2600K suddenly started cooking itself

[durbs]

Hi, my main dev rig has started to misbehave. Nothing has changed on the machine but a few days back it popped up an alert from the Asus monitoring software "warning CPU temp 86 degrees" which I ignored as assumed the software was reporting incorrectly. Few minutes later the PC locked up and hung - which it never does.

Restarted and all was good until I started an encode in Handbrake - same again. Can replicate this each time something intensive like video work is run.

I can only think of:

A) Asus software reporting wrong temp, this was disproved by the way the machine actually crashes after a few mins of intensive work.

B) Cooler fan packed up - visually checked this and fan is running fine. Checked reported speeds and again fine. Set fan to more aggressive profile in BIOS and speed increased but temp issue persisted.

C) Cooler unseated somehow - checked and appears seated fine, is solid and no changes had been made inside the machine prior to this.

Chip is 2600K with a very mild overclock on Asus Z68 board and cooler is a decent-ish Freezer Pro one, not a stock cooler.

Any ideas where to look next, beyond replacing the cooler? Gaming works fine and it'll happily run games all day but I guess that's not really pegging the CPU?

 

[wazza300]

the freezer pro coolers can crack,and become loose,id check the black plastic mounting and maybe get another cooler and repaste the cpu

 

[durbs]

the freezer pro coolers can crack,and become loose,id check the black plastic mounting and maybe get another cooler and repaste the cpu

Cheers, yeah, the symptoms suggest the cooler has gone pear shaped somehow. Couldn't see any obvious signs but didn't look for cracks, just checked it was not wobbly and the fan was sound.

Guess its a new cooler then

 

[wazza300]

they are good coolers but they use plastic to mount the fan/heatsink I think and ive seen a few crack,even if you cant feel any movement any slight loss in pressure would raise temps

I can't think whatelse it can be

 

[ubersonic]

Tried running realtemp or core temp to show if the warning is correct or not?

 

[durbs]

Tried running realtemp or core temp to show if the warning is correct or not?

Yeah, verified the temp via a 2nd monitoring app and it pretty much matched the Asus one, around 90+ before PC locks and requires a hard reset. Mobo temp is low at around 36.

What's a half decent cooler these days for Sandy? Don't need a monster as this is mainly a working PC so isn't clocked.

 

[Weazle]

The Akasa Nero is a good quiet cooler, cheap at the moment too. Its a bit larger than the Freezer Pro.

 

[Smoogels]

I'd take the CPU cooler off, examin it and if it's all ok, reseat it.

If it's still the same after reseating/repasting it, a new cooler would prob fix it. Although, I'd just have a check of the CPU voltages incase they have been accidently increased or something. Is unlikely, but worth a check since it only takes a minute to do with CPUZ or similar

 

[durbs]

they are good coolers but they use plastic to mount the fan/heatsink I think and ive seen a few crack

Turns out you were completely right! It was carnage under there when I took the heatsink off today to try reseating it:




The opposite side also had a hairline crack so was going the same way. The plastic had changed and gone all brittle.

Went watercooled in the end for the 1st time and fitted a Kuhler, very nice temps now, even under sustained 100% prime95 load

 

[wazza300]

That's better,pretty stupid idea to use plastic instead of metal,with all the heat cycles it becomes brittle over time

 

[SirChumpalot]

That's shocking!

Glad you sorted it though.

 

[linktoinsanity]

That's not good that they use plastic like that yeah.

Glad your sorted with no harm done, and that the 2600K is alright!