Package: cpuburn
Version: 1.4a-1
Severity: minor
Tags: upstream
The README contains a small paragraph on the causes of overheating:
If sub-spec, your system may lock up after 2-10 minutes. It shouldn't.
burn* are just an unpriviliged user processes. But it probably means
your CPU is undercooled, most likely no thermal grease or other interface
material between CPU & heatsink. Or some other deficiency.
First, I don't know what "sub-spec" means.
As discussed above, overclocking is a major cause of overheating. But
overclockers should know that.
I agree the lack of thermal grease or something like that must be
another major cause, however that must rarely happen except for those
who assemble their PCs themselves, and I guess these people should know
what they're doing.
But the vast majority of computers are bought pre-assembled and
shouldn't have this issue. I bought my first branded (non-clone, in this
case Gateway) PC one year ago, and I noticed overheating problems
earlier this month. The Intel Core i3 330 CPU would reach 86 °C and
throttling would start. I could reproduce that easily with burnBX. I
opened the laptop's case and saw no dust. I didn't see any way to access
the CPU even after removing some 20 screws. So I called the retailer,
Future Shop (which usually has outrageous practices, if that's different
from most computer shops), told them about the problem, and they told me
the problem had to be dust, the solution being to bombard the case with
air. The first guy I spoke to said this should be done every 6 months.
The second said each 2-3 months. I couldn't believe I had never heard
about that before, that the Gateway manual didn't even mention this
problem, and that this would have to be done so often. But having no
choice, I tried it and was happy to confirm the CPU now runs much
cooler, about 20 ° less with 4 simultaneous burnBX-s, which is now
normal. This laptop is almost always in my basement, which is not
particularly unclean. The only somewhat unusual thing is it runs day and
night. Still, with that experience and what the store people told me, I
would challenge the README's claim and say that nowadays, with
pre-assembled laptops being so common, if we can no more just put the
vacuum cleaner in the PC, dust must be a more likely cause of
overheating than lack of interface material. It should be at least
mentioned.
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