Super User is a question and answer site for computer enthusiasts and power users. It only takes a minute to sign up.
Sign up to join this community
My computer shuts down during intense use of the processor, but the sensors show that temperature of CPU is less than 78oC.
By intense use, I mean any of the following: playing games, converting/encoding video, even simultaneously using tabs in the browser.
Hardware Information:
Why would this be happening and what could be the root of the problem?
I had a computer case without fans once, and my Pentium III processor would overheat easily (it's not that hard in the Israeli summer...). Eventually I opened the side panel of the case and left it open, aiming a 16" fan directly at the motherboard. This was the only thing that cooled down the computer enough to keep running.
You need to follow the following steps:
Clean your computer. Open the case, and dust it. Vaccume clean or blow air to remove the dust accumulation on Motherboard and Fans.
Apply a cooling paste between your CPU and CPU Fan. Cooling pastes are excellent heat conductors, Intel's paste should be available for around $1.
If you don't have any additional fans already in the cabinet, install them. Add one to the front, one at the back. The front fan should suck air in while the back should throw it out - promoting ventilation. They should be of the same make and size to facilitate airflow.
Change the PSU if it is old. I switched from a 450W local PSU to a 390W Cooler Master for one of my PCs - and immediately observed amazing difference in cooling.
While we are on the topic, this is an excellent free software to monitor the temperatures (and also has a horde of other features): Speedfan.
I've found that when you're really overheating your computer won't start up immediately after shutting off, or if you do, will shut off again before making it to the desktop. OTOH when I found that my MSI AtiXpress200 motherboard's bios wouldn't support the GeForce card I had, during a game it would shut off at a random point. When I had bad ram, windows itself was pretty good about mentioning that it thought I must have bad ram after it was started from a crash, and that I should scan for ram problems. Personally I suspect you have an issue where you PCIe BIOS isn't quite up to date with the geforce's use pattern.
Ok, I had the same problem as the first post. As you will see from my comment above.
I cleaned the fan assembly on top of the heat sink... but what I didnt check was between the fins of the heat sink...
I will admit it, I smoke in my office... bad habbit, what can I say.
So, on a second inspection of the heat sink (paying a little more attention this time) I noticed there was build up between the fins - which no doubt was stopping air flow over the sink.
I gave it a damn good blow out and no more shutdowns.
I hope this helps anyone having the same issues.
In your screen, it shows that the nforce3-pro CPU is 85 degrees. Is the sensor malfunctioning in the software ?
Software based CPU temperature sensors rely on the BIOS settings. Check your BIOS for power management settings to see if the settings have been changed from the default. Otherwise, I suspect a bad or under-powered PSU.
