CPU Temperature woes

[Yvo]

I thought I would never post in here about my CPU temps being too high, but there has to be a first for everything I suppose.

My computer is adequately cooled, or so I thought, it has one 80mm front fan (intake), one 80mm back fan (exhaust) and right above that another 80mm exhaust that leads to the powersupply (Enermax 350 whisper). I have a Thermaltake Volcano 5 cooling the AMD Athlon XP 1700+, which is recommended for use with the CPU (and it did excellent up in till this point). I am not overclocking anything and the latest product added is a new video card, but the temperatures were high before this point. I have also tried to de-dust the computer and fans.

So what am I doing wrong... what is one way I can reduce temperature of my CPU... it is at 57 C right now, idle'ing of course.

Summary of specs:
AMD Athlon XP 1700+ cooled by Thermaltake Volcano 5
Epox 8K3A
512MB PC2700 DDR RAM (Crucial made) with attached Thermaltake memory heatsinks.
Aopen Aeolus Geforce 4 Ti4200 (core: 250MHz, memory oc'ed to 500MHz, stock memory is set below normal clock)
One WD 40GB 7200 rpm drive, One Seagate 60GB 7200 rpm drive
All running on Windows 2000 SP2

Please help... this super hot system is super unstable!

Yvo

 

[mechBgon]

First of all, the EPoX 8K3A gets its temperature reading directly from the AthlonXP's internal diode, unlike other KT333 boards which estimate it using an external thermistor. The core can routinely operate at 75C and maxes at 90C, so even if your full-load temperature is 70C you're still not really pushing things. If you do want to lower the temperature, an Alpha PAL8045 with an adjustable-rpm YSTech fan would be a slick combo, and it fits your board.

Are you sure you got your RAM specs right? So far Crucial only offers PC2700 in modules up to 256Mb. Did you mean it has Micron chips on it? What brand is the module itself? What kind of timings are you running for CAS, Precharge Delay, Fast Command and so forth?

 

[Yvo]

2x 256MB PC2700, my apologies
I just shorten it up to 512mb total 😉

Micron (I believe) is the name on the chips. The timings are 2-5-2-2 (I might have this backwards). I know Command Rate is at 2T since 1T is very unstable!

 

[mechBgon]

Doh, I should have thought of the 2 x 256 possibility, sorry 😱

Maybe trying the RAM timings slower would reveal whether the timings have anything to do with it. Do you have a game or benchmark that consistently crashes, where you could use it as a test to determine stability?

 

[Yvo]

Well when I put my FSB to 166 for the PC2700 3dmark 2001 goes to the desktop.

When I reduce it down to 133MHz the program works fine. So I have it running at 133MHz already.

http://service.madonion.com/compare?2k1=3915499

But the computer is still unstable at 133MHz... I can live with the fact that I run it at 133MHz... not a HUGE speed increase, but it is still unstable & high temps are still a problem.

 

[mechBgon]

If it's unstable at 133, maybe try 2.5 3 3 6 on the timings and see if that helps, as a troubleshooting step? If it's unstable in that setup, most likely something else is causing the problem.

By the way, what brand/model of power supply are you running on?

 

[Yvo]

I have the blue Enermax one... I got an Enermax one with my case but the adjustable fan and 2 fans in the powersupply got me hooked.

The part number: EG365P-VE FCA (350Watt)

The thing that annoys me the most is that it worked fine up until a sudden where the temps went much higher... maybe its time for a reformat 🙁

Yvo

 

[jiffylube1024]

Take any CPU ratings with a grain of salt. If it's instable, however than there is a problem. Did you use Arctic Silver on the CPU? If so, did you apply it properly (as per the directions on their website). If not, then I'd advise you get some.

My ASUS CUSL2 tells me that my P3 733 runs at a cool 9 degrees C, heating up to 13 when it's really stressed! No joke (too bad this is totally impossible with air cooling, heck it's way below air temperature!)