Managing heat and throttling on Great Wall GW3300 512GB
The feeling of seeing my frame rate lock back to a steady 60 FPS was an absolute rush! The controller on the Great Wall GW3300 was hitting 82℃ - 88℃ under full load, triggering the hardware protection that cut my speeds in half and caused those jarring frame drops. I first tried limiting the max read speed via software, but that just pushed my load times from 15 seconds to 40 seconds, which was a pathetic compromise. I eventually ripped off the stock heatsink and replaced it with a high-conductivity 1.5mm silicone thermal pad, while cranking my front case fans to 1600 RPM. Monitoring with HWMonitor, the peak temp dropped from 85℃ down to 60℃ - 66℃, and the stuttering stopped completely. I messed up the first install because the pad was too thin, but adding a second layer fixed the contact issue. Random writes are now steady at 700MB/s - 900MB/s. Stress tests confirm no more throttling, with temps holding at 60℃ - 66℃.
