Can prolonged heat spikes fry a CPU?

[sgopal2]

Problem: About a month ago my computer was locking up a lot. I opened up the case and realized that all the fans had not been re-connected when I took out my old hard-drive. Temps were ranging on Sensor 2 93-98 F. I connected the fans and the computer doesn't freeze up nearly as much anymore, but I'm afraid I fried my CPU somehow. I probably had no fans running in the computer for about 4 weeks. (The only fan that was running was the one on the heat-sink).

Computer freezes after being on at random times. Can occur after a few minutes or few hours. The longest the puter has been on is a few hours before it freezes. I don't get the Blue Screens of death, but the mouse just stops working and the screen freezes. CTRL-ALT-DEL doesn't do anything and the only thing that works is reset. Temps are now running 82 - 85F on full load (sensor 2 on MBM5). I uninstalled WinXP thinking that SP1 fvcked everything up and re=installed Win2K pro ... same problem.

Did I fry my puter's CPU from the month long period where the fans weren't running? If so should I try to get another replacement CPU for my mobo??

My rig details:

CPU: AMD Athlon XP 1700 + 1470MHz
Motherboard: Epox 8KHA+
Power: Antec PP 403X 400 Watt PS
Memory: 512 MB of Crucial PC2100 DDR
Video Card: Matrox Millenium G400 Dualhead
Hard Drive: WD 800JB 7200 RPM
Monitor: Samsung Syncmaster 755 DF x 2
CDR/CDRW Manufacturer & Model: Plextor 12/10/32 CD-RW

 

[sgopal2]

bump. Any help please??

 

[PvtB]

Are the quoted temperatures for the CPU? CPU temperature should be the highest one reported by MBM sensors.

If your temperature is for the CPU, are you sure your temp is in F not C? Your quoted numbers seem very low nowhere near the typical operating range (unless your computer is in a fridge ). If you meant Celsius, then I would definitely look for a better cooling solution before declaring the CPU dead. Make sure that you use a good thermal compound.

This page lists maximum operating temperatures for various CPUs - could be helpful:

http://www.heatsink-guide.com/maxtemp.htm

 

[sgopal2]

No...the quoted temps above are for case temps in Fahrenheit (sensor 2 on MBM5). I really never paid attention to sensor 1, but I remember them being usually 15-20 degrees higher than the case temps.

I'm using a thermalright SK-8 copper heatsink with delta fan. Arctic silver was applied to the CPU core before attaching the heatsink.

So in summary:
Before the fan fvck up: CPU temps ~ 115 - 120 F idle; Case temps 94-98 F idle
After the fans were reconnected: CPU temps ~ 100 - 108 F idle; Case temps: 82 - 84 F idle

All I remember noting is that once the case temps got about 98- 99 F the computer would crash. Since the cooling problem has been resolved by proper fans/ventilation, I am really wondering if my continued crashes are due to frying the old CPU.

Should I bother to try and get a new CPU??

 

[PvtB]

I would say it's not the CPU's fault. Your CPU fan was working all the time and the temperatures seem ok. If anything got damaged I would look at some other components that might have been affected. Check any component that uses active cooling (north bridge, GPU) and make sure it's not overheating and fans are working.

Things worth trying:

1. Try disconnecting different components to narrow down the problem.
2. Look at your BIOS settings and make sure that RAM/AGP/FSB/HDD settings are at their defaults.
3. Try underclocking your CPU/FSB and see what happens.
4. Test your RAM. Try memtest86 (http://www.memtest86.com/). Run it for a while until your system "heats up" to see if you get any memory errors or lockups.

Hope this helps,