P4 3.0C @ 60*C, then cool to touch...?

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insanarchist

[H]ard|Gawd
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Sep 3, 2004
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Alright, the company I work for just purchased a rackmount system from a manufacturer, and I was given the task of cooling it down and quieting it down (the thing sounds like world war 3 has started in the office... I actually ducked the first time I heard it.) While making it quieter shouldn't be a problem (quieter fans, better cable management, etc.; the thing was cheap!), I have yet to figure out this magical cool-to-the-touch 60* C processor. Now, I know what you're thinking; bad/no contact between processor and heatsink. Well, here's the thing..

When we first got the machine yesterday, it was running at like 50*C in the bios. That's pretty darned high, so I removed the stock heatsink and replaced the stock heatsink grease with some radioshack stuff (we needed a quick fix and the boss didn't want to spend retail prices for AS), figuring "hey, it couldn't be any worse, right?". Yeah, I boot it up, and it is idling right next to me at 58*C. It is the stock intel heatsink (the newer one with the spiral pattern & copper core), but I figure "hey, it could still be a contact issue". So I power down and remove the heatsink as quickly as I could, and then touched the core to see how hot it was. The damned thing wasn't even warm! Am I getting faked out here, or is my poor rackmount insane? :confused:
 
MemoryInAGarden said:
The temperature sensor is probably in error.
Click to expand...

That's what I kinda figured. The only piece of information refuting that possibility is that the temperature actually rose when putting better heatsink grease on, versus lowering. Do you think it is just completely on the blink?
 
I'd go with the sensor also, my sensor is kindof weird a little like that too (though not quite as bad). I'd say get throttle watch and if it says everything's ok then ok. It won't burn up or nothin.
 
I have heard that the grey thermal compound on intel heatsinks is quite good compared to the white thermal compound. People say it is a shin etsu variant. A few years ago shin etsu paste was tested against AS3 and it turned out to be better but relatively unknown to non-oem markets.
 
All I can say is that You did a very stupid thing.Intel's TIM is better than 95% of all the
greases you find on the market.Secondly , how you measured the temp is funny at best.CPU temp drops 15-20 C in 1s and when you power it off it drops instantly to ambient.

If you want to measure heatsink temp , do it at full load at the base and add another 10C and you get actual CPU temp.

You should have checked full load temps in Windows then choose quieting settings in the BIOS for the cooler until you comply with 2 simple things : silence and temps lower than 63-65 in full load.

*It starts to throttle at 67C so you lose performance.

insanarchist said:
Alright, the company I work for just purchased a rackmount system from a manufacturer, and I was given the task of cooling it down and quieting it down (the thing sounds like world war 3 has started in the office... I actually ducked the first time I heard it.) While making it quieter shouldn't be a problem (quieter fans, better cable management, etc.; the thing was cheap!), I have yet to figure out this magical cool-to-the-touch 60* C processor. Now, I know what you're thinking; bad/no contact between processor and heatsink. Well, here's the thing..

When we first got the machine yesterday, it was running at like 50*C in the bios. That's pretty darned high, so I removed the stock heatsink and replaced the stock heatsink grease with some radioshack stuff (we needed a quick fix and the boss didn't want to spend retail prices for AS), figuring "hey, it couldn't be any worse, right?". Yeah, I boot it up, and it is idling right next to me at 58*C. It is the stock intel heatsink (the newer one with the spiral pattern & copper core), but I figure "hey, it could still be a contact issue". So I power down and remove the heatsink as quickly as I could, and then touched the core to see how hot it was. The damned thing wasn't even warm! Am I getting faked out here, or is my poor rackmount insane? :confused:
Click to expand...
 
savantu said:
All I can say is that You did a very stupid thing.Intel's TIM is better than 95% of all the
greases you find on the market.Secondly , how you measured the temp is funny at best.CPU temp drops 15-20 C in 1s and when you power it off it drops instantly to ambient.

If you want to measure heatsink temp , do it at full load at the base and add another 10C and you get actual CPU temp.

You should have checked full load temps in Windows then choose quieting settings in the BIOS for the cooler until you comply with 2 simple things : silence and temps lower than 63-65 in full load.

*It starts to throttle at 67C so you lose performance.
Click to expand...

Be that as it may, the heatsink grease I used still shouldn't suck. I don't particulary give a flying crap what the load temperatures are in windows when it is way hotter than it should be in the bios. In reference to setting the "thermal throttle", this is some crappy mini-atx intel board with barely any system settings in the bios. That, and I'm pretty sure, since the fans are at 100% already and the thing is at like 50-60*, setting the fans to turn down until it gets to 65* won't really do anything but make it quieter every 20 seconds or so before the fans ramp up again.

In my own defense, I don't consider changing the heatsink grease to something different to be a "very stupid thing" considering the symptoms I had to work with (hot proc, cold hs). and as you haven't given any other useful suggestions, I would recommend refraining from being a jerk to someone asking for help until you actually have something useful to say.

Oh, and learn to use punctuation, correct capitalization, and the space bar if you don't want to seem like some n00b flamer. Thanks. :rolleyes:
 
Even if it really isn't running hot, it will probably throttle anyway once that sensor registers the throttling point in the BIOS.
 
The black stuff that used to be on the older intel heatsinks wasn't so great. The radioshack white goop and it were about the same. The black stuff just wasn't as messy.
 
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