C2D e6400 running a little hot?

[Putter]

First here's my specs:

Antec P180b case
Gigabyte P965-DS3 Motherboard
2gb PC2-6400 XMS2 RAM
eVGA 8800 GTS 640mb
OCZ GameXstream 700W
320gb Seagate 7200.10 SATA harddrive
sound card, opticals not really relevant...

Anyways, I have my comp up and running (finally), and it just seems like termperatures are significantly higher than most other peoples. I have coretemp, TAT, the BIOS tool and speedfan, but don't really know how to work them that well. From what I could find out, from BIOS and TAT, my idle temps are about 40-41 degrees. I have stock cooling and AS5 applied. When I do that load test in TAT, my temps go up into the high 50's. So I'm not really sure what the problem is, but people are reporting low-mid 30 temps with stock cooling, even with a small overclock.

One possible problem could be that I added too little thermal past. I covered the whole thing, but maybe it was too thin of a layer? I dunno.

Second possibility. I have my CPU fan set to auto. Should I set it to run at a particular speed (or can I even do that?), or is it how it should be. Because all I know is that it seems to be running not dangerously hot, but hotter than seems normal.

Thanks.

 

[lx_flier]

They seem ok for stock cooling to me, for some reason my e6400 is only 2 degrees hotter when i o/c from stock to 3ghz @ 1.3250.
btw When you covered the whole thing in thermal paste did you use your finger? or did you put your finger in a plastic baggy first?

 

[Putter]

I used a piece of a Visa to spread thermal paste. And I cleaned the Visa piece first aswell.

And is it ok that my load temps are that high? It seems ludicrous to be in the mid-high 50's.

As long as it's normal. I'm not looking for some super cold system just yet...I might overclock sometime down the road, but right now I don't have any reason to. I tried Oblivion yesterday on the absolute max, and there were only a few stutters even out in the mountains.

 

[saintvir]

After reseating the HSF, disable Smart Fan Control in BIOS under PC Health Status. This will force the fan to run at 100% all the time.

My temps (using Core Temp) have never been higher than 35 deg at Idle with CPU OC'ed to 3.2GHz @1.3375v.

 

[Putter]

Hmmmmm, when reseating, do I need to reapply the thermal paste? Cuz, won't it be melted or something? (I'ts Arctic Silver 5, I think I might have mentioned before). And with it running 100% all the time, won't that lead to extremely loud running?

As long as it's not TOO high, I don't really want extra noise, but I will try it if you guys think it would be nice.

 

[CompuTronix]

Putter, the following is from the Core 2 Duo Temperature Guide:

Background

Intel has 2 distinct C2D thermal specifications, and provides a test program, Thermal Analysis Tool (TAT), to simulate 100% Load. Some users may not be aware that Prime95, Orthos, Everest and assorted others may simulate Loads which are intermittent, or less than TAT. These are ideal for stress testing CPU, memory and system stability over time, but aren't designed for testing the limits of CPU cooling efficiency.

Some users may also not know that C2D's feature 3 sensors at 2 different temperatures; a single on-die Tcase sensor, (between the cores), and dual Tjunction sensors, (one within each core). Consequently, there is much confusion regarding specifications, calibration offsets and test methods, so results can be difficult to decipher and compare. Therefore, when expressing Idle & Load test Results, it's also necessary to define the Variables such as:

Results

Tcase = Idle & Load
Tjunction = Idle & Load, Hottest Core

Variables

Ambient = Room Temp
Chipset = Model
C2D = Model
CPU Cooler = Model
Frequency = CPU Clock
Load = Test Program
Motherboard = Model
Vcore = CPU Voltage

It's important to compare apples to apples, otherwise it's just temperature salad. Please read the Guide.

Comp 8)

 

[Putter]

Ok, instead of reseating it (which I still might do, we'll see), I just disabled Auto Smart Fan. And, like you said, it essentially dropped to about 28 degrees celcius, and mid thirties at some load. I don't really wanna keep it like this though, it's a bit loud.


As for that Core 2 Duo Temp guide...I don't understand it very well. How do I check my Tjunction and Tcase temps?

1 last thing. In SpeedFan, at the bottom it shows voltages. They look like this:

Vcore1: 1.28V
Vcore2: 1.92V
3.3V: 3.33V
5V: 4.87V
+12V: 0.77V
-12V: -16.87V
-5V: -8.63V
+5V: 5.21V
Vbat: 3.09V

Is this bad/good/mean nothing at all? Just curious.

 

[CompuTronix]

As for that Core 2 Duo Temp guide...I don't understand it very well.

Read, read, read, then read again.

How do I check my Tjunction and Tcase temps?

All the information you need to answer your questions is in the Guide.

Help yourself.

Comp 8)