What actual *CORE* Temps are too high?

[signmeuptoo]

I have Everest running and it is reporting that my CPU temp is just 38 degrees which is just fine, but the core temps are much higher, about 56. What is too high on them? The CPU is the dual core Athlon 64 4800 Toledo. Is there an AMD page that covers this? Thanks.

[Guest r3d c0m3t]

I have Everest running and it is reporting that my CPU temp is just 38 degrees which is just fine, but the core temps are much higher, about 56. What is too high on them? The CPU is the dual core Athlon 64 4800 Toledo. Is there an AMD page that covers this? Thanks.

 

I believe you asked this same question in another thread.

[signmeuptoo]

Actually, I mentioned it but no one answered it. The thread wasn't about this specifically so what is the problem with me trying to find out?:eek2:

 

You told me that 54 isn't too high for a core temp, and I realize that already, but I need to know WHAT *IS* too high, what the CEILING is for when I start overclocking.

 

Please.

[General Septem]

There's no real ceiling other than what you're comfortable with. There's definitely a temperature at which your CPU will be instantly fried, and it's probably different depending on the core.

 

The rule of thumb though is that every 10 C will halve the life of the processor, and every 10 C cooler it runs will double the life.

 

When I ran Orthos the other day, core #1 got up to 68 C. This is a dangerous temperature in the long-term but I was comfortable letting it run overnight. I will not however run Orthos again until I lap the base of the HSF and the IHS to fix this high temperature. If I saw it go above 70 I would have shut it down immediately, and if I was a little more alert the other night I might have decided to shut down Orthos even at 68 C. I haven't seen it go above 60 C load other than in Orthos.

 

Many overclockers' rule for Athlon 64s is never to let it go above 50 C. Intel's C2Ds run significantly hotter than Athlon 64s, however, so this rule is adjusted. It is not uncommon to see a Conroe go above 50 C. Likewise, for dual core processors, the threshold may be a little higher than for single core, simply because higher temperatures is the nature of the beast.

 

With your system I would not let it go above 60C, and I would strive for under 50 C load if possible. You can help temps by lapping the base of your HSF, removing or lapping the integrated heat spreader of your CPU, and/or getting a better cooler.

 

With my Tuniq Tower, my Opteron 165 idles in the 20s, if I turn the fan all the way up (which I generally don't at idle, but once it's in a case I probably will).

[signmeuptoo]

In fact, my non core temp is only 38 degrees full load, I think that is what you are actually talking about. I DID lap my HS/F, which is a nice Thermalright XP-120, in fact, I lapped the hell out of it and used Mother's polish even and it is just like a mirror. I am also using Coollaboratories Liquid metal.

 

The only better thing I could do is use one of the newer thermalrights or tunique or scythes, but this XP-120 set me back so much and it IS a good HS. I am using a nice Panaflo with it.

 

What bothers me is how much higher the CORE temps are than the CPU temp, 55 as opposed to 38. I used to be running about 54 degrees CPU temp, and if I had used the stock cooler it would have been worse, it seems my chip is a very hot one.

 

Either people don't understand me that I am NOT talking about the CPU general temp BUT the **CORE** temps here, and/or no one knows here, which surprises me. With all the focus on CPU temps on this down revision socket, I would think by now folks would have some solide information on the topic.

 

If I was using the stock AMD cooler my temps would be as much as 25 degrees hotter right now and I have to wonder, what with that being NOT overclocked yet, what am I to think...

[Lenny_Nero]

Tcasemax and Tjunction max are the 'max' temps that you can go to with out causing damage to the CPU (and I doubt it will cause any damage), I know this as fact for AMD but I dont know for Intel but I expect its the same. The newer chips have a better heat/thermal shut off and unless your running without any cooling at all should not 'kill' the chip like the older athlons could (like the Tbirds) because the power is just cut at what ever point.

 

I have yet to see a CPU 'wear' out (or even hear of it in 30 odd years) and the old man has not either, and he has worked with just about every one. I have a Celeron that is getting on for 10 years old and has had more than a 100% overclock for 5 or 6 years and because of my wireless runs at 100% 24/7, and has done so for the last 5 plus years and its not going to ware out anytime soon.

 

My x2 core 0 can go above 52c (DTM temp) when I load it up when above 2.8 GHz, but that is still 10~12c below the max, and after a while both will even out at the same.

