How to Prevent Diablo 4 Killing Your GPU

Publish date: 2021-05-13

Blizzard posted on their forums that the Diablo 4 team is currently investigating the reports of GPU issues affecting players during the closed and open beta periods. The post said they are working closely with Nvidia to identify affected hardware configurations and gather as many data points as possible to assist the investigation. Here are all the details we have gathered, so you know what to do if this issue affects you.

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How to Stop Diablo 4 From Killing Your GPU

Initial reports by players on the forum posts and Reddit is that the issue lies with one GPU mode, the GIGABYTE Gaming GeForce RTX 3080 Ti. Players report issues with their GPU, from crashing with “The game has encountered an unexpected” error to completely bricking their GPU.

While software can kill a graphics card, it may seem strange, but it can be explained based on previous examples of a game bricking the GPU of its players. For instance, when Amazon Games’ New World launched, it pushed GPUs so hard that an existing defect on a specific graphic card model caused it to fail. What this means is that there is a specific part of the graphics card that can’t handle the performance of Diablo IV. Whether that is power consumption, temperatures, a defect in the card, etc…

Related: How to Fix Diablo 4 Stuttering on PC – Common Issues and Fixes

Here are a few steps to help prevent a game crash or GPU failure:

  • Update your GPU driver
  • Clean your GPU fans if they are covered in dust
  • Make sure you have proper cooling and ventilation for your GPU
  • Lower the in-game settings so you don’t max out the performance of your GPU
  • Monitor the performance and temperature of your GPU during normal gameplay and cutscenes

    • If you did experience a game crash or a GPU failure Blizzard wants you to do the following:

  • Conduct a complete power cycle (AC OFF->AC ON) and see if GPU can be detected under Windows.
  • If GPU can be found under Windows, do a clean driver install.

    • If that doesn’t work then you will need to post the following on the official forum post:

  • GPU card vendor and model number
  • Display resolution when running Diablo IV
  • Display mode (Windowed/Windowed Fullscreen/Fullscreen)
  • Max Foreground FPS, Max Background FPS
  • Diablo IV graphic quality settings, preset with Low/Medium/High. Or more detail with custom settings.
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