The card makes a scratching/grinding sound like that of an old HDD that's reading/writing. It happens only sometimes and I think only at idle. I think it is due to the fans turning on and off. Sometimes at idle, the fans start glitching up and turning on and off every second, so I hear them spin up and down very fast. To fix this, I adjusted the fan curve to keep the fans off until 50c. Another way to avoid this is to keep the fans at 35% minimum at all times. Lowering below 35% makes them keep turning on and off and making the grinding noise. The fans work fine in game though when spinning faster.
 
Is there any fix for this other than using Precision X1 all the time to enable the custom fan curves?

When it does this can you see the fans twitch a bit? Corsair had this on the AX860i that I have. I think they might have fixed it in a firmware though, I haven't heard it in a long time. The fan, when turned completely off, would twitch slightly. I noticed because of the same reason you said, it sounded like a hard drive... Yet, I didn't have a hard drive! I did some research and Corsair at the time was saying that it was normal. The fact that it no longer does it, and it seems to have been fixed in a firmware update, tells me that it was probably never really "normal", just "acceptable".

granturissimus
Another way to avoid this is to keep the fans at 35% minimum at all times.

yep, looks like evga fans cant handle fan speeds below 35%, i have an 1660 ti and it does the same.
 
Dont worry.

chrisdglong
When it does this can you see the fans twitch a bit? Corsair had this on the AX860i that I have. I think they might have fixed it in a firmware though, I haven't heard it in a long time. The fan, when turned completely off, would twitch slightly. I noticed because of the same reason you said, it sounded like a hard drive... Yet, I didn't have a hard drive! I did some research and Corsair at the time was saying that it was normal. The fact that it no longer does it, and it seems to have been fixed in a firmware update, tells me that it was probably never really "normal", just "acceptable".

I haven't observed what the fans are doing during the grinding sound but it must be that. I set the fans to 35% and no more grinding sound.
 

gusforce
yep, looks like evga fans cant handle fan speeds below 35%, i have an 1660 ti and it does the same.
 
Dont worry.

Well at least its not just my card then. I'm still interested if there is a firmware update or something that can fix it. It seems like something that could be easily fixed.

Here is EVGAs response to me for the same issue:

I did some testing with a 2060 KO today, and using PX1 I was able to figure out what's happening. What you hear is the click of the fans turning off and back on, which is normal for these style fans. It seems that any fan speed below 40% can potentially trigger than fans to randomly pulse down to 0 RPM then back up to speed. As long as the fan speed can be manually reset to 40%, the fans will not turn off and on. The lower you set the fans below 40%, the more likely it will start to happen. I tested down as far as 29% fan speed, and one time out of 12 tries the fans operated normally at 29%. Likewise I was only able to trigger the off/on pulsing once at 36% and not at all at 37% or higher. I could fairly reliably set the fan speed down to 32-33% by lowering the curve by 1-2% at a time without the fans pulsing. At 31%, it occurred nearly every time and I would have to start over.
 
Note I was not able to reproduce the issue without using PX1 running, but that may potentially vary from card to card.
 
For now, using PX1 to manually set a fan curve no lower than 40% will prevent the fans from shutting off and back on, and causing the click. You can try lowering the fan speed percent one or two percent at a time to get it lower without the pulsing off and on, but if it happens again just set the fan speed to 40% and try again. I don't recommend trying for less than 32% unless you are very patient.
 
I'm having our engineers look into it further and see if we can do anything about the fans pulsing off and on.

I have the exact same issue. Seems like many are experiencing the same issue, also on other models.
Any news on a driver update?

Hi. I am having the same problem. I can hear the fans through my headset. In game the card is running well but while browsing (while i'm concentrating) it is a loud revving - fan spin on/off. My temp is also 36/37'C when the problem is triggered. I live in Australia. I'm disappointed EVGA, you have been recommended by several Australian reviewers. I have asked my PC shop for an exchange. 
 
 
 

I contacted evga and they told me the noise is due to the motor in the fans and that its something the vbios cannot fix. 

AVA-G
Hi. I am having the same problem. I can hear the fans through my headset. In game the card is running well but while browsing (while i'm concentrating) it is a loud revving - fan spin on/off. My temp is also 36/37'C when the problem is triggered. I live in Australia. I'm disappointed EVGA, you have been recommended by several Australian reviewers. I have asked my PC shop for an exchange. 
 
 
 

linktjt
I contacted evga and they told me the noise is due to the motor in the fans and that its something the vbios cannot fix. 

posts released from filter .. sorry for the delay