MSI Afterburner help

[Krigga]

Hi again,

In MSI Afterburner, my power limit is set to 100% and my GPU temperature limit is set to 83 degrees (GTX 1060).

My questions are:

Is it okay when my power limit exceeds 100% (it hit 103% today)?

Should I lower the power limit?

What even is power limit?

Should I lower the limit on my GPU so I don't damage it?

Thanks.

[Bananasplit_00]

just crank the power limit, if its within resonable temps there is no problem you almost can not break a GPU with stock BIOS, not even if you max out voltage and power limits, as long as tems are bellow 85C its good

[Krigga]

1 minute ago, Bananasplit_00 said:

just crank the power limit, if its within resonable temps there is no problem you almost can not break a GPU with stock BIOS, not even if you max out voltage and power limits, as long as tems are bellow 85C its good

What does power limit even mean?

[Krigga]

BUMP

 

[Mirdon]

When you reach your card's maximum expected tdp (power limit) due to overvolting and overclocking, you start to get underclocked and undervolted to stay below that threshold which causes instability since you'll get varying speeds as your driver's continuously fighting that power limit. Increasing the power limit lets you increase that maximum tdp allowing you to have further headroom when overclocking since it can now handle more power without underclocking/undervolting.

[Mick Naughty]

I set my power to 110% minimum. Also set the voltage to max, until I find how much I need for the overclock to be stable but I normally don't do that.

[Krigga]

3 hours ago, Mirdon said:

When you reach your card's maximum expected tdp (power limit) due to overvolting and overclocking, you start to get underclocked and undervolted to stay below that threshold which causes instability since you'll get varying speeds as your driver's continuously fighting that power limit. Increasing the power limit lets you increase that maximum tdp allowing you to have further headroom when overclocking since it can now handle more power without underclocking/undervolting.

I haven't overclocked anything. What do you suggest I raise my maximum power limit to?

[Mick Naughty]

5 minutes ago, Krigga said:

I haven't overclocked anything. What do you suggest I raise my maximum power limit to?

Doesn't matter as there's are still limits to what it can do. Raise it to the max. 

[Krigga]

3 minutes ago, Mick Naughty said:

Doesn't matter as there's are still limits to what it can do. Raise it to the max. 

I'm worried in doing that. Is it at all dangerous that the power limit exceeds 100 when that is the maximum (can I leave it as is)? Thanks.

[Mick Naughty]

3 minutes ago, Krigga said:

I'm worried in doing that. Is it at all dangerous that the power limit exceeds 100 when that is the maximum (can I leave it as is)? Thanks.

It's not, card will only handle what it can take. Been doing it for years with several cards. Either limit your performance or use what's offered to you by the manufacturers. 

[Krigga]

1 minute ago, Mick Naughty said:

It's not, card will only handle what it can take. Been doing it for years with several cards. Either limit your performance or use what's offered to you by the manufacturers. 

So it's perfectly safe to set my power limit to over 100? Sorry, I just don't want to destroy any of my parts.

[Mick Naughty]

20 minutes ago, Krigga said:

So it's perfectly safe to set my power limit to over 100? Sorry, I just don't want to destroy any of my parts.

Yes for the hundredth time. 

[Krigga]

1 minute ago, Mick Naughty said:

Yes for the high hundredth time. 

Thanks.

[Mirdon]

38 minutes ago, Krigga said:

I haven't overclocked anything. What do you suggest I raise my maximum power limit to?

 

29 minutes ago, Krigga said:

I'm worried in doing that. Is it at all dangerous that the power limit exceeds 100 when that is the maximum (can I leave it as is)? Thanks.

 

The 100% power limit is the expected tdp of the card while the max power limit (120% or depending on your card) is the actual limit the card could safely reach, however, not every card is the same, some can reach that max limit without problems while some badly binned cards could have some problems maintaining that max power limit (but afaik it very rarely happens). Some people do leave their power limit to 100% but they won't really go far with it since gpu boost already overclocks your card closely to your power limit and temperature.

 

tl;dr: GPU Boost already ocs your card close to the 100% power limit so you need to increase power limit to sustain additional manual overclock.

