q9300 temps

I think one of the sesnors is defective. Test them.

A few thoughts come to mind. You might try lapping the Zalman 9700 a bit to level its surface and get a more even temperature distribution, or at least try reseating the heatsink. There should not be that much variation between the core temps, and either reseating the heatsink or lapping and reseating it should help. Next, as I found with my quad core chip, Speedfan hasn't been exactly reliable in its temp readings. Last I read, it was a Speedfan software problem and they're working on it.

As a last observation, while a load temp of 57c isn't too high, its far higher than I like to run. Other than the aforementioned lapping and/or reseating of the heatsink, you might buy a better one. Anandtech has several reviews on heatsinks and many are better than the Zalman 9700.

Just some thoughts.

Give me a few min, will check them out.

just did those.. bios said 35C.

Installed that intel thermal analysis tool.. would load after install, then found out it doesn't work with 64bit vista, restarted and logged in to 3 errors, comp restarted it self and then blue screened with a STOP error on next load up >.< seems ok now though atleast.

:| just after I clicked submit I got another BSOD on usbhub.sys, happened twice so far.. any clues? Researching on it atm

The BIOS reading of 35c is fine. I still wonder about the readings from the Prime95, as they are all over the place. I've run Prime95 with my QX9650 at 4050ghz (9x450) and had readings between 48c-50c among the cores. Given that you've reseated the heatsink a number of times with little change in the results, I would also wonder if the computer case has adequate fans for good ventilation. If the air is too stagnant, even a top rated cooler will tend to heat up.

Nah it's a antec 900, 2 fans on the front, one at the back by the zalman fan that pulls the air out from the zalman fan, one in the middle, a huge one on top and one on the side of the case, all brand new so completely dust free also

edit:

Ive removed all the OC's at the moment cause of these BSOD's.. they prob aint causing them but just wanna check.. but since going from the 3.2 overclock back to 2.5, the cores have only gone down by a couple degrees

OK, I have an Antec 900 as well and its a great case for moving air. I took some time changing the BIOS on my computer this morning and bumped the speed up to 4100nhz and then checked Speedfan for temps. I'm using Speedfan version 4.34, by the way, if that makes any difference. Anyway, after running through 3DMark06, the reported temps were:

CPU: 27c
Core 0: 47c
Core 1: 35c
Core 2: 37c
Core 3: 37c

As you can see, my temps are fairly low, just a hair lower than yours at idle. That can be explained by the fact that I'm using a TRUE heatsink, so its not indicative to a problem with your setup. It could be that with the Zalman 9700, you'll have to settle for a slightly lower overclock to hold the temps under 50c. Don't know for sure about that.

I'm starting to wonder if the different temps you reported have something to do with the motherboard and how the temps are getting reported. In fact, with your continued BSODs, I'm wondering if there is a problem with your motherboard itself. The overclocks and temps that you have shouldn't be causing any BSODs, as you state, they probably aren't causing the problem. You might run Memtest86 to check the ram and rule the sticks out as a cause. Can't say anything for sure concerning your motherboard at this point, but something is causing the BSODs.

Thanks for the reply, BSOD's seemed to be down to some vista update, my friend had the same thing happen once I spoke to him that day and he has a similar board (680i).

I've put the overclock back to 3.2 a couple days ago now, the computer hasn't crashed, slowed down or anything since, runs prime95 without any errors and the memory always passes the test thing on boot up, 3dmark06 runs fine too, scores around 15800 points, is that about right for my processor? (got 2x 8800GT's and doing it on vista 64bit)

Just figured maybe it's either down to some really bad concave/vex IHS or 9700 or just a silly sensor or something. I'm not too fussed really since it's stable now, just annoying to have such a big difference in the temps..