Need some advice aand looking for local help.

[Lemon law]

When my wife's old computer died, I felt buying for a local dealer would get me some support if anything went wrong. And while the local dealer had some good prices,
sadly he is in denial about the problems I am having.

I got a fairly good system I thought would meet my wife's future needs. Its based on an MSI mother board, namely a P6NGM-FD. The processor is a socket LGA 775
pentium D dual core pressler. It basically runs perfectly except for one problem, at least in terms of reported core 0 temperatures, it idles at at least 50 C and more often at 55 C at stock speeds. Under any normal load Core 0 temperatures soar past 70C
and can go as high as 80 C. Anytime core 0 temps go past 70 C, the CPU fan gets annoying loud, so I have a real problem. The MSI mobo is no overclocking board and these readings are at lowest possible v-core voltages and no overclocking.

At the same time, core 1 temps stay in the 30-35 C range. As do all other motherboard and HDD sensors that report HDD temps, motherboard, and all other setting at 33C with all voltages in spec. I also put in another case fan which has no
discernible effect.

The dealer did remount the cpu with a new intel heat sink and fan, and that had no effect. But I have to wonder if he has the push pins mounted right. And since I have no experience, I am somewhat reluctant to try it as a do it your self. So is there anyone experienced in the vicinity of Lebanon, IN willing to help me on this?
If so, please PM me.

According to intel, the cpu is defective if core temperatures difference exceed 15C, and in my case they can exceed 40C. But the exchange of the CPU has to done through the dealer and my wife needs her computer on a daily basis. And the dealer flat out refuses. I suppose I could take him to small claims court, but the filing fee is $78.00 and I can't get a court date until February.

I have considered something like an arctic 7 cooler, fairly cheap from places like new egg, but I doubt even that cooler would be enough to cool a defective CPU.
I have somewhat decided that an intel e 5200 would be my better bet, its listed compatible with my mobo, and seems to offer the best bang for the buck, and as a 45nm fab, its far less wattage and more temperature tolerant. I would, if possible
reuse the better intel pentium D heat sink and fan, but I could not in conscience
resell a defective chip.

I also have to consider its possible, the sensors are defective. I monitor heat using speedfan and the MSI dual core center. Real temps and core temps refuse to install, I assume because of the intel pentium D 915 not being on their list.



What advice can this board offer me?

 

[o1die]

I recommend the e7200 or e8400, which are listed under "cpu support" for your board. If you're not getting any windows bluescreens or random system reboots, your current cpu may be fine.

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

Originally posted by: Lemon law
According to intel, the cpu is defective if core temperatures exceed 15C, and in my case they can exceed 40C.

Can you show us where this is stated? Chances are, your ambient temperature is higher than 15C; it's probably in the area of 20-23C. The CPU cannot be cooler than ambient, unless you're using refrigerated cooling.

Has the dealer actually seen the disparity in core temps? Can you take a screenshot and show him?

 

[Denithor]

Ouch, so much for better service from the local shop.

The first thing I would do is update the BIOS to the latest available for the board. If the temp probes are off that may fix it and your noisy fan will stop cranking up when the temps are read correctly (assuming they aren't really 80C).

You might try reseating the cpu yourself, if you do get some good thermal paste (I use Arctic Silver Ceramique). Clean off the heat sink and cpu properly: remove the old thermal pad and then use cotton balls or an old sock and plenty of rubbing alcohol for the waxy residual. Apply a small blob of thermal paste to the center of the cpu (about the size of a grain of cooked rice). Reseat the hsf onto the motherboard over the cpu. Note you will have to remove the motherboard from the case to do this properly.

If you're nervous about doing this yourself, you might post in general hardware and see if there's anyone from your region who could help (probably put in your title what you're looking for to get the most attention).

 

[Lemon law]

Originally posted by: Flipped Gazelle

Originally posted by: Lemon law
According to intel, the cpu is defective if core temperatures exceed 15C, and in my case they can exceed 40C.

Can you show us where this is stated? Chances are, your ambient temperature is higher than 15C; it's probably in the area of 20-23C. The CPU cannot be cooler than ambient, unless you're using refrigerated cooling.

Has the dealer actually seen the disparity in core temps? Can you take a screenshot and show him?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ooops, I meant to say the differences in the reported core temperatures, And when I have a condition where core 0 shows 75C and core 1 shows 35C, 75-35=40 C
and above the difference 15C limit. Of course the sensor could be defective instead, I hope that explains what I meant to say.

 

[Martimus]

Originally posted by: Lemon law

Originally posted by: Flipped Gazelle

Originally posted by: Lemon law
According to intel, the cpu is defective if core temperatures exceed 15C, and in my case they can exceed 40C.