 

Find your chip on this page and then follow the link to read about yours, or go to AMD.

[General Septem]

or go to AMD.

 

According to this, it would appear my processor's max is 65 C. I ran Orthos for eight hours with one core loading just above this and it seemed to be alright. In other words, I concur with your statement "I doubt it would cause any damage".

[Lenny_Nero]

Yep, I have done quite a bit of reading up on this in the past, because I used to have one of the TBird type chips in my Asus that would get b0rked in less than a second if the temp when over the Tcasemax (which from what I did a quick read on last night is not really used any more because...).

 

But now the shut off switching and temp reporting is much better so the chip will close down before any real problems... if you are using the standard HS/f but as I expect that most of us will be using something better it should be less of a problem, and its all down to the Thermal Profile (TDP ???) of the chip, which is not so much of a hard and fast x2 == 65c and Optys == 71c sort of thing, its down to your chip build and all that, but I think the lower limit is 65c so that is what I am working with and if I have more room then all the better.

 

But the more I looked into this last night (and again for a few hours) the harder it became and the more I found that I cant find my chip profile in any of AMD's (and others AMD Geeks for 1) active pages/lists. I have the box here which has the 4200+ x2 skt 939 sticker and everything I run reports it as that and 110 watt... but when I put this info into the AMDGeeks (and others) thing it fills in stuff I dont have and the only way I can make it work is as a 4400+ x2 or 4600+ x2 ???

 

Sorry signmeuptoo, I got mixed up with the AMD .pdf's and the link is for the Opterons, if you go to AMD and search the whitepapers for the x2 stuff... or just take it as read that 65c is a good number to stay below that is what I am working with.

[Thasp]

Are you sure coretemp is reading high 50s and you're not really reading the part that says what the highest temp you should go to is? The first time I turned on coretemp and saw 85c I ran for the PSU switch before I noticed the real CPU temperature under it. It's hard to believe at stock under load, a good heatsink properly mounted is keeping any modern AMD chip 50s at load at stock, coretemp.

 

Theory B is that the IHS sucks so while the CPU doesn't give off much heat to the socket(the bios/mobo temp sensor), the inside of the CPU is hot. Some people cut the IHS off to fix that issue, but I wouldn't unless you have a steady hand and don't mind the chance of killing something.

[Bugone]

Noob question alert!! I found this thread looking for an answer to the same question. but I am not sure about one thing. I am using Ntune to monitor temp at the mo. and it reports a "sys" temp of ~52°c @ idle. What does this mean? What is the max. temp I should let this get to?

[Kithylin]

Just thought i'd add my experience with opterons and heat.

 

I've used motherboard monitor (mbm5) to monitor my cpu temps for a while now, on my opteron 185 and lanparty nforce4 sli-dr board. I have the cpu overclocked very margionally, only +20mhz fsb for +260mhz over stock.

 

I've been using the mbm5 settings posted in the main overclocking thread on these forums, and i'm not sure if the cpu temps reported in this program are core temps, or something else, but watching these temps, i've seen my opteron get up to 60c before, but like to do that i have to run a major multi-threaded app like the new winrar, and set it to maxium compress and let it run for 30-45 minutes. After a few hours (or even overnight) at running a process like this, my opty will get up to 65c - 67c on mbm5, and very commonly is around the 50c - 56c - 58c mark while playing games, i've had it running like this for about 4 months now, with no issues what so ever. Also of note, i've increased the core voltage to 1.59v and ldt voltage to max in bios, so, that probably makes it a bit warmer, but i want it stable, so made sure everything has enough juice.

 

Edit:

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Oh yeah, also using ThermalAlright XP-120 and 120mm antec Tri-Cool case fan and arctic silver 5.

[Lenny_Nero]

The best way to find out what you are reading from would be to read up the info for the prog that you are using, or get a copy of CoreTemp and check it up against that.

 

TBH CoreTemp is one of the better ways of checking the CPU temp, I have spent quite some time on this and even writing up a report on all of the temp progs that work with the DFI RDX200 CF-DR board in another forum and it shows many others up, even the pay version of Everest gets the cores named wrong.

 

As for the max temp of your chip that depends on what your chip is, but the bottom limit for around 75% is between 65~70c there are a few that are 62c and some even lower, this is for the main Athlon range, the Opterons have a bit more leeway, but I stick to the same 65c for all of mine.