Slowing motherboard?

[stickyctrlkey]

When I leave my system on for a couple of hours everything slows down a lot. Its super fast when it first starts, then gets progressivly slower. I know it is not a memory leak or some other software problem, is it possible it is the motherboard or CPU? (EpoX 8hka+, 1700+). The floppy drive controller on the Motherboard is also shot (has been since I got the board a year ago).

wrnctrlkey

 

[Lord Evermore]

Physical damage or any other hardware issues wouldn't cause it to "slow down" (though overheating a P4 would), it would make it slow right from the start if it worked at all. How can you be sure it's not a memory leak or software problem? Why did you not return a board with a bad floppy controller?

 

[stickyctrlkey]

Its a long story why I didn't return the mobo because the floppy controller didn't work, but basically I bought it in Japan and found out when I got home, so couldn't return it. If a p4 can slow down when it gets hot, how about an Athlon 1700+XP? Also, I have done lots of tests to find a memory leak and no luck. Unless someone knows a sure-fire way to find a memory leak?

 

[Lord Evermore]

P4's have built-in controls so that when the internal thermal diode senses the temperature rising too high, the processor's clock speed is dropped in order to reduce heat output, but it continues running. A P4 can actually run without a heatsink at a very very reduced clock speed.

An AthlonXP system relies on motherboard circuitry to monitor the thermal diode (the XP line was the first to get a diode) and then determine what happens at what temperatures. Most boards only give you the option to shut down or sound an alarm at a certain temperature. I don't think any Athlon board allows for reducing the speed to control heat. If the board doesn't support this feature, then the XP will simply continue to get hotter until it burns out (assuming the heat issue is something that would reach such high temperatures). If the heatsink came off an XP, it would burn out within seconds.