Looking to Upgrade My Workstation - Need guidance!

[bob williams]

Wow, Something new I have never experienced. Since this is a new build and temperature seems to be a concern of many, I have been monitoring my CPU, northbridge and Motherboard temps----Until this morning they seem to have been steady at about 110-120 degrees F. But this morning I was manipulating about 50 photos at a time and then jumped into a batch print out of LR3----I assume this is processor intensive because my my CPU temp jumped from 115 to 180 in 30 Seconds---Once the operation was done, the CPU temp returned to normal.


My questions---


Is this normal and to be expected.


If normal, at what temp should I panic and force a shutdown or terminate the operation?


Thanks,


Bob

[Sheiky]

It is normal for your processor to get hotter when it's used more intensively. I believe the I7 950's max temperature is about 80-85 degrees Celsius/ 176-185 Fahrenheit. It will probably remain working once this limit is crossed for a small amount of time, but for longer use it will probably degrade fast.


Anyway for normal use your processor will downgrade it's own energy-need and speed to save energy. And when extra speed is necessary it will get into turbo mode which makes one of your cores faster and also increases the heat obviously.


As you describe it, you should be safe, however these are my pc's temperatures:





This is the result of a system benchmark. My idle temperatures are in the MIN column. The MAX teps are the result of a 100% load benchmark of more than 3 hours.


For this benchmark I overclocked my I7 920 to 3.2 Ghz, so you could imagine that your processor isn't properly cooled. My CPU cooler barely worked harder to achieve these temperatures, because the fan on my CPU cooler can do 1700RPM and only "needed" 1300 to get these results. I am using a Scythe Mugen 2 aftermarket cooler, but for normal use the stock cooler should be doing good enough.


Can I ask you what type of CPU cooler you use? The stock cooler or an aftermarket one?And also what kind of heat-conductivity paste you use? These factors can do a great deal.


You might have a heat disposal or conductivity "problem".

[Sheiky]

Now that I'm thinking about it a little more. I see that you have a well ventilated case, so a high case temperature causing these high temps isn't the deal here.


I guess you're using Lightroom 64bit? In that case, the Turbo mode isn't activated by these processes, since Lightroom 64-bit uses all the cores at once and the Turbo doesn't kick in then.


In that case you can very well compare my results with yours. My processor is build on the same 45nm base, so it is physically very much the same. My processor runs at 3.2Ghz and yours at 3.06Ghz, so pretty much the same as well. For me it seems clear that your CPU-cooler isn't sufficient enough or you haven't installed it properly (uneven conductivity-paste for example).


Do these temperatures occur often? With actions like exporting and importing for example? In this case you probably should find a solution for it. At least for me personally these temperatures wouldn't be acceptable, but I'm a safe kind of guy [] I also assume your pc is making quite some noise doesn't it?


Are you also sure your fans are working properly?


Ps: you can set-up a safe-temperature in BIOS. An automatic shutdown temperature, which will shut down the pc once you cross the limit you have set.

[bob williams]

Can I ask you what type of CPU cooler you use? The stock cooler or an aftermarket one?And also what kind of heat-conductivity paste you use? These factors can do a great deal.


You might have a heat disposal or conductivity "problem".

Jan, Great info, Thanks---and I think your right about the heat dissipation problem. I am running the stock fan that came with the boxed processor, but no paste was used since it didn't come with the stock processor fan.


I will try and find the Everest software---It looks much better than the "included" utilities that I have"


Thanks


Bob

[Sheiky]

Bob, I just found out that the limit I named isn't an official limit.


You might want to read this. Some of this technical stuff makes it hard for me to understand it correctly. The 80-85 degree Celcius is a widely adapted idea of a max safe-temperature, so it's not an official max temp.


Anyway, something to read: http://www.pugetsystems.com/blog/2009/02/26/intel-core-i7-temperatures/

Jan, Great info, Thanks---and I think your right about the heat dissipation problem. I am running the stock fan that came with the boxed processor, but no paste was used since it didn't come with the stock processor fan.


I will try and find the Everest software---It looks much better than the "included" utilities that I have"

Bob, even replacing the sticker paste with "real" paste will reduce your temperatures significantly. In my brothers case it was a minimum of 5 degrees difference, just by replacing the paste.


In theory the boxed cooler should be good enough, however I'm wondering what this will do to the life-time of your CPU in the long run.


As I said, I use the Scythe Mugen 2 cooler(which is about 38 Euro, so probably the same amount of dollars) and combine it with Arctic Silver Premium paste and it works wonders for me.


Everest is in my opinion one of the better programs to monitor these things.


Good luck!

[bob williams]

Jan, Here is a 5 min test that I ran, and, as you can see the CPU gets hot when under load---up to 89 degrees C. I think I'll adopt your recommendation and drop some money a an aftermarket cooler and paste.


Thanks,


Bob





[img]/cfs-file.ashx/__key/CommunityServer-Discussions-Components-Files/7/6663.CPUStats.png[/img]

[Sheiky]

Ouch...that's quite some difference!


Some good coolers(in European market) are:


- Scythe Mugen 2


- Prolimatech Megahalems (very good)


- CoolerMaster N520


However you should be aware of the size of some of these [] Most of these aftermarket coolers are somewhat larger than the stockcooler [A]


Not only will they cool better, they will also be more quiet. And if you ever want to over-clock your pc to increase performance, a good cooler is a must have.


Good luck Bob!