Hello;

I own above-mentioned motherboard with Athlon XP 2500+ (Barton, 1833
MHz). My problem refers to temperatures. Indicator on CPU shows 51-53
Celsius degrees, and while gaming - even 60-65 degrees (cooler Pentagram
Freezone 80CU). But what disturbs me more, is northbridge temperature -
on average it is 45-47 degrees, and while gaming - even 53-55 degrees. I
have a motherboard version only with northbridge radiator, but without a
cooler. I installed coolers in the case (one sucking air in, and the
other one - exhausting), but it did not change the situation much. I
replaced original, wide IDE and FDD cables with thin, round ones, but it
also did not change much. Radiators are very warm, which means that they
receive heat from the chips.

I have a question - shuld I worry about that? My system still works
fine, it did not freeze even once, but I am a little anxious.

I'd be grateful for any help.

Krzysiek

Show quote Hide quote i got the same board using a 2600 barton

i have oc'd the 2600 to 3200 speeds in the past and had a idle temp of 50
degress C

however not oc'd now i am getting about 45 C

i think my system in general is poor for cooling, i am using a coolermaster
vortex dream 7 cooler and its a hell of alot cooler than the stock AMD
cooler.

i am also using two case fans (80mm vantec stealth)

not as fast/loud as normal fans but they keep the system temp down to about
35 C

i dont really use this comp for gaming, infact i have given up on gaming
until i get a nice new PC with nice new parts

this one is pretty old, lots of parts cannabalied from older or second hand
computers, for instance the hard drive, monitor, cd-rw/dvd-rom, floppy disk

i wouldnt worry about the temps

but it could be cooler

i am in a pretty hot room, but the case i use is huge, it has 6 external
5.25 bays and 2 external 3.5 bays and about 8 internal bays, it also has
room for two PSU's

PSU's give off a loada heat might wanna look at that

i got a thermaltake 480w dual fan psu, its cool

Thanks, I think it is due to the fact that I have an old case, it is
pretty narrow, so there is not much space for proper air distribution. I
am going to replace northbridge heatsink to Zalman ZM-NB47J - just in
case. A will also work with my case open and with ordinary desk fan
blowing into computer guts. I tried - it really helped - temperatures
dropped to max 40 (system) and 57 (CPU) during quite long gaming :-).

Krzysiek

On Wed, 06 Apr 2005 10:41:26 +0200, KED
<Krzysztof.Dmyt***@univ.szczecin.pl> wrote:

Sounds like you don't need a northbridge 'sink replacement
or to take the side panel off, only to do the normal cooling
measures everyone else does, to get more air in the front
bottom of the case and more out the mid/top rear.  Thin
cases are not hard to cool, there doesn't need to be a lot
of space for "proper air distribution".  Airflow impedance
is almost always due to the intake and exhaust regions, not
the points inbetween.  Unfortunately when cases get
shorter/thinner/shallower, it seems they're more prone to
the intake or exhaust problems too, typically.

On Tue, 05 Apr 2005 10:37:14 +0200, KED
<Krzysztof.Dmyt***@univ.szczecin.pl> wrote:

Hmm, the name "Pentagram Freezone" doesn't exactly inspire
confidence, but then as you wrote below, "system still works
fine".  A Barton with it's larger core is usually pretty
easy to keep cool, unless your case is quite warm inside
then your heatsink isn't doing very well.  Even so, a Barton
at stock speed & voltage (not overclocked) should be fine at
60-65C. 

If you wanted to o'c it (since the CPU can likely go at
least 300MHz faster) you should think about a different
heatsink... and your present 'sink might be kinda loud too,
as most generics are.  If the present 'sink is quiet, and
not exceptionally engineered (relative to it being a
generic) it could simply be that your temps reflect this low
airflow rate. 

If you like low noise and low cost heatsinks then this is a
tradeoff that you might make, and is an acceptible one so
long as CPU stays in a stable temp range AND the fan
fulfills it's secondary purpose, to move enough air on the
face of the motherboard to cool off the power regulation
circuitry (especially capacitors).  Try running Prime95's
Torture Test for about 3 hours and if it passes that without
errors and your larger motherboard capacitors don't feel
more than moderately warm, you likely have plenty of thermal
margin left, there's no game and very little else that heats
up a CPU as much as Prime95 or other special-purpose
programs which isolate that subsystem as much.


This is a curious thing, your wondering about a northbridge
temp that is lower.  Did you consult the spec sheet and thus
have a reference for what an excessive temp might be?
If not, I suggest you should not worry about NB temp at all
unless you have a problem that seems related.

Which is a good thing.  If you were overvolting the chipset
(not even possible most often without altering physical
circuit(s) on the circuit board) or the system were in
extremely warm, near inhospitable external environements,
you might then need more cooling.  Otherwise it's a bad
thing to have a northbridge fan, it simply introduces
another failure potential, noise, dust buildup for more
periodic maintenance points.

For reference, since you aren't even exploiting the full
spec'd speed of KT600 (DDR400/200MHz) with your Barton 2500,
let alone overclocking the FSB past 200MHz, you should have
quite a bit of temperature tolerance.  Because your FSB is
lower than possible, the temp margin for stability goes up -
and that would be the issue, you're not even remotely close
to a damaging temperature.

Since these two parts you mention are specifically designed
to be warm-to-hot while running, the issue would be whether
the REST of your system components were hot, that the
overall temp you see is merely a reflection of inadequate
airflow... and that even if those parts didn't get cooler,
the other might've.

By "installed coolers" did you mean there were NO fans in
the case at all, except the power supply exhaust?  If so,
the system never should've been ran like that at all, I
mean, not turned on even once, period.  Both AMD and Intel
specify cooling arrangements, including a rear exhaust fan.
It is pointless to ignore and then come back later and
question temps.  Excuse this note if you already had an
unimpeded exhaust fan, but some cases also need more front
air intake- not necessarily a fan but open area.


I'd love to know who started that crazy urban legend that
cables make a difference.  They don't... not relatively
speaking... almost anything else possible to do to a chassis
will make more of a difference than cables.  Air is not
solid and flows around obstacles in a case incredibly well.


_IF_ you think the northbridge heatsink isn't making good
contact you could take it off, clean off the original
thermal interface material and apply a nice thin coat of
thermal compound... preferribly a synthetic ester based
compound rather than silicone based, something like Arctic
Silver or better still Arctic Alumina/Ceramique as it's
electrically inert, easier to cleanup, cheaper, and nearly
same performance as the more expensive Silver based
alternatives.  Same could be done to the CPU heatsink if you
think it's warranted.

OK, but I will replace the original heatsink by Zalman ZM-NB47J 0 it's
bigger - just in case :-).

I hope so, but SiSoft Sandra warned me that the system temperature
should not exceed 50C.

This is an older case - formerly it was used with VIA KX133 motherboard
and Athlon 550 MHz SlotA - and for this purpose it was fine. But now, I
this case is rather obsolete. I know I should buy a new one, but I do
not have money to spend on this.

Yes, this case had no fans (except the power supply exhaust).

But slim cables surely won't make it worse :-).

But it was really crowded in the case. Of course you're right - air will
pass through, but maybe a little slower...

The heatsinks receive heat - they're very warm.

thanks
Krzysiek

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