Can you show us where this is stated? Chances are, your ambient temperature is higher than 15C; it's probably in the area of 20-23C. The CPU cannot be cooler than ambient, unless you're using refrigerated cooling.

Has the dealer actually seen the disparity in core temps? Can you take a screenshot and show him?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ooops, I meant to say the differences in the reported core temperatures, And when I have a condition where core 0 shows 75C and core 1 shows 35C, 75-35=40 C
and above the difference 15C limit. Of course the sensor could be defective instead, I hope that explains what I meant to say.

I would think it is a defective sensor. I don't believe that one core could be that much hotter than the other just due to thermal diffusion.

 

[Lemon law]

Marimus may be correct in stating, " I would think it is a defective sensor. I don't believe that one core could be that much hotter than the other just due to thermal diffusion."

But sadly, thinking and knowing are two different things. I too have a lot of theories but no real way to tell which is which.

I have numerous temperature warning alarms from the MSI dual core center, but no BSOD yet.

And to answer the o1die recommendation of the e7200 and e8400, the e7200 shows at $120, the e8400 at $163, and I can get an e5200 for $80 shipped free. We are concerned with price and low temps, than on performance.

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

But even if it is a defective sensor, and doesn't effect the performance and safety of the CP, the fact that the fan spins up very audibly is, to me, unacceptable.

The dealer should be willing to try another CPU; if the original is indeed defective, he can send it back to Intel under warranty.

 

[aigomorla]

Bad mobo sensor temp.

Never trust it, never rely on it.

The Prestler DOES NOT have a readable diode so coretemp and realtemp wont work.

If your temps are wacked, your sensor is wacked, and its a mobo problem, not a cpu problem.

If i remember correctly the mobo got its DTS under the cpu.

 

[n7]

Not sure what is the problem here.

Your system is running fine, yet you feel something is wrong because a temp sensor is likely broken & because the fans kick into a higher speed under load?

Buy a better cooler then?

As a tech, if you system runs stably under stresstesting load, i wouldn't be replacing anything for you either, sorry.

 

[Lemon law]

Originally posted by: n7
Not sure what is the problem here. ( even if its a false alarm, I doubt you would tolerate the annoyingly loud fan )

Your system is running fine, yet you feel something is wrong because a temp sensor is likely broken & because the fans kick into a higher speed under load?
( The fans get loud and stay lod under even any moderate moderate load, the intel spec is the cpu should not exceed 63.4 C.

Buy a better cooler then? ( I have considered that, but if the sensors are even semi real, even a better cooler will not bring heat under specs? )

As a tech, if you system runs stably under stresstesting load, i wouldn't be replacing anything for you either, sorry. ( At 78 C the cpu is supposed to throttle down and run at a snails pace. If you were my dealer and pulled that crap on me, you would never have me as a customer again. Nor will the dealer I trusted. )

 

[dbcooper1]

If the temperature sensor is on the motherboard, how does it read the core temps. individually?

 

[n7]

Originally posted by: Lemon law
( even if its a false alarm, I doubt you would tolerate the annoyingly loud fan )

I build my own systems, which means i get fans specifically designed to be quiet, otherwise i know i'll be dealing with loud fans.
If a prebuilt has a defective fan, absolutely it should be replaced, but a loud fan doesn't mean defective.

Originally posted by: Lemon law
( The fans get loud and stay lod under even any moderate moderate load, the intel spec is the cpu should not exceed 63.4 C. )

Eh, you got a Pentium D...that's the whole issue in the first place.
I hate to say this, but you'll find that few OEM systems with basic coolers or stock coolers @ Pentium D actually run at very "Intel spec" temps...course, no one really knows how they are measuring their temps, so you cannot really prove yours is running yours above spec unless they were to tell us exactly how to measure like they do...

Originally posted by: Lemon law
( I have considered that, but if the sensors are even semi real, even a better cooler will not bring heat under specs? )

Before we can start worrying about Intel's specs, we'd need a truely accurate way of measuring temps in the first place...

Originally posted by: Lemon law
( At 78 C the cpu is supposed to throttle down and run at a snails pace. If you were my dealer and pulled that crap on me, you would never have me as a customer again. Nor will the dealer I trusted. )

But that's just it...is it throttling down?
I'm guessing it's not, since it's not actually overheating at all. Keep in mind if it's really overheating, it will just shut off the system, regardless of temps sensors.

I get what you are trying to say, but i don't believe temps are guaranteed to be accurate on the motherboard anywhere on any warranty, so i hate to say, but unless you bought it with some warranty guaranteeing temps somehow, it's all the dealer's discretion when it comes to this situation.

