Northbridge Temps on Zotac 9300 ITX

Katch

Katch

Katch

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Joined
22 Feb 2010
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106
Does anyone know a program that will pick up the sensor in the NB as real temp and hwmonitor don't and I'd like to keep a close eye on it while stressing - at the moment its causing thermal shut downs...
 
Everest Ultimate will (a new version, v5.50, has just come out). If you are not using the onboard graphics, the MCP temperature should not go above 55C, and if you are using it, you should not see more than about 70C. Worth checking if the MCP heatsink is making good contact, as Zotac issued a warning a while ago that the stock Intel CPU cooler might touch the MCP heatsink and displace it a bit which was leading to very high MCP temperatures and shutdowns. If memory serves me right, the MCP temperature had to exceed 95C to trigger a shutdown.
 
yup Everest has done it.

I was getting ridiculous temps on the MCP even with the onboard GPU disabled - it was idling around 74 - going up to 85 under use and hitting 100 and thermal shutdown under stress.

I've just taken the board out - pulled off that crappy tape and lapped the heatsink and reseated with AS5 and some better pins... will have to see if that's enough or if I'm going to have to put a better cooler on it.
 
Turns out that installing a H50 inside a sg05b results in far too low an air flow to keep the NB acceptably cooled. After lapping the NB heatsink and adding a second fan to the rad in push pull, there is just about enough air flow to keep the NB under 75 degrees at full load.

Still a little high for my liking so I'm going to mod up my H50 to include the NB in the loop soon.
 
I discovered this problem last night too. Building an E3300 based replacement for my old Atom box and was absolutely astounded at how quickly and how high the MCP temps went at idle.

I've removed the HS, those stupid push pin connectors and the stock thermal compound and opted for a nut/bolt and Arctic Silver replacement. Idling at around 53 now as opposed to 68, couldn't get the before load temps as the thing wouldn't stay booted for more than 5 minutes before shutting down.

Great board, great features, terrible thermal design. Then again that's the joys of mini ITX I guess.

edit - reading about it would appear Zotac decided to up the speed of the GPU + shaders in the later revisions on the board (I-E):

This speedbumped GF9300-I-E has a 580Mhz GPU (from 450MHz) and 1400MHz shaders (from 1200MHz), and a smart black heatsink to match.
Click to expand...

I wonder if this has got anything to do with the temps, and more importantly I wonder if the BIOS supports GPU underclocking...?
 
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The GF9300-D-E BIOS does not support GPU underclocking or overclocking and I guess that the GF9300-I-E would be similar. The onboard GPU on the GF9300-D-E can be overclocked and underclocked in Windows with EVGA Precision or a similar tool.
 
I've got GPU clock speed tweaking options in my BIOS on the I-E, running on BIOS dated 18-9-2009. There are individual speeds for GPU and shader.

It was getting late last night so I didn't have a play, but it's on the list for tonight...
 
Yup you can down clock the GPU on the I-E. Have set mine to 450/1200 for testing, so far with the above mods I'm sitting at 50 deg idle on the MCP.
 
50C MCP at idle coincides with what I am getting on the GF9300-D-E. If it goes up to 52-53C, this is a sign that the filter of the front intake fan needs cleaning...
 
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