URGENT! CPU Temp too high???????

[SiM]

I would say its a bit high too. I wouldn't run my CPU (if I had a C2D) that hot... 60C max is what I would aim for

[ripperuk]

well after having a read at other forums, my cpu seems to be running about right, although i could be wrong. Here is what is said on another forum:

they are set to throttle at 85C so i would say 70-75 should be fine as the safe limit, the Quads are rated to throttle at 100*C

Could anyone clarify if the above quote is wrong? If so, then what is the correct and safe MAX limit?

[aidanjt]

You should be aiming for at least 1C per Watt, honestly my Pentium 4 is colder than that!

[ripperuk]

aidanjt, you tell me mate what i can do to make a difference.

[aidanjt]

Can you take some photographs of the innards of your case?.. It helps a lot in trying to visualise the airflow, also are you stepping down your central heating?.. Also grab a cheap thermonitor from tescos or something to periodically check on the ambiant temp of your room. My room is around 19-20C, CoreTemp reports my coretemps to be 21C each, idle, now that the Artic Silver 5 has set. Also, are you using Artic Silver 5 or the knock off clone that came with the Zalman? You wouldn't believe the difference AS5 makes, tis cheap too.

[ripperuk]

Ok mate...i will take some photos of the pc case and post them later.

My room temp will be in the range of 19-23C.

I am using Arctic Silver 5:-


Lastly, can i do anything to further cool down my mobo northbridge?

[aidanjt]

Yeah, take it off, scrape all that hard thermal pad crap that Asus use with a peice of creditcard like plastic, buff it up with some TIM Cleaner, leave it to air for a good half hour, somewhere that's free of dust. Then use a tiny dot of AS5 on the Northbridge die and try to flatten it evenly I have a plastic wick to do this perfectly but a creditcard like peice of plastic will do again, put a bit of AS5 on the NB heatsink itself and rub it around the center with a peice of kitchen roll till you can see the metal again, this should fill in the tiny inperfections and make sure there's no air particles trapped. Then reset it, try to minimalise rocking as you get the clips/pins back on, pressured rocking will trap air at least, you could crack the die at the worst.

This is something I need to do myself, but the NB temp is 29C on my board so it hasn't been a priority yet.

[Clunk]

Yu may just have a CPU that isnt great for overclocking, and the board is feeding it more than it normally would.

Or, as you board is slightly knackered anyway, it could be reading the temps wrong.

What I would do is manually set the voltage to 1.3v, set the fsb to 300, make sure the correct ram voltages and timings are entered and then do orthos again.

[ripperuk]

thanks for that info aidanjt...even with the o/c, my northbridge temp has not risen above 29C, so is it worth even doing this? Also how can this affect the CPU temp?

[aidanjt]

It wont really, 30C is a very stable temp for a northbridge. You'd only really want to go lower for extreame overclocking.

[ripperuk]

@ aidanjt - as requested, here is an inside photo of the pc case with fans:-



Let me know your thoughts...

[aidanjt]

Hrmm, there's not much you could improve on there without anal attention to cabling detail. Might try moving the front 120mm fan up 2 notches and bring the hard drives to the bottom, better still would be to get another front intake fan, you can get them on scan. I'm guessing the 8800 is leaching much of the needed cool air. Even if you get another front intake keep the hard drives at the bottom, the cabling is distruptive to airflow.

[Clunk]

Hrmm, there's not much you could improve on there without anal attention

Thats a very generous offer

[Harkin]

Hrmm, there's not much you could improve on there without anal attention

Im not gonna ask u for advice again unless u lower ur call out fee

Thats a very generous offer

Oh man how do u do it, I sprayed coffee all ova my keyboard after nearlly choking to death

[ripperuk]

anal? can we be a bit more specific?

on serious note...can u give me anymore recommendations on improvement?

also someone on another forum mentioned "lapping"...what is that and is it easy to do? can it make a lot of difference?

[Harkin]

anal? can we be a bit more specific?

on serious note...can u give me anymore recommendations on improvement?

also someone on another forum mentioned "lapping"...what is that and is it easy to do? can it make a lot of difference?

Lapping is when u sand the heatsink or cpu until its really smooth. Usually its done to make the Cpu/Hs as flat as possible. Results vary but if I were u I wud leave that till last, cos firstly u wud void the warranty on both the Cpu and Hs, so if u did something wrong u can kiss em goodbye.