Cooling Problems?

C

Cephus

New Member
I'm trying to figure out how to better cool my wife's computer without resorting to water or cryo cooling, which shouldn't be necessary. The system has been up for months with no problems at all, but starting yesterday, it started overheating and running very hot.

It's an AMD Athlon 2400+. At the moment, she's got 4 80mm case fans, a brand new copper-plate CPU fan, HD cooler and the case is open and another fan is blowing into her system and her CPU is running at 62C with zero load.

My computer is sitting right next to hers, it's an even faster system that runs no hotter than 40C under full load.

Ideas?
 
Nope, the heatsink is fine, fan is running at full power, etc. We did turn down the video refresh rate which helped a little, but she's still running a full 20 degrees hotter than my system.
 
you sure your temp iodes havent just kicked the bucket, try using a different program to read them from, even better use the BIOS, they're usually more accurate
 
dragon2309 said:
you sure your temp iodes havent just kicked the bucket, try using a different program to read them from, even better use the BIOS, they're usually more accurate
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That *IS* the BIOS temp.

Reducing the video refresh rate has dropped the temp to about 55C but that's still way too high.
 
alanuofm said:
what kind of thermalpaste did you use? maybe it wasn't layered on right. i suggest artic silver 5 or premium.
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AS5 is better then those stock pos thats you get with your heatsink/fan combo.. i really reccomend AS5
 
AS5 is better then those stock pos thats you get with your heatsink/fan combo.. i really reccomend AS5
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There's nothing wrong with using the stock thermal grease. I use Zalman's ZM-TG1 thermal grease ($5 for 2.5ml) and it works just as well as AS5.
 
is the heatsink clean? and if it is, if you put your hand on the side of the heatsink, do you feel a big airflow? because it think this is a problem with the arflow.
also, make shure IDE cable dont produce a big resistance in the airflow.

does the pc get enough air through the side, is no opening of the case blockaded?
 
Archangel said:
is the heatsink clean? and if it is, if you put your hand on the side of the heatsink, do you feel a big airflow? because it think this is a problem with the arflow.
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Nope, it was a brand new, out-of-the-package heatsink that was wiped clean before installation, using AS5 grease.

also, make shure IDE cable dont produce a big resistance in the airflow.
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No, they're routed around the airflow.

does the pc get enough air through the side, is no opening of the case blockaded?
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At the moment, both sides are off the case and we put a 20" box fan, blowing in HIGH blowing into the case. The CPU overheated again last night. If you put any sort of moderate load on the system, it overheats.
 
joelkyr said:
Reseat your HS and see if their is any improvement.:)
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Initially we thought it was a failing fan so I replaced it with another fan that we had here. Identical temperatures. So we went out and got a high efficiency fan with a copper heatsink rated for a much faster processor. Identical temperatures.

The mobo temp reads around 35C so my question now is, is it a possible bad heat sensor (the mobo is shutting down the system to keep it from being damaged) or a possible bad CPU?

I really don't think it's the fans at this point considering how much we have blowing into the system. We could probably cryo-freeze it and have the problem.
 
Does the CPU temp ever change or does it more or less react as you would expect? The thermister might be screwed up do you have a temperature probe you could attach to get a rough reading?
 
So your mobo temp reads 35 C and your CPU temp reads 60+ C? Thats a pretty big temp delta. That would most likely mean one of three things (assuming proper air flow):
1) your heatsink is inadequate
2) large contact resistance between the CPU and heatsink due to improper thermal paste application
3) malfunctioning thermal diode

If you're absolutely sure you applied the thermal paste correctly then I would guess its a bad diode. Those things aren't terribly accurate to begin with.

We could probably cryo-freeze it and have the problem.
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What exactly do you mean by that?
 
Yeti said:
So your mobo temp reads 35 C and your CPU temp reads 60+ C? Thats a pretty big temp delta. That would most likely mean one of three things (assuming proper air flow):
1) your heatsink is inadequate
2) large contact resistance between the CPU and heatsink due to improper thermal paste application
3) malfunctioning thermal diode

If you're absolutely sure you applied the thermal paste correctly then I would guess its a bad diode. Those things aren't terribly accurate to begin with.
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The heatsink is rated higher than the CPU and I know the thermal paste is fine so I guess that's all that's left. I've got the mobo set to shut down before it overheats, I can turn that off and see if it fries anything.

Worst that happens is she gets an upgrade.
 
Archangel said:
is your psu hot? (just to make shure it doesnt blow his hot air towards te heatsink :) )
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Nope, it's venting out the rear of the case, that shouldn't be a problem.

I'm really convinced it's a bad sensor. Might as well turn it off and see if I have a problem.
 
well do ou have such a laser-thermometer (or something like that), so you can measure it yourself while he pc is urned on? then o could pomard both maument and see if they are te same
 
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