My new $2K gamer is a furnace!

[JonMyrlennBailey]

I was just testing it by running TANE SP4 maxed out in a dense 3D forest route with 300,000 trees for about a half hour after running TS 2022 for about an hour maxed out and when I opened the front glass doors of the entertainment cabinet, I smelled electrical burning.

I felt the top of my Marantz audio receiver and it felt warm but not painfully hot to the touch. Touching the side of my gaming tower where the vents are next tot he graphics card it was as hot as toaster just used. So, I shut the PC down right away and left the doors wide open.

The computer gave me no audible or visual signs of any overheating and there was no aftermarket overclocking done by me.

The cooling provisions have no liquid cooling, just air cooling with a bunch of fans. The AMD Ryzen 9 has a Noctua low-profile heat-sink cooler on top of it with a bunch of thermal paste sandwiched between. There is case fan on either end and the Zotac GeForce RTX 4070 Super has two fans of its own. The Evga Supernova 550 Watt PSU has its own fan. Six fans total.

Is my PSU underpowered for this rig? Is it prudent to leave the double glass doors wide open while gaming? The living room TV/stereo cabinet is open in the back of the gaming tower.

Incidentally, the images are not as crisp for TANE SP4 as they are for TS 2022 on this new high-priced heat-intensive rig, but TANE SP4 seems to not have much in the way of frame shudder to mention from what I've observed so far, even with maxed-out settings in heavy 3D-content scenery routes.

What puts out more heat driving under a heavy Trainzing load, the AMD Ryzen 9 or the RTX 4070 Super?

Yes, Trainz diesel engines sound super awesome through my Marantz-driven Dayton Audio floor speaker pair and that self-powered Klipsch 10" subwoofer. A 2.1 home audio system.

 

[johnwhelan]

Case design and layout for cooling takes effort. Not all custom built systems have their cooling systems engineered correctly. Alienware is good at it. I wouldn't leave the side of the case off, the fans should be set up for air flow through the system and leaving the side off might interfere with it. Also be aware that Trainz is much more demanding heat wise than many other programs.

Cheerio John

 

[Forester1]

I would say you definitely want to leave the double glass doors open to allow more cool air to flow through. There are also utilities you can use to track the heat of your CPU while you play. I don't have the names handy, but someone should chime in.

 

[JonMyrlennBailey]

I would say you definitely want to leave the double glass doors open to allow more cool air to flow through. There are also utilities you can use to track the heat of your CPU while you play. I don't have the names handy, but someone should chime in.

The MSI Click 5 BIOS allows me to set the target temperature of the CPU. I think a lower target temp means higher speed fan operation. NVIDIA lets me monitor GPU temp during game play as well as fan speed, voltage and wattage. I was observing it during Driver. It would go over 200 watts sometimes. GPU temp would vary between 75 and 87 degrees C. When out of 3D tree intensive parts of the route, the GPU temp would suddenly drop to about 65 degrees C. Setting tree detail from ultra to normal helped improve frame rate considerably.

Trainz is one power hog.

 

[autodctr]

Get the unit out of the cabinet first of all. Set it on something to keep it up off of the floor. Check to make sure all of the fans are operating.

Next, try lowering your frame rate. I always have to laugh when people here say that they are running anything above 60FPS......you can barely see the difference between 15FPS and 30FPS. Anything higher than 60 is just wasting energy.

 

[JonMyrlennBailey]

Get the unit out of the cabinet first of all. Set it on something to keep it up off of the floor. Check to make sure all of the fans are operating.

Next, try lowering your frame rate. I always have to laugh when people here say that they are running anything above 60FPS......you can barely see the difference between 15FPS and 30FPS. Anything higher than 60 is just wasting energy.

Trainz is set at 60 FPS.

 

[ricomon35]

@JonMyrlennBailey - Buy CPUID's HWMonitorPro app here.

It will give you very detailed real time info on everything that's plugged into your motherboard.
You will be able to see how fast and when your system parts heat up, and cool down.

I use it on my system everyday. Superb app

My app window looks like this. Image showing idle, only a few background apps running.

I also recommend buying a water cooling system, as AMD 9 CPU's run hot by design. You will need one @JonMyrlennBailey for sure
I run an older (9 years) FX-8320 Black Edition, and I run water cooled system, a must have.

My setup has this model by CoolerMaster, > Cooler Master MasterLiquid ML360R ARGB Close-Loop AIO CPU Liquid Cooler, 360 Radiator, Dual Chamber Pump, AddressableRGB Lighting, Dual MF120R Fans for AMD Ryzen/Intel LGA1200/1151 LGA 1700 Compatible

They also make setups w/o the RGB lights
Non-RGB setup by ASUS > ASUS ProArt LC 420 All-in-one CPU Liquid Cooler with Illuminated System Status Meter and Three Noctua NF-A14 industrialPPC-2000 PWM 140mm Radiator Fans

There are cheaper systems, but they do not perform as well, and will not last long (lower quality components and cooling fluids)

The extra tall case I bought is also a really nice setup. Gobs of room for everything, but most important, gobs of air space for managing heat !

My setup:

Green>Red paths = Cool air to hot air flow

 

[JonMyrlennBailey]

Thanks for all the extra hardware suggestions, folks, but I am on a limited physical space budget. I can't have some ugly monstrosity of a computer in my living room either.

