Intel Extreme Stress Test with Z97/i7 4790k

RobinsonJ · 21 Jul 2015 at 10:18

So I put this together last night and ran Intel's Stress Test. Basic processor temperature just running Windows was around 32C. With the stress test on it went up to around 90C, hovering between 87C and 92C, peaking at 97C. The test "passed" and the CPU didn't need to throttle. I only ran it for 5 minutes though as I had other things to do. I'll run it for a few hours at the weekend I think.

As I understand it this is normal for an OC i7? Just checking to make sure I've not ballsed up the thermal paste (again).

BluD · 21 Jul 2015 at 11:05

Please dont leave it running for a few hours if its getting that hot

Intels burn test software aint suppose to be healthy for these chips, it over heats them. I would try another bench program like Real Bench if your stress testing an overclock, or just running a few games and see if its crashing.

RobinsonJ · 21 Jul 2015 at 11:08

Haha ok. So it *is* running too hot then. I'll clean off the paste and re-apply to see if I get lower temps. I did a pea-sized blob in the middle yesterday which the consensus seems to think is the best way of doing it. Maybe I should make the pea smaller. What do the pros do? I've watched some Youtube vids but they show you the results with a plate of glass, not a big cooler that slips around when you're trying to fasten it down.

evsknight · 21 Jul 2015 at 12:55

What vcore is that at ? And what speed are you running it at?

My board was auto increasing voltage and it got silly hot even at 4.4/4.5gz. It was heading to 1.3 and beyond and that's using an AIO cooler.

I dropped the vcore down ran tests, dropped it down again and so on and then bumped it a little and locked it. It's now locked at 1.145 vcore and 4.4ghz (i'm not a big overclocker, I just like things running quiet and cool for day to day). Temps sit around 75 when prime 95 on the small FFT's

RobinsonJ · 21 Jul 2015 at 12:58

To be honest I don't know. It comes pre-OC'd from overclockers and passed all their tests before shipping. So I'll re-do the paste and see if that makes a difference before doing anything else.

pastymuncher · 21 Jul 2015 at 20:52

Don't use anything like that to stress test with Haswell. IBT, Prime 95, Linx, OCCT, Aida 64 all use AVX coding which hammers Haswell and forces it to pull a extra 0.1v if the voltage is set to offset or adaptive. This means you get a temp reading that is way higher than you would while gaming or anything else you normally do. Try running Asus Realbench for a more accurate temp guide.

RobinsonJ · 22 Jul 2015 at 06:49

Yes, I ran Prime95 last night and my PC immediately restarted every single time. I'm not going to run it again.

I reseated the heatsink after cleaning the CPU and sink, this time using the credit card method for the thermal paste. Strangely the core temps seemed higher this time but only initially. For some reason removing and putting the CPU back had reset the BIOS to defaults, and the defaults were causing Windows to blue screen continually (0xC000000F). I couldn't get to the login screen.

So I increased the voltage slightly (to 1.207) - the default was far too low - and then ran IET stress test again. It topped out at 70C. I left my PC running overnight recovering my Raid 0 with ZAR X and it's been quite stable, so I'll prob. just leave it like this.

Also managed 3 Eve Online clients with max graphics settings no problem. Once I get my raid back I'll try something a bit more CPU intensive.

RobinsonJ · 22 Jul 2015 at 11:46

In conclusion then, there's a huge thread at intel about temperature problems with i7-4790K. I wish I'd known about it before I bought this combo.

Ah well.

pastymuncher · 22 Jul 2015 at 13:30

70 degrees is fine for a air cooled, overclocked and overvolted 4790k, especially with what you are using to stress test.

BluD · 22 Jul 2015 at 17:15

Yeah 70 degrees is great, i was getting more than that on water with mine, the only way to bring it down further in a lot of cases is to remove the heat spreader on the chip and apply some decent thermal paste or liquid metal. Looks like yours runs fine now youve lowered the voltage though.

C64 · 22 Jul 2015 at 18:55

Use manual voltage when stress testing with all power saving features disabled you can switch it all back after stabilty found.

Use asus real bench to stress test i found it the best at finding instability on haswell probably because it has the H.264 encoding stress test.

Don't use a credit card method the best method is always small bit in middle and let the heatsink clamp spread it, you'll just end up with air pockets trying to spread it yourself.

For a quad apply a rice sized grain along the middle of the chip.

RobinsonJ · 23 Jul 2015 at 08:49

Thanks for that. I've seen people doing it different ways. The above is what I did the first time, though it was a pea sized amount, not rice grain sized. I don't want to do it a third time and actually after a lot of reading about Haswell and Z97 I don't think that was the problem in my case.

I think it's the motherboard settings that cause this issue as lots of people have reported it (many of them experienced overclockers), almost all of them with a Z97 (Gigabyte). There are various threads on the intel forums.

C64 · 23 Jul 2015 at 13:51

Pea is way too much paste

RobinsonJ · 26 Jul 2015 at 21:00

Just to finally, finally put this to bed, I upgraded the bios to the latest version (F6) and everything's fine even at optimised defaults. Didn't break 70C on the stress test and the average load I'm running right now (folding@home plus some other processes) is also under 70C.

So the solution to anyone who comes here later is: update your bios.