does cooling your gpu help benchmark scores and fps in games?

help benchmark scores and fps in games? i ran a fan on my laptop while doing a benchmark. i just did 3dmark06. got a 3600 even.
now what? benchmarking is like seeing how fast your video card can do 0-60 but isn't it more important to see how skillful your card is out on nurburgring?

 

Well, when the GPU gets too hot, yeah, it really helps it from not catching on fire.

3D06 marks aren't the greatest tool in the world. Usually it's a specific game that's one of the best to test. FEAR is normal. WiC I've seen quite a few times. CSS Stress test too.

 

i meant does it being cooler help the gpu? like does the gpu perform slightly better at 67 celsius rather than 80 celsius?

 

No. Why would it? It just allows more room for OCing.

 

Keeping your cpu/gpu/RAM/MB ect will help the electrical circiuitry to work much easier and should increase the life span of the electrical devices on a computer.

less heat is better. Not just for
Over clocking. Less resistance.

 

Well, if it does get hot then it will increase in resistance. It should help to keep it cool, but don't expect major jumps in performance

 

it just helps with Overclocking... keep pushing it until it gets hot..

 

Yup, well put.

2 things come out of keeping your GPU cool:

1) More overclocking headroom
2) Longer lifespan

In the short term, running your GPU cooler on it's own isn't really going to give you better performance though.

 

It will definately increase its lifespan and you wont have to worry about crashes/frying your GPU. And someone posted something about how a notebook cooler got him an extra 40 3Dmarks..dunno if that helps :\

 

lifespan? c'mon now guys... this things are made to run longer than you'd like

 

No, a cooler gpu wont give you better performance because the clock speeds stay the same regardless of temperature.

Having a cooler GPU can give you a better OC though and extend its life

 

True for resistors, not true for semi conductors. It's actually the other way around, but pretty non-linear

 

I dont know, cooling will help in the fact that when equipment starts to get over its recomended operating temp, the resistance gets to be so high it will directly affect performance. My 8800gtx was running in a case and hitting 80c and higher. Around that time i noticed drops in performance, i could tell the whole pc was over heating in general. After getting a real nice case that cooled like a champ my gpu was 55c max load, CPU was cranking. My PC jumped from an 11600 to a 12300 3dmark just from a new case, games that were getting a little choppy were smoother than ever. Whats even better is the case is xferring so much heat out of the case, i dont have to run my space heater in the room anymore. Im thinking of over clocking in the future as games start to catch up to my PC.

3.0ghz amd dual core (buy intel)
8800gtx (dont waste ya money get a 8800gt )
4gb ddr800
2 7200rpm HD raid 0
nforce 590 sli deluxe

 

Actually, I think everyone is overlooking an important fact, most GPUs will scale down performance (clockspeed) when they hit a certain temperature in order to prevent damage to the hardware. This actually occurs at different temperatures on different GPUs, mainly based on the GPU Firmware or BIOS.

Keep your GPU below this temperature and you will be getting full performance out of it. If it starts going above, it will begin to throttle performance so that it doesn't continue to overheat.

Hopefully your system's cooling fans can keep it below that threshold temperature at all times, in which case you have nothing to worry about and don't really need to cool your GPU unless you want to extend it's life a little bit. Otherwise, if added cooling keeps your GPU below a threshold it would otherwise hit, then you will gain added performance because of the absence of said throttling.

I don't know what the average temperature is for throttling. I would assume it is something like 95 or 100 Celsius on modern GPUs.

 

What you're describing is overheating. Overheating is always bad and isn't considered "normal operation". Most computers begin throttling fan speeds as temps rise. If you get to the point where your GPU is overheating, and throttles down or shuts off, you have some problems. Your GPU throttling to maintain control on temperatures isn't normal.

[Edit] Holy Necro Post