how to identify overheated cpu

[hiyo]

I just recently bought and installed a new comp. i have a dual core e6850, a ip35 mb, and mushkin ram 2gb ddr2 1066 medel 996535. been running last 3 days fine pretty much and i did try overclocking a little but decided to revert back to default settings.

the problem begins with this morning. i had comp running all night and morning and when i returned home i was getting unusual lag. comp seemed to be running slow and would get spikes every 5 sec - 1 min where the sound would stutter mouse would jump and programs would slow. the occurence of lag seems to correspond to how busy i am running my comp. When i keep ctrl+alt+del up and watch processes none seem to jump too high durng the lag although each running program does jump maybe 30%. no program in particular seesm to be jumping more often than the rest either.

i soon discovered upon inspection that my cpu fan was stopped and blocked by a wire. must have bumped into system when getting dressed for work. I was away for approx 12 hours. the cpu heatsink however felt cool to the touch.

i dont have exact temps cuz i just reformatted 1 day after i put system together to get rid of old drivers and whatever and havent installed any progs yet. I did runa full system scan with norton and no threats were identified.

I was hoping someone would have some information about behavior of parts when they overheat or any means to identify if there was any damage. it would be sad if i had to buy a new partr after only 3 days but whats done is done however i do wish for a fully functional computer and i cant afford to purchase a whoile new system.

when i first got on my comp and tried to close programs the comp did crash i had to hard boot. could it possibly be the os? or is it definately a hardware issue.

sorry if post is poorly organized im kinda lost as to where to start or approach to identify problem so i am also lost trying to explain symptoms. any help/info/tips would be greatly appreciated.

 

[AmberClad]

Well, in theory, the thermal diode should prevent any damage to the CPU. And I have accidentally ran my CPU without the fan (either forgetting to plug it in, or getting getting something wedged into the fan), with no ill effect. Unless you were running F@H or Orthos on it, simply having the computer on and not doing much shouldn't even trigger the thermal diode.

I guess you're in the same situation as me, where the motherboard doesn't have a CPU Fan Warning alert.

Edit: I guess one thing to check is that the default settings that you reverted to didn't set the vcore to some unusually low number. And it might be useful to have CPU-Z open to make sure the multiplier is ramping up when it should.

 

[Don66]

Try reseating your Heatsink.
Get rid of the old thermal paste, replace with new.

Sounds like your cpu, was trying to protect it self.

Modern cpu's are hard to kill.

IP35 has monitoring protection built into it, and it should have shut the computer down if the cpu was in danger of dying.

 

[aigomorla]

1. your cpu has a feature on it that allows the chip to downclock itself to prevent overheating. Thats why it shuttered. The chip was throttling itself down to a lower temp.

2. Most if not ALL C2D's have an emergency shutoff temp. That means if/when the chip reaches that temp, the comp will automatically shut off. And yes ive had it happen to me.

3. You really shouldnt do anything besides make sure that wire wont get stuck again. Your chip will work.

 

[hiyo]

thanx for the info. but the problem is still persisting. if its not the cpu then im not sure what it is or could be. when i run any process and sometimes when just sitting still and moving mouse although not as often the computer lags. feels like whole system is stuttering. system boots up fine but the one sec random stuttering is fustraiting at the least. any tipos on how to trouble shoot and identify the source of the lag? task manager doesnt show any process going over 45% at any time but lag will occur even when system is running at 4%. other than the random spikes it seems to be fine. alsol seems to be worse when multitasking.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Download and install RMClock, it will show you if you are thermal throttling for some reason.

 

[MarcVenice]

Even when it's throttling it won't start to lag all of a sudden, even a downclocked c2d, to 2ghz for instance is still a very fast cpu. Something else is going on here if you ask me. Maybe harddrive issues ? It's just that I don't think it's the cpu, because as other people explained, it has several features built into to protect itself.

Just to get something straight, your PC was running fine for 3 days, you tried overclocking, but reverted back to default settings, and then the problem appeared ? I'd try resetting the CMOS, maybe you f-ed up reverting the settings, maybe the bios did something weird, whose to say. Reset the cmos, and see if it does any good.