Frankly I think it's hilarious that you guys think you can sue blizzard to replace your fried hardware... they may volunteer to provide some monetary or other assistance to those affected, but that'd be for PR, not because you could force them to in any way. When I hear you guys complaining about this I'm reminded of other, actually serious software bugs, such as the therac-25, which actually killed people due to a race condition in the software (for the skeptical, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therac-25 [wikipedia])

PcChip

United States50 Posts

July 30 2010 03:50 GMT

#63

On July 30 2010 11:41 NB wrote:

its like: while "1 is not 0", do "memory +1 byte" => no computer can endure that without a software to break the loop

Oh really? What about supercomputers that crunch numbers all day long 24/7 for scientists? What about folding@home computers? What about webservers?

Are you kidding ??

MamiyaOtaru

United States1687 Posts

July 30 2010 03:51 GMT

#64

On July 30 2010 12:18 AJMcSpiffy wrote:

Show nested quote +

It's the same reason your computer locks up when a program tries to use 100% of the available memory. Graphics cards CAN, for example, run a screen at 500 fps if it was working at 100% capacity. However running at this 100% for any period of time causes more heat than the card can handle. This isn't a "malfunction" or problem with the card. Games are supposed to put caps on screens to tell the graphics card to stop trying to process at a safe percentage of use.

I'm sorry but this is retarded. Games are not responsible for keeping hardware from overheating. The hardware/firmware/drivers are. Games can't be held responsible for knowing about every different bit of hardware out there. The hardware is aware of itself. It is responsible for throttling down, if its built in cooling is insufficient. For many cards, it is sufficient. There are plenty of cards that can handle 100 percent use for prolonged periods (see furmark). I just don't even know where to begin with all the posts like this in this thread.

Sure it's not ideal for the menu to be using more resources than is necessary for a smooth framerate, but that's exactly what Starcraft 1 did for a whole freaking decade to the CPU, before patch 1.16. It maxed out the CPU rendering as many frames as it possibly could. They fixed it, and I bet they'll do the same with the SC2 menu. Either way, blaming the program on any hardware failures is dumb. The fault lies with the card's heatsink, drivers, firmware or some combo thereof.

FragKrag

United States11552 Posts

July 30 2010 03:52 GMT

#65

that isn't a bug

it's working as intended.

If your heatsink/fan can't take some 100% load, ramp up your fans and check for dust, and then bitch at your vendor. It's not Blizzard's problem.

mgj

191 Posts

July 30 2010 03:54 GMT

#66

On July 30 2010 12:17 Saechiis wrote:

Show nested quote +

Why are you trying to prove this point when even Blizz itself admits it's their fault? Any hardware can die because of overheating since hardware can't decide for itself that it's getting pretty hot. It's the software's job to prevent these kind of things and it was Blizz's programming that was faulty in the first place.

Blizzard never admitted to such a thing. Quote from the blue post :

Screens that are light on detail may make your system overheat if cooling is overall insufficient.

Srules

United States31 Posts

July 30 2010 03:54 GMT

#67

You can also turn on vertical sync that caps the frame rate to your monitors refresh rate.

SilentCrono

United States1420 Posts

July 30 2010 03:56 GMT

#68

On July 30 2010 11:05 Vedic wrote:

Show nested quote +

You're likely using vsync.

i have the same deal on my pc but am not using vsync. well, i'm pretty sure i'm not. i have to check.

PrinceXizor

United States17713 Posts

July 30 2010 04:03 GMT

#69

On July 30 2010 10:58 jibber wrote:

Good to know. Personally I would have appreciated a heads-up before my video card fried, but maybe this can save someone else from the hassle I've been dealing with since yesterday afternoon.

Me too. Except i figured out that the game was working too hard in beta and edited the cap in myself, what i didn't expect was the beta editor to fry it. >.< happened the day before release and now i have 3 weeks until i get my laptop back. at least it was under warranty but man no SC2 hurts.

phamou

Canada193 Posts

July 30 2010 04:03 GMT

#70

i didnt understand the OP correctly, can someone give a step by step on how to fix/prevent this problem? I am using windows 7, with a Radeon 5770. Do I need to change anything in order to prevent my vid card to fry?

thanks in advance

TadH

Canada1846 Posts

July 30 2010 04:08 GMT

#71

Thank you very much for posting this, my laptop was over heating so bad, and this seems to have fixed it, thanks again.

Wargizmo

Australia1237 Posts

July 30 2010 04:11 GMT

#72

Wow that helps a lot, although my card wasn't getting fried the fan speed would go up to 90% and get really noisy during the menus and loading screens, this seems to have fixed it.

BabelFish

United States14 Posts

July 30 2010 04:15 GMT

#73

On July 30 2010 11:41 NB wrote:

Show nested quote +

if you let your computer run an infinite loops without a break, it will broke eventually and that apply for every hardware.

its like: while "1 is not 0", do "memory +1 byte" => no computer can endure that without a software to break the loop

Umm... It's standard testing practice to insure that electronics hardware can sustain maximum load for a very very long time.

Heck, before the invention of power-scaling CPUs, the chips ran at full power all the time. Your operating system has an Idle Process thread that runs when nothing else is available. In modern chips this thread can shut down parts of the processor, but older chips just chewed on that thread over and over again till something else more important came up.

On July 30 2010 12:42 NicolBolas wrote:

Show nested quote +

Please. I actually do graphics programming. It's not uncommon for test programs, used to demonstrate an effect, to hit hundreds of FPS. And they don't cause problems.

GPU's generate heat based on how much work they're doing. Rendering 10 frames is virtually no different than rendering 1 frame with 10x the "stuff" in it. The only difference is that you're clearing the framebuffer 10 times more often. And even framebuffer clears are an optimized operation on any card made in the last 5 years.

This man understands his graphics cards.

Even under full load, a properly cooled and cleaned case will keep any modern enthusiast card well within operating temperatures. Modern chips are designed to be able to run surprisingly hot.

uiotui

United States54 Posts

July 30 2010 04:30 GMT

#74

I don't really understand what is going on... I watched my graphics card before I applied the lines and it was hovering around 60-61 degrees... after the 'fix' it's still like 59 degrees. Hard for me to even tell if it's doing anything.

Phootaba

Sweden28 Posts

July 30 2010 04:36 GMT

#75

Example my video card does 512 frames/s in some menus instead of the 60(top refresh rate).

Some of this can bre blamed on the manufaturers. Adding those lines are simple enough though.
Unless you're using a gtx-480/470 above 80C is scary stuff

jibber

30 Posts

July 30 2010 04:36 GMT

#76

Uiotui: I noticed it using the on screen fps display with fraps. Perhaps that could give you a better gauge of if it's actually making a difference.

As for the hardware vs blizzard debate it's a combination of both, but blizzard is stepping up and taking responsibility. You probably won't have a failure if you have a proper setup but it's blizzards programming that left the fps uncapped.

I respect them for stepping up and admitting it though. I wish other companies would follow suit IE Apple, Banks, etc..

GreEny K

Germany7312 Posts

July 30 2010 04:39 GMT

#77

I was wondering why so many people were posting about game crashes and the like in the tech thread. I just assumed it was because sc2 is too much win.