N3V must have stocks (trading papers) in computer hardware firms.

 

[ricomon35]

Thanks for all the extra hardware suggestions, folks, but I am on a limited physical space budget. I can't have some ugly monstrosity of a computer in my living room either.

N3V must have stocks (trading papers) in computer hardware firms.

@JonMyrlennBailey >>> Well, you don't need the case I have, but you will need to manage your airflow, so the water cooler, and maybe case fans.

There ARE non-water systems but they are VERY heavy and can put stress on your motherboard because of that weight. I.e around 2.5-3 pounds.
Th quality grade of your Motherboard will make difference there. i.e. a miltary grade components and mobo layer material.
Most Mobos specs lists will have that rating listed. >>> Military grade motherboards

There are also twin fan systems w/o rgb lighting, that are designed for cases with less overhead real estate.

My setup was designed with expansion and future motherboard/RAM upgrades in mind, hence the size.

The Noctua line has great coolers, and somewhat cheaper than the WC systems. i.e. >>>

Noctua NH-D15 chromax.Black, Dual-Tower CPU Cooler (140mm, Black)

Noctua NH-U9 TR4-SP3, Premium CPU Cooler for AMD sTRX4/TR4/SP3 (92mm, Brown)

 

[JonMyrlennBailey]

Just running West From Denver route for two hours, the GPU was remarkably cooler (53 degrees C, 75 Watts) than when I ran a TANE SP4 route with heavy 3D tree forest at about 85 degrees/200 Watts. I think TS 2022 might be less power hungry than older Trainz.

 

[HPL]

As I am concerned, TRS 22 is the ONLY game making my video card (RTX 3090) reach 80°C. Temperature is around 60°C in ALL other games/simulators. All settings to max.

 

[JonMyrlennBailey]

Dialing down tree detail setting helps take a work load off the computer considerably. I like to see every rivet on a locomotive boiler and actually read the gauges inside the cab, but I could care less about every leaf and every needle on each and every tree.

The next great frontier in computer software and hardware design will be to make things as energy conserving as possible for the scale of the work tasks at hand. That a home computer can put out more heat than a typical 100-watt-per-channel stereo receiver troubles me still.

 

[boleyd]

By totally removing the side panel I solved my overheat. I tried various steps such a partially open side panel and an added fan atop the PC - None worked,

 

[autodctr]

Trainz is set at 60 FPS.

Then try 1/2 at 30FPS. I doubt that you will see any difference in viewing, but the heat will definitely go down.

 

[pdkoester]

Then try 1/2 at 30FPS. I doubt that you will see any difference in viewing, but the heat will definitely go down.

I also am interested in the setting for this. Where does one find that setting to limit it to 30 or check what it is currently set to?
Thank you in advance.

 

[AFdude06]

As I am concerned, TRS 22 is the ONLY game making my video card (RTX 3090) reach 80°C. Temperature is around 60°C in ALL other games/simulators. All settings to max.

Same here. I have a 3080Ti and my temps get way out of control (80-85C) with Trainz but every other game has only ever pushed 70C. My CPU, a i9-9900K, gets hit really hard too. I’ve had it top out at around 90C sometimes. All that to only get around 40 fps.
———————
@pdkoester

I also am interested in the setting for this. Where does one find that setting to limit it to 30 or check what it is currently set to?
Thank you in advance.

In the Settings window under General Settings, you will see a box marked Display Resolution or similar. It will have options to set resolution and frame rate starting with the max resolution and refresh rate of your monitor.

Cheers

 

[HPL]

I also am interested in the setting for this. Where does one find that setting to limit it to 30

Simply set "Vertical sync" to "Half".

 

[pdkoester]

I do not see a frame rate setting. I see my resolution and refresh rate. I have the Vertical Sync set to None, because most of the time this helps in other software games / simulations to increase performance.

 

[pdkoester]

I found details, that explains what you guys are saying. I will give it a try.

Vertical Sync​

The Vertical Sync option is used to help with smoothness when running Trainz, particularly at lower frame rates.

Full​

At full, whenever the frame rate drops below 60frames per second (FPS) there will be a 'skip' in smoothness. If the frame rate is consistently below 60 then there will be regular skipping of frames. If you see frame rates above 60FPS, but still inconsistent then this option will help make Trainz run smoother.

Half​

The default setting is Half. This forces the maximum number of frames to be 30FPS at all times. This allows a much smoother frame rate if your computer runs below 60FPS and above 30FPS. If you see frame rates below 30FPS then you may still see skips.

None​

Setting Vertical Sync to 'None' will turn Vertical Sync off completely. In this case there will be no capping of the framerate, and as such it may vary a lot which may cause stuttering. On very high performance hardware you may wish to try running with Vertical Sync off.

 

[pdkoester]

From my experience, it was better to keep that setting at None. I was seeing skips with it at Full or Half settings.
For reference my system is the Intel i-5 2400F processor, GTX 1080ti GPU, Samsung 980 Pro M.2 NVme SSD, 32GB DDR5 6000 RAM, and the SoundBlaster Z soundcard.
Does everything I need, just trying to see what that setting could do.