Graphics Card related questions

Hi MSI
Does your 980 gaming card have VRM sensors for extracting temp values?

It's hard to judge without seeing the product.
If you didn't do anything to cause a short-circuit it should not explode or whatever.

I would send it back to the shop for warranty service. The shop or MSI RMA will judge if it is in warranty or not (they will simply look at it to see if there is any user damage or not).

Ty for the reply. I've already contacted komplett.se, who replaced my card within the the warranty So problem solved!

The GTX 980 GAMING 4G does have a VRM sensor for fan control but atm there is no way to get the value with standard utilities (like MSI Afterburner, GPU-Z, etc).

I have checked and there are known issue with certain vbioses and video playback.
Since we produce many cards with small differences the vbios differs as well, so not all models /vbioses are affected.

In order to give you the correct latest vbios for your card I need to know the first part of your garphics card (XXX-VYYYY-ZZZ), for example 602-V277-19S.

Sorry I didn't described it properly.
I should have said the first part of the serial number, i.e. 602-V277-yyy
(912-Vxxx-yyy is the retail SKU (card+packing+features), 602-Vvvv-www is the card SKU which determines which vbios you need)

With a single GFTX970 if you run GPU-Z in idle the bus speed should list as PCI-E 3.0 x16 @ x16 1.1, whihc means that the bus speed is lowered from Gen3 (8Gbps) to Gen1.1 (2.5Gbps)

If you run a 3D application it should switch to @x16 3.0.

In SLI the cards should still be listed as x8 (1.1 mode in idle or 3.0 mode during 3D)

What I have seen from reviews is that 2xGTX 970 in SLI should score 13K in Firestrike (Graphics score=16K)
http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/geforce_gtx_970_sli_revi...
So I don't know why you scored 23K (unless you did a massive overclock).

I have no reference for Valley scores in SLI (only score I have is Valley Extreme HD test 4294p for 2x GTX980 SLI)

You might want to update the motherboard's bios to v1.B if you haven't done so already.

If the problem persists could you post a screenshot of GPU-Z showing the PCI-E @ 1x?

Both Z87A-GD65 and Z97 GAMING 7 can switch lanes between the three PCI-Ex16 slots like this: 16,0,0 and 8,8,0 and 8, 4, 4.
(I assume you use PCI_E2 and PCI_E5 on the Z97 GMAING 7, that should result in 8x, 8x, 0)
x1 is not supposed to be possible.

And since you have already tried two motherboards it is most likely an issue with the graphics cards.
Software isn't the issue either since you already have the issue in the bios setup (board explorer).
Could you check if the PCI-E connectors on the graphics cards and motherboards aren't damaged or dirty.
What happens if you swap the cards between the slots.
Does the x1 config move to the other slot in the bios board explorer?

Another wild guess could be that something is shorting your PCI_E5 slot form the bottom (maybe a mounting standoff that is in wrong location).
You need to take out the motherboard from the case to check this.

If the problem moves with the graphics card then it's probably not the second PCIe slot or the motherboard.
What happens if you insert the possibly defective card alone in the motherboard? Then you can check if it only happens with SLI configs.
What happens if you don't connect the SLI bridge on top?

I have checked with our HQ and they are removing the repetitive Fan spin-up in idle from the vbioses.
All vbioses will be available through LiveUpdate soon. Atm GTX 980 vbioses should already be online through Live Update

If you can PM me the first part of the serial number, i.e. "602-V316-xxx" I can already sent you the new and corrected vbios.

The fans on GTX970 GAMING 4G should both spin simultaneously when the GPU temperature is hotter than 60°C and when the GPU temperature drops to 50°C or lower the fans stop spinning. That is normal behavior. (BTW the GTX 980 GAMING fans are controlled independently so one fan spinning on this model could be normal)

If one fan spins and one doesn't on GTX 970 GAMING 4G then the not-spinning fan is broken and you should return it to the shop for warranty service.
So far we have heard these complaints on a small number of cards. We also received a small amount of GTX970 GAMING 4G cards back from the market with fan issues
We suspect that on the first batch the "Warning sticker" on the fan might have some impact on the fan construction causing issues on fan1 (closest to the display connectors). To prevent this issue from happening again we have improved the stickers in the later productions.
If fan1 doesn't spin and GPU temperature goes over 60°C then fan2 will start spinnig at 100% RPM (only FAN1 RPM is feed backed an monitored by the fan control circuit).
We have also received a few cards with fan2 failing on GTX970 GAMING 4G which we are still investigating.

In the MSI Global forum (froum-en.msi.com) we have heard people reporting that if a fan doesn't spin it sometimes helps to give it a small push and run the fans manually at 100% (with MSI Afterburner) for a few hours.
MSI does not recommend this procedure. If a fan doesn't run by itself, it probably has a mechanical issue (too much friction to start) and this issue might come back in the long run.

Anyone who has fans that aren't running (while GPU temperature > 60°C) we (MSI) advise you to return the card to the shop for warranty service.

Yes, the fan issue alone should be enough to get the card replaced. We don't want you to run into problems later on by a failing fan when the issue showed itself already in the beginning.

The PCIe x1 issue is probably a unique issue and is also enough reason to get the card replaced.

You can refer to this thread. If they have any questions, ask Inet to contact me (Ruudt from MSI in The Netherlands, they probably know where to reach me).

LiveUpdate is offering the vbioses for GTX980 and GTX970 GAMING 4G that removes the fan spin up every 35seconds in idle.

If you want to know how a vbios update works, I made a video about how to update the vbios using LiveUpdate6.

Hello,
is it possible to get new fans for my 'MSI GeForce GTX 780 3GB OC TwinFrozr Gaming', bought 2013-12-09 from Inet ?
One of the fans is rattling and making noice, but i rather replace both at the same time.

Can't find a port to lube it up either and dont feel like drilling into it (unless i have to).

// Martin

In order to get your fans replaced the card needs to be returned to Inet for warranty service.

Can i still do that if i broke the warranty screws?