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Is it safe to leave a CPU on 100% load for many, many days?

I run folding@home on my computer all day, turn it off when I go to bed. After say 1-3 years of doing this solidly how will it compare to say if I didn't do this? Temps are 65-70c on average. Will the CPU degrade over time is my question.
 
Delta12 said:
tbh has anyone actually got a cpu that has degraded to any significant degree?
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Always wondered this. I had a 700MHz Duron overclocked to 1.1GHz back in the day, it is still running 27/7 to this day. In fact the machine has only been turned off a handful of times ever (couple of accidents, new power supply and a hard drive swap) in eleven years or so

It sits at between 0 and 30% load most of the time though, at 1.9V :D
 
HankScorpio said:
I run folding@home on my computer all day, turn it off when I go to bed. After say 1-3 years of doing this solidly how will it compare to say if I didn't do this? Temps are 65-70c on average. Will the CPU degrade over time is my question.
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I ran these on my Q6600 overclocked folding rig, an X2-6000+ in a server, and on my E6600 3.4ghz and they all lasted years. I had the E6600 at 3.4ghz overclocked and overvolted for 3 years, and it never skipped a beat. These all used to fold.
 
bainbridge said:
The cpu is an amazing achievement when you think about it this way, try running a car at 100% & see how long it lasts!
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True the CPU is an amazing achievement, but a car is mechanical, with moving frictional parts that wear every millisecond that the engine is turning.....not quite the same :)
 
francky said:
True the CPU is an amazing achievement, but a car is mechanical, with moving frictional parts that wear every millisecond that the engine is turning.....not quite the same :)
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Same with how it's always my HDD's that are the first things to fail for me in my computer's life cycle.
 
Delta12 said:
tbh has anyone actually got a cpu that has degraded to any significant degree?


I mean I know people who still have perfectly fine overclocked pentiums 2s that have led hard and abusive lifes that are still working perfectly fine nigh on 15 years down the line.
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I have an old pentium 4 Northwood which has been used and abused since it was brand new. Gaming, folding, server hosting, the chip has done it. Including a stint at 100% load for 2 years solid when it was already an aging chip. It certainly feels like the performance has degraded somewhat, using a fresh install of xp it is not as quick as it was when it was new, and my super pi times are a little slower.
 
I had a processor that overclocked to 3ghz just fine. Opteron 146, Then randomly it just wouldn't do it anymore. 2.9 was the best I could get.

Strange as I'd changed nothing.

Long story short, the motherboard had started to show signs of ware. Rather than the processor, new board and it was back up to 3ghz.

FYI, I swapped the board due to a faulty PCIe slot, not because i lost out on 100mhz :p

I don't think CPUz degrade really, unless overvolted. And running a processor at max load should never be a problem, regardless of duration. Cooling allowing ofcourse, although I would expect the standard cooler to be capable. As it is surely part and parcel of what the processor\cooling should beable to handle
 
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