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What happens when a CPU overheats?

Roonaldo

Roonaldo

Roonaldo

Associate
Joined
27 Oct 2009
Posts
67
Just wondering as im finishing a build and just in case i havent fitted my H50 correctly and it overheats (its an i5 clocked to 4Ghz) will it break for good? break my mobo? what?

Thanks
 
The CPU also has thermal throttling which will reduce the speed if the temp gets critical, and most motherboards you can set a shutdown temp, I have my I7 at 80c ~
 
If you're that worried then just head straight into the bios and watch it for 5-10min. There's no power management so the chip will be at full power (albeit not under load) and you will be able to see easily if it stabilises at a sensible temperature or if it tries to melt through your case.

As said above though, you can set thermal thresholds in the bios (best to set these as low as possible really, in order to give yourself as much of a safety margin as possible).
 
Set fire to the plastic connections to the RAD which in turn will set fire to the PCBS in your case, contained in the small box but still fed by air from the fans this is likely to get hot enough to burn, or at least melt through the case and burn down your house or street if you're not in detached housing.

Insurance won't cover it as you were tampering with equipment (overclocking) outside of the manufacturers specifications and un-able to pay the damages you will go to prison for ever more (or if you're lucky Austrailia because all the prisions are full).

Or the Intel Thermal Management v2 TM system will kick in and throttle your chip down and eventually just turn off crashing your machine.
 
topbanana said:
It generates a infinitely small black hole into which the main logic core is sucked.
Click to expand...

Chris Beard said:
Set fire to the plastic connections to the RAD which in turn will set fire to the PCBS in your case, contained in the small box but still fed by air from the fans this is likely to get hot enough to burn, or at least melt through the case and burn down your house or street if you're not in detached housing.

Insurance won't cover it as you were tampering with equipment (overclocking) outside of the manufacturers specifications and un-able to pay the damages you will go to prison for ever more (or if you're lucky Austrailia because all the prisions are full).

Or the Intel Thermal Management v2 TM system will kick in and throttle your chip down and eventually just turn off crashing your machine.
Click to expand...

Man, that stuff was too strong!:D
 
If you run just below throttling temperature at a high voltage you'll eventually manage to kill the processor though.
 
Basically.... If you truly overheat your cpu, you'll ruin its lifespan, burn out the chip, and potentially take other components with you.

Assuming you want some super hardcore oc.... you set the shutdown temp really high, so it'll never get there. (if thats even possible...) Once it gets to a high enough temp level, the silicon melts, the copper on the heat spreader melts, the heatsink goes with it. It drips molten metal to the chipset below, which clogs up the heatsink on that, causing it to overheat alongside. Then the two melt together onto the graphics card which sits below. The heat of the molten metal begins to slowly burn through the PCB, causing a short circuit which sends a thoroughly large electric current through your pc, possibly even going through your keyboard, mouse... frying you, your expensive pc, any monitors you have attached...your hard drives, and maybe sending back-current enough to blow your PSU, which trips the switch in your fusebox.
 
Copper melts at 1080 centigrade. Silicon melts at 1400 centigrade. It is exceptionally unlikely that you will manage to melt either in a computer.
 
SMAndy said:
Basically.... If you truly overheat your cpu, you'll ruin its lifespan, burn out the chip, and potentially take other components with you.

Assuming you want some super hardcore oc.... you set the shutdown temp really high, so it'll never get there. (if thats even possible...) Once it gets to a high enough temp level, the silicon melts, the copper on the heat spreader melts, the heatsink goes with it. It drips molten metal to the chipset below, which clogs up the heatsink on that, causing it to overheat alongside. Then the two melt together onto the graphics card which sits below. The heat of the molten metal begins to slowly burn through the PCB, causing a short circuit which sends a thoroughly large electric current through your pc, possibly even going through your keyboard, mouse... frying you, your expensive pc, any monitors you have attached...your hard drives, and maybe sending back-current enough to blow your PSU, which trips the switch in your fusebox.
Click to expand...


I live and wait every day for your posts :D:D:D What Jon said!
 
yeah it will ruin the lifespan of the chip, melt it no.

however its possible it burn it out, as my mum did to a 1400+ AMD :mad:
 
There is a video on Youtube (that I can't find) of a heatsink being removed from the CPU and ~10 seconds later the CPU gives out a loud bang and blows a hole in the MOBO. So thats your answer. Though in reality it should fail gracefully, your PC should turn itself off if it gets too hot.
 
niggyg said:
There is a video on Youtube (that I can't find) of a heatsink being removed from the CPU and ~10 seconds later the CPU gives out a loud bang and blows a hole in the MOBO. So thats your answer. Though in reality it should fail gracefully, your PC should turn itself off if it gets too hot.
Click to expand...

Thats a fake video, im nearly sure.
 
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