It sounds to me like the the sensors are borked, which is causing the fan to run full out speed...which means the only really defective part here is possibly the mobo...of course whether it's technically defective is another matter.

I guess what i'm trying to say is that there's a hell of a lot of gray stuff here.

You might be seeing black & white, but i sure as hell don't, which means your issues are really up to the dealer's discretion more than anything.

 

[Lemon law]

To N7,

A few points, speedfan is the only utility that reports both core temps, the MSI dual core center, and HW monitor are in close agreement, but report only the higher core 0 temp reading.

In terms of annoying loud, the fan noise is not bad until processor temps go over 65C, and then fan speeds increase and get very loud. I agree that there is a lot of gray stuff, but I need to know what will cure it for sure.

 

[VirtualLarry]

First of all, the Pentium D runs hot. Real hot.

Second, intel OEM coolers aren't really know for keeping things cool.

Put those together, and yes, you're temps are going to be high. Which means that auto-adjusting CPU fans are going to be louder.

So really, if that's what you purchased, then you got what you expected. If you expected the CPU to run cool, and the fan to run quiet, then you purchased the wrong CPU. The cheapest is not usually the best. It sounds like you bought the cheapest.

Thirdly, if the Pentium D doesn't have on-die thermal sensors, then I don't know how Speedfan is calculating two core temps. I have a sneaking suspicion that there is only one real CPU temp, and the other sensor is reading something else, even if it happens to be labled by default by speedfan in such a way as to suggest it's a cpu temperature. At 30-something C, for a Pentium D, that's not a CPU temperature, at least not one that one would consider in the ballpark for a Pentium D CPU.

So your suspicion about having two differing core temps (different by 40C) is probably outright wrong.

I don't think taking this guy to court is the right solution. In fact, I think that you need to look at yourself and ask why, in this day and age, especially with the resources of ATF available to you, that you went and bought a Pentium D CPU.

That was the mistake, and it's not this guys fault. As long as it's not thermal throttling, then it's running in spec, and therefore you really have nothing to complain about, quite frankly.

If you want to see if it is throttling, then download and run RMClock in the background, it will tell you.

Finally, getting an E5200 is a very wise idea, if the mobo supports it. It runs very cool, even with an OEM Intel heatsink (use the biggest Pentium D heatsink if you can, the stock heatsink that comes with the E5200 is tiny), as long as you don't overclock.

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

Originally posted by: n7
Not sure what is the problem here.

Your system is running fine, yet you feel something is wrong because a temp sensor is likely broken & because the fans kick into a higher speed under load?

Buy a better cooler then?

As a tech, if you system runs stably under stresstesting load, i wouldn't be replacing anything for you either, sorry.

As a former tech who's been building systems for over a dozen years, I would never let it get to this point.

If a temp sensor is malfunctioning to that extent that the fan is kicking in obtrusively loud, then there is a problem. The customer would be getting a new part and an apology.

 

[Denithor]

Is there a different fan header on the motherboard you could plug the cpu fan into?

 

[Idontcare]

Originally posted by: Flipped Gazelle
The customer would be getting a new part and an apology.

And that's just the "common business sense" part of it if you want to continue staying in business as a ma-and-pop local computer store, let alone the point of whether there is a legitimate hardware issue.

Bottom line is you are in business for a purpose and reason and small businesses do not last long by leaving customers with a feeling of buyers remorse as you depend on customers for being your in-field sales agents by proxy thru spreading good words about your business.

What cost is a Pentium D replacement versus having a customer bad-mouth you and the experience they had with you to dozens and dozens of townsfolk for the next 5 yrs?

 

[Lemon law]

Originally posted by: Denithor
Is there a different fan header on the motherboard you could plug the cpu fan into?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I suppose I could plug the fan into a different header or simply run it at all its annoying
full speed. But its hardly the point, the fan and sensor are functioning correctly even
if the sensor lies, below a reported sensor temp of 60 or so the fan runs at a quiet less than 2600 RPM, above that it runs faster and louder.

Just opening firefox is enough to raise temps 8-10 C.

 

[Idontcare]

Originally posted by: Lemon law
Just opening firefox is enough to raise temps 8-10 C.

You know it almost sounds like you have a really anemic HSF on there. Like the reseller plopped a Pentium D oem chip in your rig and then hooked up an Intel stock HSF for a standard Pentium 4 (non-dual core).

Not that you'd really have the background to make a strong argument along these lines to the reseller but it may be in your best interest to pursue getting a superior HSF for $20 if you are intent on salvaging the rig/cpu for continued usage.