Temperature sensors showing high CPU temps, CPU not super hot

(For monitoring heating I have used SpeedFan, Ai suite II (asus mobo software), RealTemp and my bios (on an Asus Gene IV Rampage))

SpeedFan says 100-120 C RealTemp says 30-80 C at idle (30 C currently) and 100-ish while gaming Ai Suite says 80-90 C at all times BIOS says 70-90 C (My CPU cooler is a Corsair H60)

Lately my computer has been giving me readings of my CPU hitting temperatures as high as 100 degrees Celsius. When I open my case after turning it off, or while my comp reads 100 degrees, the area around the CPU feels nothing like 100 degrees, more like 50 degrees. Today I put it apart and together again, cleaning out dust and such.

At idle my comp reads from 40-80 degrees Celsius.

Is it possible that my mobo sensor is faulty? While it doesnt seem like it gets as hot as it says it certainly affects my computers performance while gaming. It ran WoW easily at 90fps before, but now I barely make a 60fps. Fluctuating between 40 and 61fps.

Images of my case: http://imgur.com/a/8fhFr

Edit 1: I think the temperature might have been more accurate than what I thought. As MSalters pointed out, the ambient temp might be much lower than that of the CPU. My water cooler seems to be low on water, even though its a model which should never be refilled, and which cant be refilled. I have ordered some thermal compound and contacted Corsair about their CPU water cooler. If anyone has any experience with similar issues any input would be nice.

Zvartsund

Posted 2013-12-30T12:58:41.607

Reputation: 1

The first step would be to remove the cooler, clean the thermal paste, and reapply the thermal paste to see if doing so makes any difference. Unless you experience performance problems or your computer is restarting I wouldn't trust the software your using. Related question http://superuser.com/questions/55632/cpu-temperature-sensor-wrong?rq=1

– Ramhound – 2013-12-30T13:23:20.767

How much dust build up is there? Time to buy a can of compressed air and blow the dust out? – cybernard – 2013-12-30T16:57:02.430

The corsair h60 I found by googling is a water cooling unit. It could be low on water. Shake the radiator do you here water noises. – cybernard – 2013-12-30T17:05:07.227

Yes, I hear water noises, what does that mean? – Zvartsund – 2013-12-31T12:34:38.547

Answers

Heat moves when there is a temperature difference. Usually the amount of heat moving is proportional to the temperature difference. The 100 degrees measured is inside the CPU. That may very well correspond to 50 degrees ambient (and thus a 50 degree difference) if there's a large heat production.

A better cooler removes more heat for the same temperature difference, or alternatively the same amount of heat with a lower temperature difference. For instance, a cooler that's twice as efficient would cut the difference to 25 degrees, so it would keep your CPU at 50+25 = 75 degrees.

MSalters

Posted 2013-12-30T12:58:41.607

Reputation: 7 587

This answer makes no sense. If his CPU was actually that the temperatures the sensors are indicating he would see both performance issues and a hardware reaction to said temperatures ( i.e. his computer would shut down ). He does indicate performance problems but its not clear, if said decrease in performance is real, or there is some other problem ( driver, ect ). – Ramhound – 2013-12-30T14:10:29.313

Lol, he sees performance issues (fps drop from 90 to ~50). HW reaction would initially be CPU throttling (explaining fps drop). Tjmax for some CPU's is as high as 125C, so there's no reason to assume that a 100C CPU should lead to an immediate shutdown. – MSalters – 2013-12-30T14:21:27.013

I stand by my statement that a 50 degree difference between the CPU temperature and the ambient temperature is unrealstic. I stand by my statement 100 degrees for any of the Sandy, Ivy, or Haswell Intel chip ( or even AMD chips ) would present larger performance problems. – Ramhound – 2013-12-30T14:54:13.060

Good heatsinks will cool down quickly when no power, so even 5 seconds of shutdown and the heatsinks will drop. Maybe you are getting a little overheat, but I would say performance drops are from SOFTWARE CPU throttling, in an effort to prevent overheating.

Check your motherboard utilities and see if you have any power-saving or safety monitors that are set to kick in at a certain temperature. Can always attempt to disable dynamic frequency modes, or try to limit when they are enabled.

If your motherboard driver utils have nothing related, also check in the BIOS for those features.

Sometimes energy-save features can significantly impact high performance applications much sooner than you might have thought. If it was overheating, you want some performance knockdown to save the computer, but you may be able to adjust that to a less aggressive cooling mode.

If you think the sensor is bad, try to measure it against a known source heat source (I assume you can detach the sensor leads and play around with them). Squeeze it in your fingers for 5 minutes, or hang it outside the box and see if it matches your AC setting.

user2097818

Posted 2013-12-30T12:58:41.607

Reputation: 480