Wierd noise coming from GPU in irrlicht shader example

[eye776]

Yesterday I upgraded from a GeForce 6200 to a GT220.
I then proceeded to run the irrlicht samples at 800x600/16bpp.

1) Overall performance is kind of crappy. On the Quake 3 level I only get around 200 FPS (no q3shaders, no q3 map objects). (I'd get about 120 with the 6200 IIRC).

2) When launching tutorial no. 10. Shaders, a strange squeaky sound comes out of my video card. (Both D3D9 and OGL sport this behavior). The sound changes in pitch as I move closer to/farther from the three shaded cubes.

Could this be a driver issue/board issue?

[DavidJE13]

that squeaky noise is surprisingly common; I've noticed it on a few cards. It usually has a pitch dependent on the framerate, where a low framerate means a low pitch. Once the fps is capped to 60 or so it seems to disappear. It might also depend on scene complexity, probably caused by the fan changing speed when the card is having to do a lot of work.

can't say anything about the 200fps other than that you should try more complex scenes - you may find that even though it has a poor baseline speed it can cope with more complex scenes without loosing much, and you only need to even think about it when it goes below 60 anyway.

[Virion]

i used to have this noise problem when i was using my old geforce fx5200. it doesn't happen with my new 8800GT, though.

[Sylence]

I know about cards that make a high pitch noise when running at extremely high framerates (1000+) and I know that this is nothing to worry about. But at this low framerates... well maybe it's the same thing...

[eye776]

Thanks a lot for the input.

I rechecked the power connectors, shut down the system, removed and reinserted the video card.

Now, I've made a mistake when posting:
Regarding 1) it was the 7.Collision example NOT 2.Quake3Map that has 200-300FPS. 2.Quake3Map averages at 1130 FPS.

When the fps is high there is, indeed, a barely audible squeal.

However it really squeals hard in the following examples (tested all of them):
4.Movement
6.2D Graphics
10.Shaders
9.MeshViewer
10.Shaders
11.Per Pixel Lighting
12.Terrain Rendering (when going outside the terrain and staring at the skybox bottom it gets louder)

Unrelated to irrlich I also tested Dead Space (1152x864, High) and Risen (1024x768, Maximum) and some randome japanese games (it didn't squeal in any of those games).

Tonight I'll also test the Ogre3D samples, Crystal Space samples and probably Nebula samples.
I'll report my findings tomorrow.

PS:
1) I found a very old project of mine built on Irrlicht 1.1, and it DOES NOT make the card squeal.
2) The card squeals in both OpenGL and D3D, high and low level shaders.

[hybrid]

This is really simply due to the excessive framerates. My bet is that none of the games reached these numbers (simply because they cap the framerates) and maybe Irrlicht 1.1 wasn't that fast in that example. But you can download the SDK from SourceForge, and you'll get the same sound with those examples.

[Pazystamo]

Same for me.. ON 9800GTX then running shaders example on Openlg shows ~4000 fps then cube visible and ~8000 fps then invisible, sound is always squeaking. But i think that vsync should help here..

[m3ltd0wn]

that squeaking is made also by a normal CPU when it is on LOAD too, also i IDLE mode it squeak a little, different patterns, as I am an it technician, i would like to share my experience about this , in BIOS you have an option called SPREAD SPECTRUM, well, on newer motherboards this option is found like this: CPU SPREAD SPECTRUM, AGP/PCI-E SPREAD SPECTRUM, what it does it simply eliminates that squeaking noise (the value is set to AUTO or a percentage, or DISABLED) at a cost of a little drop in performance, the squeak is in fact electromagnetic interference, try this, make a simple electromagnet : 1 nail, wrap around some isolated wire, and connect the both ends of the wire to a battery, then put that electromagnet next to a radio, you'll hear the same squeaking noise
also this noise is present in the power supplies found in a computer case, but it is a little lower in tone because it is filtrated by capacitors...

