Temperatures while gaming

[Mono]

I'm currently testing out a few games on my Late 2013 iMac. Project Cars and other racing sims mainly.

With Project cars being quite the hog for resources the temperatures shoot up, at full res they get close to 95° on my GPU and around 80° on my CPU. All the while running at 60fps with no lag or stutter.

Is this within a safe range? Anyone else also playing quite intensive games on a similar machine?

Specs:
i5 3.4ghz
8gb Ram
Nvidia GTX 775m

[76561198232238636]

Hello

[videogames]

It's borderline. Your components won't cook themselves, but rather throttle until they get back down to reasonable temperatures. This will result in a sudden drop in performance, and may lead to a reduced the life span of your CPU and GPU if they're operating within those temperatures constantly. Unfortunately there's not much you can do besides using 3rd party software to increase fan speeds, and keeping your Mac free of dust. There's no room in that tiny enclosure for proper cooling.

[Mono]

When you talk about throttling does that only happen within the OSX enviroment? I forgot to mention i'm on Windows 8 using Boot Camp. I've had no drops in performance what so ever. constant 60fps.

I've dropped the resolution to 720p to test and got a drop of 20° so now the GPU is 73-75°. This seems more resonable to me, what do you think?

Obviously it would be ideal to run at 1440p but if that's going to cause damage long term whats the point.

[videogames]

It can happen in any environment. It depends on the exact models of the parts themselves, but usually a GPU will start to dial back clocks around 90-95C, while the average Intel CPU can go close to 100C, with 105-110 being close to it shutting down to prevent damage. Cooler parts will also boost clocks farther.
While your temps aren't great they're not dangerous either, unless you're getting those values all the time. 75C for a GPU is fairly common, no worries there. You should still push higher, but I would look into using utilities to either set up a custom fan profile for your GPU or adjust it manually when you're gaming. Not sure how easily doable this is on a mobile GPU like the iMac's. A good rule of thumb is to try and stay under 80C at load, but sometimes that's just not possible without proper cooling.

[Mono]

Thanks!

Yeah those values are only when gaming on someting like Project Cars. I'll have a look into the fan control applications and get back to you. So anything under 80° while under heavy load should be good?

[Onufrii Flot]

Wp

[Mono]

Pumped the resolution up to 1080p. Makes all the difference in terms of visuals, a lot of the detail was going to waste at 720p. Even better is that there is no diffrerence in temps.

Steady 72-74° with most of the bells and whistles turned on, never dropping below 60fps!

[KamQ12]

I'm playing on macbook air 13" 2015. Sometimes few competitive match in a row! When outside is hot and on my mac working CS:GO for few hours maximal temp are around 80 C.

[Mono]

Originally posted by Olly **MURDERER of John Snow**:

I'm playing on macbook air 13" 2015. Sometimes few competitive match in a row! When outside is hot and on my mac working CS:GO for few hours maximal temp are around 80 C.

Ruddy hell, those things are so slim how do they keep cool!? :O

What's the graphics chip in your air?

[...]

Hello

[parharrington]

How does one check the tempature of their cpu and gpu on a mid-2011 iMac?

[Mono]

I've been using Macs Fan Control. Works on OS X and in boot camp windows.

http://www.crystalidea.com/macs-fan-control

[parharrington]

Originally posted by Mono:

I've been using Macs Fan Control. Works on OS X and in boot camp windows.

http://www.crystalidea.com/macs-fan-control

Ty I'll check that out.

[evaevaevaeva]

I have a 2012 macbook pro and have always had overheating problems with any graphics intensive games- especially the sims and skyrim run on bootcamp. A fan helps and it's not as bad as my old dell that litterally gave me burns on my thighs, but it's still pretty bad.

[Mono]

Originally posted by chocolatemomiji:

I have a 2012 macbook pro and have always had overheating problems with any graphics intensive games- especially the sims and skyrim run on bootcamp. A fan helps and it's not as bad as my old dell that litterally gave me burns on my thighs, but it's still pretty bad.

What kinda temps you getting on your GPU?