[Krigga]

2 minutes ago, Mirdon said:

 

 

The 100% power limit is the expected tdp of the card while the max power limit (120% or depending on your card) is the actual limit the card could safely reach, however, not every card is the same, some can reach that max limit without problems while some badly binned cards could have some problems maintaining that max power limit (but afaik it very rarely happens). Some people do leave their power limit to 100% but they won't really go far with it since gpu boost already overclocks your card closely to your power limit and temperature.

 

tl;dr: GPU Boost already ocs your card close to the 100% power limit so you need to increase power limit to sustain additional manual overclock.

Thanks for your detailed response, but I'm not sure if my GPU boost is active or not. How do I check?

[Mirdon]

1 minute ago, Krigga said:

Thanks for your detailed response, but I'm not sure if my GPU boost is active or not. How do I check?

It's automatically enabled if you have the driver for the card. But if you want to see it for yourself, you can open gpu-z, afterburner or any other monitoring software and run a benchmark like valley, heaven or a game and watch your clocks. It should be more than your card's clock says in its specs.

[Krigga]

1 minute ago, Mirdon said:

It's automatically enabled if you have the driver for the card. But if you want to see it for yourself, you can open gpu-z, afterburner or any other monitoring software and run a benchmark like valley, heaven or a game and watch your clocks. It should be more than your card's clock says in its specs.

So, I'm fine as is?

[Mirdon]

1 minute ago, Krigga said:

So, I'm fine as is?

Pretty much yeah, however if you need the oc, it's pretty safe to reach the max temp limit. I only ever oc when I need to but since getting the 1080 and playing at 1080p, I never played with the oc.

[Krigga]

1 minute ago, Mirdon said:

Pretty much yeah, however if you need the oc, it's pretty safe to reach the max temp limit. I only ever oc when I need to but since getting the 1080 and playing at 1080p, I never played with the oc.

One last question: Is it okay if I have a 32 inch 1440p monitor with a GTX 1060?

[Mirdon]

1 minute ago, Krigga said:

One last question: Is it okay if I have a 32 inch 1440p monitor with a GTX 1060?

It's perfectly fine but if that's the case, you may want to oc your card to reach your desired fps. If you're reaching like an average of 50-55 on medium/high settings then it would be a good idea to overclock your card to reach that sweet 60fps.

[Krigga]

1 minute ago, Mirdon said:

It's perfectly fine but if that's the case, you may want to oc your card to reach your desired fps. If you're reaching like an average of 50-55 on medium/high settings then it would be a good idea to overclock your card to reach that sweet 60fps.

How does OC'ing my card affect my card life (got it 2 days ago).

[Mirdon]

1 minute ago, Krigga said:

How does OC'ing my card affect my card life (got it 2 days ago).

Not really that much (a few months to a few weeks) as long as it's a reasonable oc. People have their cards still working for 4-5 years before they eventually retire the card and purchase an updated card. What I usually do instead of finding the most stable clock like with most oc'ers is that I only oc until I reach my desired fps because anything more than that is a waste.

 

tl;dr: You'll retire your card before it actually dies from oc provided that you keep a safe temp and voltage.

[Krigga]

2 minutes ago, Mirdon said:

Not really that much (a few months to a few weeks) as long as it's a reasonable oc. People have their cards still working for 4-5 years before they eventually retire the card and purchase an updated card. What I usually do instead of finding the most stable clock like with most oc'ers is that I only oc until I reach my desired fps because anything more than that is a waste.

 

tl;dr: You'll retire your card before it actually dies from oc provided that you keep a safe temp and voltage.

Thanks for your help. Much appreciated. Overwatch download is almost done  

[Mirdon]

2 minutes ago, Krigga said:

Thanks for your help. Much appreciated. Overwatch download is almost done  

You're very welcome, if it's overwatch then you probably don't even need to oc to reach 60fps at 1440p on max settings (did a quick search: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyY597-xtaA). Enjoy!

 

[Krigga]

1 minute ago, Mirdon said:

You're very welcome, if it's overwatch then you probably don't even need to oc to reach 60fps at 1440p on max settings (did a quick search: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyY597-xtaA). Enjoy!

 

Thanks mate. Have a great day!