Can someone test Minecraft and report on heat?

[Ninjarider1978]

I just got it replaced. The lady at Staples opened the box to check that everything was in it, but she held it on its short end so when it was opened the tablet came crashing out. Oops. Luckily these things are built pretty freakin' solid, cause nothing happened. (Tile floor, too. Not that carpet they did the drop test on at the Keynote.) The tablet feels a lot cooler now. I can actually put my hand on the back and keep it there, (unlike last time, I could keep it there maybe 3 seconds before it was painful) and the fan doesn't rev up nearly as much. I almost can't hear it now! HWMonitor is reading 90°C now, so I have no idea what the crap. Maybe the temperature monitor is screwy? Whatever, it's not a frying pan now, so I can deal with a bad sensor.

I have had concerns over the temperature mine runs at since I bought it. Even with some pretty basic metro games running the fan comes on to a medium level and the back gets warm, not super hot but certainly pretty warm. An example game would be my little pony from the windows store. My daughter loves it so some nights shes plays and I listen and feel and in my opinion it runs much hotter than it should for such a basic game. So I decided to do what you were asking and see how Minecraft performs and found it doesnt do very well. The game jitters and the cpu is at about 67C and the CPU is also being throttled to about 1.45GHz to maintain it at that temp. The back is considerably warm, not to the point where I am in pain but pretty hot. The fans run the loudest I have heard them for sure.

So are you saying that with the replacement SP3 you can now play Minecraft and it doesnt nearly get as hot?

There was also another thread where the guy was running a program called heavyload and his SP3 was getting up to 90C and then after a minute the CPU was being throttled back to 0.78GHz just to bring the temp down. He asked others to do the same so I did. I basically had the identical results as him whereas others CPU's were being maintained at 1.3-1.5GHz at that temp. This got me worried originally, now with this test I feel it needs to go back for a replacement.

I think I will wait and see what Patch tuesday brings and then do a full refresh like they recommended for you, then go from there.

 

[Seneleron]

Look, the tjunction temp on the 43000u is 100c.

You read that right: 100c.

running in the 70c range is nothing for most modern processors, and is *WELL WITHIN* the thermal spec for the 4300u. The reason the back gets hot is because it is PART of the cooling solution (help disperse heat via the chassis)

Maybe it doesn't matter, but so you know for next time: thermally there was nothing wrong with your SP3.

But don't take it from me!

http://ark.intel.com/products/76308/Intel-Core-i5-4300U-Processor-3M-Cache-up-to-2_90-GHz

 

[Ninjarider1978]

Look, the tjunction temp on the 43000u is 100c.

You read that right: 100c.

running in the 70c range is nothing for most modern processors, and is *WELL WITHIN* the thermal spec for the 4300u. The reason the back gets hot is because it is PART of the cooling solution (help disperse heat via the chassis)

Maybe it doesn't matter, but so you know for next time: thermally there was nothing wrong with your SP3.

But don't take it from me!

http://ark.intel.com/products/76308/Intel-Core-i5-4300U-Processor-3M-Cache-up-to-2_90-GHz

I see what you are saying and agree, but it makes me wonder why the seemingly big difference between touch temps on the backs of these things. I understand there are different people with different tolerances to temperature doing the "measuring", but even the OP had 2 different SP3's and found they varied a fair bit doing the same thing. Last night I was watching an HD movie on Netflix (ah Total Recall, brings back a few memories!) and the top right was very hot. It just makes me think this thing has issues with getting the heat out of the vents and so the back ends up being the "heat sink", which would not be good. Anyway, I love this device and am not going to give up on it but I also dont want to be stuck with a "hot" lemon.

 

[Antelope22]

Hi. I tested the default settings as you said, and yes it sure does get a bit hot and stutters. However, having render distance option set at 12 in the video settings is simply too much. Just set render distance to 6 or 8 and max frame rate to 30(helps significantly when generating new areas). Try it and see if it helps. I even managed HD textures and it stays reliably under 70 C, although the frame rate sucks when it rains.

 

[Seneleron]

but it makes me wonder why the seemingly big difference between touch temps on the backs of these things

Normally I'd just chalk it up to something like thermal paste application or slightly warped/incorrectly mounted heat sync, but I had . . . a moment. . . today with my SP3.

Completely unrelated to all this, I happened to unplug it and pick it up to move it, and it was warm. Loaded up Hwmonitor, 65c [idle, with 3 chrome tabs opened]

So I loaded up task manager. 30% CPU usage. Random windows system and. . wait for it. . .

I/O errors that looked A LOT like the SP2 micro SD problem.

can't say it's related, because I haven't seen it consistently yet, but I'm starting to wonder if there's another harware conflict floating around in the SP3...

 

[Pew446]

So are you saying that with the replacement SP3 you can now play Minecraft and it doesnt nearly get as hot?

My first SP3 was literally to the point of pain from touching the back. This one is cool enough that I can keep my hand on the back for over a minute until it gets painful. I honestly believe the replacement helped.

Hi. I tested the default settings as you said, and yes it sure does get a bit hot and stutters. However, having render distance option set at 12 in the video settings is simply too much. Just set render distance to 6 or 8 and max frame rate to 30(helps significantly when generating new areas). Try it and see if it helps. I even managed HD textures and it stays reliably under 70 C, although the frame rate sucks when it rains.

I get upwards of 45 fps on this tablet. My last one was running around 30-35. You are right though, lowering view distance helps a lot with heat and such.

Normally I'd just chalk it up to something like thermal paste application or slightly warped/incorrectly mounted heat sync, but I had . . . a moment. . . today with my SP3.

Completely unrelated to all this, I happened to unplug it and pick it up to move it, and it was warm. Loaded up Hwmonitor, 65c [idle, with 3 chrome tabs opened]

So I loaded up task manager. 30% CPU usage. Random windows system and. . wait for it. . .

I/O errors that looked A LOT like the SP2 micro SD problem.

can't say it's related, because I haven't seen it consistently yet, but I'm starting to wonder if there's another harware conflict floating around in the SP3...

I haven't tested the micro sd slot on my tablet, but I don't think I will, 128gb on a tablet is enough for me.

 

[Geneo]

Little off topic, but I have a 64gig micro SD. Stuck it in the SD adapter, copied15 gigs worth of pictures and docs from one computer, took it out of the adapter, plugged that tiny card in my sp3, and moved them over in half the time it took to copy it. Worked like a charm.

Do I trust them enough to use them constantly as an extra drive? No. But for transferring files or as a backup, sure.