Should I go by CPU temp. or core temps?

iamfett

Weaksauce
Joined
Apr 17, 2008
Messages
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When monitoring your temps. which one should I be more concerned with, CPU or core?
When Idle, my CPU hovers around 45 - 47 Celsius (sometimes spikes to 213 - is that normal) and cores hover around 31 - 33 Celsius (43 - 46 under load)
 
I was under the impression that core temps are the ones to look at. Realtemp and Coretemp monitor the core temperatures not CPU. I may be incorrect though.
 
For your CPU, you should be using either Real Temp or Core Temp which will give you the most accurate readouts as far as software monitoring goes. They only list the correct temperatures, so there's no confusion as to which are the proper numbers.
 
Idle temps will not be read correctly by Realtemp/Coretemp but load temps will be correct within about 5C at 60C, the discrepancy reducing the higher the temp.
Intel chips are only calibrated for throttling (max) temp.
Also on 45nM chips, Realtemp and Coretemp havent got the ability to read sensors below a certain temp threshold (varies with each chip).
While my motherboard util can read CPU temps down to 22C, Realtemp gets stuck at 42C for my E8400 at the same time as the motherboard util showing the temp drop right down.
 
^ True, although idle temps in general aren't really significant so if they're not read accurately it doesn't make much of a difference.
 
Thanks for the info, by the way I use core temp for my for monitoring my temps.
The CPU temp came from HWMonitor.
And like I mentioned earlier, is it normal for the CPU to spike?

On a side note, are the temps I posted earlier "decent"?

Thanks everyone
 
I use Tcase (CPU temp). It is well known that Intel hasn't released TJunction Max for their desktop CPUs. All the temp utilities calculate core temps from the TJunction Max. Because they don't know what TJunction Max is, they have all estimated it for each CPU based on similar mobile CPUs where TJunction Max is actually documented. I've seen TJunction Max 105 and I've seen 95 for a Q9450, as an example. Therefore in my case these utilities would report a 10C difference. The way it works is... core temp reported = TJunction Max (estimated by utility) - DTS (which is accurate).

This is why I personally don't even bother with using core temps. What is an inaccurate instrument worth? However, if one day Intel releases TJunction Max metrics or someone is able to accurately figure them out, then I'll use core temps.
 
And like I mentioned earlier, is it normal for the CPU to spike?

On a side note, are the temps I posted earlier "decent"?

Thanks everyone

Temps spiking to over 200C is not normal, although chances are it's because of a bug in the DTS, so it's nothing to worry about. At the very least, you can be confident that your CPU is not actually reaching such a high temperature.

And yes, your temperatures are definitely decent :).
 
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