied?

 

I used Thermalright TFX since alot of folk said its thick and resistant to the pump out effect.

 

Will just need to see how it holds up over the next few weeks and months but initial results have impressed me.