I got up this morning and turned on my computer then went to take a shower as normal. Came back down stairs to be faced with an alarm and a bright red warning on my monitoring software. The CPU temperature was at 81 degrees C! This is an Intel dual core where it normally sits around 31-32 degrees when not busy.

Promptly shut it down and waited a couple of minutes. Turned it back on and entered the BIOS power check. Yep, temperature was rising by the second. Took it in to the office and had the technician pull the heat sink and replace the thermal compound which had nearly completely dried up. Good as new again. About 3 years seems to be about the average I've seen for this issue based on all the computers at the lab (greater then 100). I have a standing request to the techs when a computer comes in for problems or cleaning to replace the thermal compound as a standard procedure.

If I didn't have thermal/fan monitoring software running who know what would happened to the CPU (well yes, I do know and it ain't pretty).

I highly recommend a regular cleaning of the computer - fans, case, filters and if getting older, replace the thermal grease. And also to have a hardware monitoring software running and limits set. The one I recommend is HW Monitor. It monitors all fans including CPU, case, Video card (if the hardware sensors are supported by the software) and all temperatures including hard drives and all system voltages.

Isn't your mainboard set to safeguard your CPU?

All my boards will at least shut down when temperature rises over a certain level, some of them will first start with reducing clock speed, where often the only indication is a very sluggish PC!

Isn't your mainboard set to safeguard your CPU?

All my boards will at least shut down when temperature rises over a certain level, some of them will first start with reducing clock speed, where often the only indication is a very sluggish PC!

My previous mainboard did but appears this one doesn't unless it thinks the safe point is 81 degrees.

//edit - the HW Monitor does allow to set a throttle % based on a selected device temperature but I had not enabled that feature yet.

I use mainly MSI boards which came with an software for to set the alarm pp for temperatures. I also use Everest for to display the CPU temp in the system launch (lower right).

Most of the todays Bios have the function for to set temp limits or warning in case on of the fan's stop working. In normal cases that is protection enough.

Cheers.

My previous mainboard did but appears this one doesn't unless it thinks the safe point is 81 degrees.

//edit - the HW Monitor does allow to set a throttle % based on a selected device temperature but I had not enabled that feature yet.

I still have an older AMD XP 2100 for which 80 degrees is considered absolutely normal Max temperature is rated as 91 degrees.

It's worth it to find the actual maximum temp for your CPU because they can vary wildly. Set the safety at 75 degrees with the above mentioned CPU and you won't do much computing!

I still have an older AMD XP 2100 for which 80 degrees is considered absolutely normal Max temperature is rated as 91 degrees.

It's worth it to find the actual maximum temp for your CPU because they can vary wildly. Set the safety at 75 degrees with the above mentioned CPU and you won't do much computing!

I'm aware of the Intel spec on the CPU I'm using (E6600) and it is 60.1 degrees maximum safe temperature. But even in the same CPU number, different steppings can have different max allowed temperatures. You can lookup the maximum CPU temperatures in the below charts.

http://users.erols.com/chare/elec.htm

CPUInfo is a good program to give detail on your CPU. Development though stopped in January this year, but still useful tool.

SpeedFan is also a good monitoring/control program.

All my mainboards (ASUS) come with monitoring software, specifically ASUS Probe, but prefer more device monitoring and flexibility.

Thought I would add another application that some forums recommend when attempting to overclock CPUs.

CoreTemp

I got up this morning and turned on my computer then went to take a shower as normal.

If you must shower with your computer, make it a cold shower.

I mean, really... it's just common sense...

HDD health

HDD Health is a full-featured failure-prediction agent for machines using Windows 95, 98, NT, Me, 2000 and XP. Sitting in the system tray, it monitors hard disks and alerts you to impending failure. The program uses Self Monitoring and Reporting Technology (S.M.A.R.T.) built into all new hard disks, and can predict failures on your hard drives. A host of alerting features include email, local pop-up messages, net messages, and event logging, while using no system resources.

http://www.panterasoft.com/