CPU at 100 C! That isn't normal.

Okay so I recently had a bit of a problem with my power supply.
Not sure why, but the 12 volt P4 CPU power connector quit working.

I wired up the connector to a 4-pin molex accessory connector now and the computer boots fine without complaints. Made sure to use the OTHER accessory rail, not the one that has all my devices on it.

So anyways, I get the computer back up and running, and the only thing that seems off is that my temperature, which was previously being reported as between 39C to 55C, is now getting up to over 100C or so the thermometer says. Not sure why, but it's clearly running very hot, much hotter than before.

CPU: Intel Pentium Dual Core 2.5 GHz E5200
Motherboard: Gigabyte G31M-ES2L
PSU: OCZ 500W StealthXtreme

Anyone got any ideas?

I did re-mount the heatsink when I was troubleshooting the problem earlier, so I guess it's possible that I need to do it again and use some more thermal paste... however I'm pretty sure I mounted it pretty well. (However just to be sure I'll run out and get some more thermal paste tomorrow and mount it again...)

Hi pyro,
what program are you getting this temp reading from? and have you checked your bios temp reading?
unless it has been disabled, your machine should be giving you a warning and shutting down from that temp between 70-85c.

I really doubt its at 100C. Whatever you are using to report the temp may be wrong, or less likely you damaged a sensor.

I would trust Intel's CoreTemp? program over anything else.

At 100 your cpu should be so throttled down it would be VERY noticable.

You could also reboot and immediately get into the BIOS and see what it is reporting.

The BIOS is reporting 97 C.
I doubt it's wrong.

It's throttled the CPU back from 2.5GHz to 1.8, or so the BIOS says.

Wow then. I guess about the only thing you can do is remove the heatsink and clean it and the processor then reapply. If you do everything right (or even partially right) the high temps shouldn't happen. Unless you did damage a sensor somehow and its reporting 'wrong' everywhere.

Okay we've put like, 4 more fans in the case, re-mounted the heat sink, and we've changed the BIOS setting to constantly run the CPU fan at max to make sure that it keeps that processor as cool as possible.

It's still sitting between 60 and 72 C when we run a game.

Any suggestions?
Does anyone know what the Pentium Dual Core line is supposed to run at? (Max and min. temp. range?)

EDIT: Okay so we've got the temperature down by restoring default settings in the BIOS, that includes the clock setting.

Now maybe I'm not understanding how this works... or how something's measured... BUT:
I had it set so that in the BIOS it said the CPU was running at 2.5 GHz.
Now by default, the settings have it running at 1.2Ghz. wtf?

So our temperature is now, when playing a game, between 50 and 55 C... but the CPU is operating at 1.2GHz... the second we change the BIOS to make it run at 2.5GHz, it overheats, and shoots to just over 70 C (about 74 C) when playing a game.

What's going on?

Hey Pyro,
Im curious if you have tried the old fashioned method to see if the sensor is just way of or damaged?
70c-100c is 158-212F have you touched your heat sink and see if its hot, or just pleasantly warm?

I have touched the heatsink.
Before it was completely room-temp. As in, it didn't seem to be connected to the processor very securely.
I have re-mounted it now, and it gets pretty warm, but not overly so. The thermometer inside the CPU now reads a max of about 70 when playing WoW on max. settings, or any other heavy task... so no where near the 100C it was reading before I re-mounted the heat sink and added some fans to the case.
(I added like 4 fans to the case to keep the temp. inside there down... seems to have worked.)

The CPU doesn't seem to be under clocking itself except when idle... but I'd still love for someone to tell me what the official 'safe' range is for the processor thermometer reading.

the maximum spec for the E5200 is 74.1C
http://processorfinder.intel.com/details.aspx?sSpec=SLAY7

Thanks man.

Well I've got my CPU down to a max of 72 C when I'm gaming... so it's all good I guess. It's running at the full 2.5GHz too.

Proof once again of the idea "Too hot? PUT MOAR FANS ON IT!" working perfectly lol.

Thanks for your help guys.

damn right that isn't normal. Get a decent cpu cooler, reduced my temps by about 40% with some thermal paste too.