High Idle - 60-61C

My Card : ASUS Radeon X850 Pro VIVO 256 MB
Default Clocks : 507 Core - 520 Mem

When I first bought this card it idled at about 35-40 C.

About 2 months after I updated drivers from a reformat and it has been idling at around 50-55 C.

Today I just installed the SoundBlaster X-Fi XtremeMusic Soundcard and since then, my video card has been idling at about 60 C which is almost as twice as high as it used to when I First got it. I was thinking maybe there was an issue with the drivers or something but im not completely sure. I'm also considering getting a new cooling unit for it, perhaps a Zalman or something similar, but im not sure.

Any ideas what has been causing this and how to fix it or should I just upgrade with new cooling? I'm still using Stock.

Thanks

- Dave

Replace the fans in your case with better ones other than stock.

perhaps your soundcard is placed directly next to the video card and it is blocking some of the airflow off of the video card thus making it hotter?

If you have quite a new cooler then try ati tray tools, it will run next to your driver and under overclocking settings you can speed up your fans to decrese your craphics card temp.


http://www.guru3d.com/article/atitraytools/189/