PC Graphics

[areynolds]

I purchased a new computer the specs listed below. The computer works great as long as you're not playing any games. As soon as I launch any game the total board power instantly goes to 350W minimum. Without any adjusting of the settings, it could go as high as 480W. Whenever the card goes above roughly 355W the power supply starts an alarm. The PC came with a NZXT 850W PSU. Thinking maybe it was just too small I upgraded to a Corsair HX1000i instead. It made no difference, still anytime a game is started the alarm goes off. If I click out of the game and the total board power drops below 355ish the alarm stops. 

Things I've tried based on what I have seen on the forums:
- Get a bigger PSU

- This 100% is not coil whine. It's a very loud steady audible alarm. Has happened on both PSU's

- If I put my 3090 from my other computer into this one there's no issues. 

- I have laid the unit on it's side(when thinking maybe it was temp related) it made no difference the temps are all within normal range. 

- Customizing the settings and put the power % to -10%. This makes it much better for sure instead of up to 480W it's typically between 350-370. 

- I have 4 monitors, currently have 1 unplugged, and the other 2 plugged into the on-board connections because just the idle power usage was over 130W. At least now it's down to about 60 which helps.

Any other thoughts or fixes y'all know of? 

[Qoojo]

Alarm from what? Makes sure the 3 power connectors to gpu are separate. The 1000w PSU is fine. No idea what alarm you are talking about though. Post pc specs.

[areynolds]

• AMD Ryzen 9-7950X3D 128MB 100-100000908WOF 16-Core 4.20GHz
• MSI MAG Core Liquid 240R 240mm liquid cooler
• 2TB 7200RPM HDD SATA 6Gb/s + 4 TB SSD
• AMD Radeon RX 7900XTX 24GB GDDR6
• 128GB DDR5(32 GB x 4)
• 850W Power Supply

I made sure all 3 were separate on both PSUs. The alarm is from the PSU(both did it). 

[Qoojo]

Motherboard?

I suspect the motherboard might have a power draw setting in bios? Since you changed PSU, and same sound persisted, it's not the PSU.

[areynolds]

I'm going to pull the PSU out tonight so it's outside the case and see where it's coming from for sure. I thought the same thing for the mb, the only setting I could see for anything related was a cpu heat alarm which I disabled. I'll do some more digging here tonight and see what I can come up with!

[cpurpe91]

My stock RX 7900 XTX TBP sensor on GPU-Z goes up to 500w at times. I don't understand why an alarm would go off. Everything works fine on my end. 1000w is plenty. Can you explain what you mean by an alarm? 

[areynolds]

Weird! I'll try to get a video tonight but it's just a steady alarm. Imagine a bios beep but just consistently running. Both the PSU's both made it; I am 90% sure it's the PSU. When I moved around listening both PSU's I heard it loudest while hovering over the intake side of the PSU. Tonight, when I get a video, I'll pull the PSU out to make sure it's 100%

I've also watched all the other temps and resource usages for the rest of the PC. Everything is well within acceptable ranges and it's right at 355W total board power that the alarm starts, as soon as it hits 349 it stops. 

My Specs:

• AMD Ryzen 9-7950X3D 128MB 100-100000908WOF 16-Core 4.20GHz
• MSI MAG Core Liquid 240R 240mm liquid cooler
• 2TB 7200RPM HDD SATA 6Gb/s + 4 TB SSD
• AMD Radeon RX 7900XTX 24GB GDDR6
• 128GB DDR5(32 GB x 4)
• 850W Power Supply

[areynolds]

Sounds a lot like this but quite a bit louder (could just be the video): https://youtu.be/f4z5Xw7uFKY?feature=shared&t=76

I'm actually going to check this fix out to make sure it's not it. Being the noise is the loudest when I'm on the back side of the case where the power switch is on the PSU I'm not convinced but doesnt mean theres not an on board speaker that just so happens to butt up right next to the PSU. 

[FunkZ]

The AMD reference 7900XTX has two PCIe power connectors. If your card has three it must be a partner model. So what card do you have?

I believe you stated you're using three separate PCIe power cables. To clarify, each cable with only one connector on each end, using three PCIe power ports on the power supply, one for each cable? Confirm they are plugged into PCIe port on the power supply and not some other 8pin port.

Are they custom cables or cables that came with the power supply? Have you confirmed the pinout of each cable? Any chance one of them is an 8pin CPU power pinout instead of PCIe?

[areynolds]

All good thoughts! Good to know on the model, when I have it pulled apart tonight, I'll see what it shows on the serial and see if I can figure out which one. Mine for sure has 3 though, all 3 cables are individual not shared so plugin to their own pcie port on the power supply. As far as the cables go, I actually tried both the ones that came with it and the ones I had in my older PC that was running a similar size PSU. 

Some others above gave some good ideas that I will be testing out tonight as well. With what I watched online earlier and some of the other ideas I'm starting to wonder if the noise is not really the PSU but just that the on board mb speaker is right next to the PSU. 

One thing I have not tried yet that I will also do is putting the graphics card in my old PC and see what it does. When I bring the 3090 into the new pc everything is fine so just been hyper focused on other areas that could be the problem, I guess. 

[cpurpe91]

I don't know if this has been clarified but you should never mix cables from different power supplies. The pin outs could be different and brick the entire PC. Watched a major youtuber do it about a year ago.

[areynolds]

Yeah the ground can be swapped which obviously can be very bad!

[areynolds]

Found the answer, embarrassing but hopefully it'll give you a laugh 🙂

[areynolds · Accepted solution]

So this was so dumb I need to give some story....

• Got home tonight and pulled the PSU out. Determined the sound was for sure NOT coming from the PSU but couldn't pinpoint it still. 
• Called my son in to see if he could help pinpoint it. He couldn't find it either, we spent 20 minutes trying to track it down.
• We go find tool we can use to put up to our ear to see if that will help. Nothing, literally not finding a thing. The noise just is loud and sounds like it's everywhere. 
  • My tower sits in a semi enclosed area under my desk. It has plenty of airflow as there's slats and what not but for this specific story, we'll call it enclosed.
• So, I get frustrated and decide I'm just going to pull it out and take the whole PC back apart and then start one part at a time to see if I can find anything.
• I still had a video playing to force the alarm. I pulled my headset and mic off and away from the desk. When I did that, I sat backwards a ways to get them out of the way. When I did I heard the noise even louder...
• On the backside of my desk is a battery backup I'm plugged into. Apparently, I was overloading it with everything that was plugged into it and it's what was making the freaking noise. It was just so loud and perfectly aligned with where the tower sits that when it would go off it was just filling the area with noise. But being behind the wood on the back it wasnt clear it was coming from that direction.
• This whole freaking time not a dang thing wrong with this machine. It was just a set of coincidences with the UPS positioned where it was and the cables not long enough to pull the tower out completely without being a little under the desk. 

So frustrating, it was a total end user move which is embarrassing but also gave us a good laugh afterwards.