[Virion]

that squeaking is made also by a normal CPU when it is on LOAD too, also i IDLE mode it squeak a little, different patterns, as I am an it technician, i would like to share my experience about this , in BIOS you have an option called SPREAD SPECTRUM, well, on newer motherboards this option is found like this: CPU SPREAD SPECTRUM, AGP/PCI-E SPREAD SPECTRUM, what it does it simply eliminates that squeaking noise (the value is set to AUTO or a percentage, or DISABLED) at a cost of a little drop in performance, the squeak is in fact electromagnetic interference, try this, make a simple electromagnet : 1 nail, wrap around some isolated wire, and connect the both ends of the wire to a battery, then put that electromagnet next to a radio, you'll hear the same squeaking noise
also this noise is present in the power supplies found in a computer case, but it is a little lower in tone because it is filtrated by capacitors...

very informative!

[Mikhail9]

try this, make a simple electromagnet : 1 nail, wrap around some isolated wire, and connect the both ends of the wire to a battery, then put that electromagnet next to a radio, you'll hear the same squeaking noise

You'll also likely burn your fingers in short order, making this even more fun to try.

[Seven]

and if you put it right up against your video card, and i mean RIGHT up against it, then the fun gets even better............

[m3ltd0wn]

hahaha, very funny but in fact it is a simple electromagnet getting a little warm is normal:

Code: Select all

The elastic band holds each end of the wire against the battery terminals.
Only use a 1.5 volt AA battery with this electromagnet.
Only remove the insulating enamel from the last 1 cm of the wire.
Removing too much insulation could cause a short circuit if the bare wires twisted together.
A short circuit would cause the wire to get very hot.

[b]Your electromagnet will get warm, this is normal.[/b]

Supplies:

- 5 meters of magnet wire 

- 4" common nail
- AA battery

- small piece of medium sandpaper

Assembly:

Wrap all of the wire onto the iron nail leaving about 10 cm of both ends of the wire exposed. Be careful to wrap in the same direction from beginning to end. Magnet wire is coated with a special enamel coating. This insulation must be removed from both ends of the wire to allow a metal to metal connection with the battery. Fold a small (2 cm square) piece of sandpaper over the end of the wire and sand, by pulling the paper, about one cm at each end. The colour of the wire changes as you expose the copper metal under the insulation.

Before connecting your electromagnet to a battery, test it to see if it attracts iron. Bring the tip of the nail close to some paper clips, metal paper clips usually contain iron. 

i've just told an example how to reproduce that sqeak, that in fact the squeak is nothing more than some electromagnetic interference

[hybrid]

So the squeaks usually come from the power supply or power transformers on the board, and not from the GPU? Interesting. I guess it's not really a question of the frequency of the GPU processing, but it depends on the power consumption of the GPU?

[eye776]

Did the Ogre 3D tests and a few others. Same squeal on FPS > 400.

In my case they come from badly insulated components on the GPU, resulting in EM interference.

I guess it's not really a question of the frequency of the GPU processing, but it depends on the power consumption of the GPU?

LOL, the GT220 has a TDP of only 58W ... O_o.

[m3ltd0wn]

the definition of electromagnetic interference:
electromagnetic interference is a disturbance that affects an electrical circuit due to either electromagnetic conduction or electromagnetic radiation emitted from an external source, the source may be any object, artificial or natural, that carries rapidly changing electrical currents, such as an electrical circuit.

through the GPU flows a rapidly changing electrical current, in fact this current flows through millions of transistors so yea it produces some electromagnetic radiation so it may interfere with other electrical components and so on

on my computer i can hear the squeak if for example i plug in my headphones turn the volume on and do some rendering, open other applications, games... the squeak patterns are fluctuating depending on how much processor intensive is the application.....


spread spectrum definition :

Spread spectrum clocking works by continuously modulating the clock signal around a particular frequency. This "spreads out" the power output and "flattens" the spikes of signal waveform, keeping them below the FCC limit.

This BIOS feature controls spread spectrum clocking of the processor's front side bus (also known as the FSB or processor bus). It usually offers two levels of modulation - 0.5% or 1.0%. The greater the modulation, the greater the reduction of EMI. Therefore, if you need to significantly reduce EMI, a modulation of 1.0% is recommended.