If you can overclock, can you underclock?

[Wangel]

A friend of mine has a factory where the temperatures in the warehouse gets very hot. Between 110 and 130 degrees is not uncommon in the summer. He requires a computer in this area. He was wondering about 'underclocking' the system and still adding extra fans. He has burnt up 2 computers in the 3 years. He currently has an athlon 750. He wouldn't care if it ran at 500 or even less. Can he underclock this to produce less heat and to make it longer lasting?

 

[bacillus]

can't see why not provided the m/board allowed manipulation of clock speed & multipiier!

 

[BA]

Yes. But, if heat is a problem, why's he running an Athlon?

 

[Yoshi]

He needs to put his computer in an industrial electical enclosure with a chiller. A chiller is basically a small air conditioner, they mount to the side of the enclosure and remind me of the AC units you see on semi trailors.

Here are some chillers from Hoffman. You can buy one of these chillers and mount it on whatever enclosure you would like. Notice Hoffman also make nice computer enclosures for computer and accessories.

A setup like this is the only good way to combat the summer heat in an industrial setting.

IMO underclocking will not make a enough of a difference in terms of operating temp.

 

[miller585]

If he really cares about heat and has the money I suggest getting a PIII, as most people know pentium 3's run cooler than Athlons do

 

[Yoshi]

Summer heat in an industrial setting hurts far more than the CPU, matter of fact it is probably the least effected. The life of the computer's power supply is greatly reduced by high constant heat and humidity. It probably reduces the life of the HDD as well. The only reliable way to fight the heat in an industrial environment is the above method. We have hundreds of personal type computers and electronic control systems protected by systems like this in our shop. It is the only real solution that works.