AMD Radeon 19.7.3 Drivers Increase RX 5700 Series Idle Fan Speeds by Over 50%

[btarunr]

AMD's recent Radeon Software Adrenalin 19.7.3 beta drivers appear to break the fan settings of reference-design Radeon RX 5700 XT and RX 5700 cards. All earlier drivers for these cards offered good idle fan-speeds, despite the lack of fan-stop, with the fan of Radeon RX 5700 XT idling around 14% or 740 RPM. Once the new 19.7.3 drivers are installed, the fan-speed never drops below 23% or 1,170 RPM. This phenomenon can be observed even on the reference RX 5700, which now idles at 22% fan-speed, or 1,130 RPM, up from 13% or 685 RPM. This increases fan speed RPMs by 66% for the RX 5700 XT and +57% for the RX 5700. To demonstrate this bug, we first installed reference RX 5700 XT and RX 5700 cards with 19.7.2 drivers, and logged their idle fan-speeds using GPU-Z. Next we switched to 19.7.3 and recorded the same data for a completely idle card, sitting at the desktop.

The raised idle fan-speeds keep the GPU cooler when idling. With 19.7.2, the GPU hotspot was observed to be around 42 °C. Booting from 19.7.3, we see hotspot temperature settle down to around 38 °C for the RX 5700 XT, and to 37 °C for the RX 5700. Such a small difference at such low temperatures really shouldn't have any effect on longevity or anything else. On the other hand, higher fan-speeds also mean that the idle fan-noise levels are noticeably higher, and no longer match the idle fan-speeds measured in launch-day reviews by TechPowerUp and other tech publications.



Update (30/07): We can confirm that the 19.7.4 drivers released late Monday do not fix this issue.

In our reviews we praised AMD for excellent idle fan speeds that make their cards whisper quiet in idle, despite the lack of the idle-fan-stop feature. With 19.7.2, the the card's idle noise output was measured at 27 dBA. With 19.7.3 and its idle fan speed raised, our RX 5700 XT now has an idle fan-noise output of 29.4 dBA. The RX 5700 went from 27.8 dBA to 29.7 dBA.

Maximum fan speeds are unaffected, because both cards are configured with a certain maximum RPM fan speed limit, which is reached after around half a minute of gaming. It seems that during gaming, that limit takes priority over the change in fan speed observed with 19.7.3 Beta.

It's also extremely surprising that AMD's driver patch notes don't mention such a significant change at all. There must be a log of someone making changes in the relevant driver code? While we can understand that not everything that's new gets reported publicly, especially if it affects rare edge cases, or apps used only by few users, adjusting the fan speed kind of changes the product that AMD sold to their customers, and they should be made aware of such changes promptly.

We reached out to AMD for comment and hope this is just a bug that gets addressed in the next driver update.



Update: The 19.7.4 drivers don't fix this issue, nor is it part of the "known issues" in the driver's changelog.



View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[Landcross]

When I read the article's title, I thought the idle fan speed was set at 50% and I was already expecting memes about AMD cards running hot again.
But... luckily I misinterpreted the title haha.

 

[cucker tarlson]

wtf how can a company like amd have problems dealing with a friggin fan since launch,first in gaming and now in idle.

 

[Zubasa]

wtf how can a company like amd have problems dealing with a friggin fan since launch,first in gaming and now in idle.

Actually this might be a band-aid fix for high idle temperatures.
There was some kind of bug with high idle voltage as well.
I suspect it had something to do with dual monitor setup.
My friend running dual monitor setup was hitting 70+ degrees idle on his 5700XT, this driver fixed that.

 

[delshay]

Can someone please check if this new driver is worse for "Ashes of the Singularity" compared to the previous driver.

 

[PerfectWave]

WoW very important news! Kappa

 

[Turmania]

For once can they do a proper launch with no bugs to show their competence....?

 

[B-Real]

For once can they do a proper launch with no bugs to show their competence....?

NV 20 RTX series : no RT games at launch. Nearly 1 year after its launch, there are still 3 games only supporting RT. 4th game's (Youngblood) RT support was also postponed. This means 3 of the 4 games RT support didn't arrive at their launch. The exception was Metro: Exodus. FF XV was also to offer RT support, it was cancelled. That's a nice launch too for a GPU series wanted to be sold for its new feature.

 

[repman244]

NV 20 RTX series : no RT games at launch. Nearly 1 year after its launch, there are still 3 games only supporting RT. 4th game's (Youngblood) RT support was also postponed. This means 3 of the 4 games RT support didn't arrive at their launch. The exception was Metro: Exodus. FF XV was also to offer RT support, it was cancelled. That's a nice launch too for a GPU series wanted to be sold for its new feature.

What does that have anything to do with this fan issue?
RT is totally new and it's normal you won't get massive amount of games supporting it.

 

[the54thvoid]

NV 20 RTX series : no RT games at launch. Nearly 1 year after its launch, there are still 3 games only supporting RT. 4th game's (Youngblood) RT support was also postponed. This means 3 of the 4 games RT support didn't arrive at their launch. The exception was Metro: Exodus. FF XV was also to offer RT support, it was cancelled. That's a nice launch too for a GPU series wanted to be sold for its new feature.

So far off-topic, I think it's in the top ten all-time irrelevancies.

I'm pretty sure it's a bug. No reason to do so and it'll get fixed, surely. If not, yeah - it makes the launch reviews a bit squinty. But still, I imagine it can be adjusted via 3rd party, so if noise is an issue, at least the slightly savvy can deal with it via AB or Trixx or whatever.

 

[cucker tarlson]

NV 20 RTX series : no RT games at launch. Nearly 1 year after its launch, there are still 3 games only supporting RT. 4th game's (Youngblood) RT support was also postponed. This means 3 of the 4 games RT support didn't arrive at their launch. The exception was Metro: Exodus. FF XV was also to offer RT support, it was cancelled. That's a nice launch too for a GPU series wanted to be sold for its new feature.

must've taken a wrong turn at Albuquerque my friend,this isn't amd's reddit.The hell does rtx have to do with amd's inability to make a blower card run without issues?

and quake rtx ? with global illumination,shadows and reflections it's probably the best implementation of all.control and doom eternal are coming soon,CP2077 endorsed rtx,as well as watch dogs legion.

 

[xkm1948]

So many bugs, good old RTG GPU launch: release a product without enough QA and let the entire user base troubleshoot with you together, best of all they will call this “FineWine” after all bugs are squashed. Win-win for RTG!

 

[JB_Gamer]

So many bugs, good old RTG GPU launch: release a product without enough QA and let the entire user base troubleshoot with you together, best of all they will call this “FineWine” after all bugs are squashed. Win-win for RTG!

Enlight me, what more bugs???

 

[AlB80]

Maybe it's not fan speed logic bug. Screenshot shows that PCIe link doesn't drop freqs. It's power saving feature. More power, more heat, more speed.

 

[Nkd]

What does that have anything to do with this fan issue?
RT is totally new and it's normal you won't get massive amount of games supporting it.

how is this a frickin fan issue? The shit is basically silent still. So lowering idle temps with little higher fan speed is bad? Don’t fall for the clock bait titles. This title makes it seem like it’s a big issue lol. OMG lower temps on idle and fan speed that can the heard. What a big issue lol.

 

[cucker tarlson]

how is this a frickin fan issue? The shit is basically silent still. So lowering idle temps with little higher fan speed is bad? Don’t fall for the clock bait titles. This title makes it seem like it’s a big issue lol. OMG lower temps on idle and fan speed that can the heard. What a big issue lol.

30db is louder that my card runs on gaming load.not too noisy,true,but is there really a reason for it to run 1200rpm instead of 600rpm? a bug ? a design flaw ?
I'm inclined to believe what @Zubasa suggested,this is probably an intentional short-term fix for some bigger issue

 

[Vayra86]

Actually this might be a band-aid fix for high idle temperatures.
There was some kind of bug with high idle voltage as well.
I suspect it had something to do with dual monitor setup.
My friend running dual monitor setup was hitting 70+ degrees idle on his 5700XT, this driver fixed that.

This, its the usual how to fix things quick and dirty 101
Well, quick... mostly dirty

Temp based fan curves are apparently not that easy, Gigabyte, Zotac, EVGA, Palit have all had their problems with it since Pascal onwards, so its not an AMD specific problem. Might have something to do with the more radical boost techniques used, after all you want a good RPM response across the whole curve.

 

[W1zzard]

The shit is basically silent still

it's definitely much noisier and well audible now. it is 50% more noisy, dba isn't linear

Maybe it's not fan speed logic bug. Screenshot shows that PCIe link doesn't drop freqs. It's power saving feature. More power, more heat, more speed.

interesting .. you might have found another bug ... let me check quickly

edit: it goes to 1.1 fine, just a bit more rarely it seems. doesn't affect fan speeds, and the fan curve display in wattman is incorrect, too

 

[Markosz]

Like anyone cares about these crappy reference cards...
Come on third party manufacturers, release your custom cards already.

 

[Air]

But can you still change it manually using a custom fan curve? If so, that's not THAT bad. If you can't change it however, that's absurd and shouldn't ever happen, specially when a GPU at iddle shouldn't make any noise at all.

it's definitely much noisier and well audible now. it is 50% more noisy, dba isn't linear

Our perception of sound pressure is also not linear, so even though sound pressure may be 50% higher, we wont percieve it as 50% louder, it's a lot less than that.

 

[cucker tarlson]

well I think it's not an issue for those who buy reference anyway.If they can tolerate the jet engine while gaming,this is nothing.

 

[Assimilator]

Actually this might be a band-aid fix for high idle temperatures.
There was some kind of bug with high idle voltage as well.
I suspect it had something to do with dual monitor setup.
My friend running dual monitor setup was hitting 70+ degrees idle on his 5700XT, this driver fixed that.

W1zz measured 36W for multi-monitor, which is abysmal but shouldn't be beyond the fan's original idle speed to cool. I reckon this is a bug that just happened to fix your friend's problem.

 

[aktpu]

Aaand .4 version is out

 

[eidairaman1]

For once can they do a proper launch with no bugs to show their competence....?

Ngreedia is riddled aswell, still got users with dying rtx's nice try though.

 

[danbert2000]

It's sad that AMD's first launch of decently priced and performant products since the first Polaris cards (470/480) is mired by issues. We can only hope that these are sorted by the time aftermarket 5700 cards get released in a couple weeks. It's interesting that the RTX Super cards are releasing with much better availability even though they "launched" two days later. I've seen reports of driver regressions with old Polaris and Vega cards, unusable overclocking on Navi cards, and generally a lack of non-Beta driver support for the new products. Nvidia or AMD fan, you have to feel for these people that bought AMD's new cards and are still waiting for good support. It sort of reminds me of the headaches around the RTX series and their high multi-monitor and idle power usage, which took a couple months to fix, and the product failures across the RTX lineup that were related to bad memory.