Anybody ever seen lower than normal CPU temperatures?

I ask because the last Gateway MX6124 I purchased showed lower CPU
temperatures during intensive CPU tasks than my other 3 laptops. I
didn't understand why this was so and I guess I should have investigated
it sooner. As it appears to have cooked the CPU or maybe the northbridge
chip would be my guess during heavy duty game playing. And since the
laptop never detected any heat problems, it didn't run the fan on high
at all.

I thought the Celeron CPU has the circuit to measure the CPU temperature
inside of the CPU right? It isn't on the heatsink or anything right? If
the former, something must have been wrong with the CPU from the start.
I'll try swapping the CPU out with a known good one here in the next
couple of days.

If the temperature sensor is on the heatsink, then it makes much more
sense. As this is the same laptop I bought that didn't have a
functioning keyboard. And I had found the keyboard ribbon clip missing
from the motherboard if you recall. So somebody must have been in there
before. And maybe they also removed the heatsink and didn't use any
thermal paste either when they reassembled. Say does Radio Shack carry
this paste? As I think I'm out of it and I should get some more.

Good thing I have three of these laptops, eh? In fact, this hard drive
came out of that laptop. As that laptop just stopped and wouldn't even
finish booting from a boot disc. Well no problem, just swap out the hard
drives, which takes only mere seconds. And Windows doesn't even know
anything changed and continues on like nothing ever happened.
Maintenance and troubleshooting just doesn't get easier than this. lol

--
Bill
Gateway MX6124 ('06 era) 1 of 3 - Windows XP SP2

In news:hnvu5d$3vn$,
BillW50 typed on :
>... something must have been wrong with
> the CPU from the start. I'll try swapping the CPU out with a known
> good one here in the next couple of days.

Yup, I got curious and swapped CPUs between two laptops and the problem
follows the CPU. Not too often do I find a bad Intel Celeron CPU
anymore. They are usually pretty rugged. Good thing they are cheap
(especially used).

--
Bill
Gateway MX6124 ('06 era) 1 of 3 - Windows XP SP2

Just curious, what was the low reading versus normal?


"BillW50" <> wrote in message
news:ho0gg3$lme$...
> In news:hnvu5d$3vn$,
> BillW50 typed on :
>>... something must have been wrong with
>> the CPU from the start. I'll try swapping the CPU out with a known
>> good one here in the next couple of days.
>
> Yup, I got curious and swapped CPUs between two laptops and the problem
> follows the CPU. Not too often do I find a bad Intel Celeron CPU anymore.
> They are usually pretty rugged. Good thing they are cheap (especially
> used).
>
> --
> Bill
> Gateway MX6124 ('06 era) 1 of 3 - Windows XP SP2
>

In news:ho0l9j$afh$,
ED typed on Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:03:43 -0400:
> Just curious, what was the low reading versus normal?

Hi Ed! My other three laptops with Celerons (two 1.5GHz and one 1.7GHz)
often read:

132°F @ idle
168°F to 180°F Maxed out

The one that went bad (1.5 GHz) often read:

123°F @ idle
154°F Maxed out

I do have four netbooks with Celerons and they read about 128°F to
132°F most of the time. But they are under clocked 900MHz running at
633MHz, so that makes sense in this case. And if I clock them at 900MHz
and max the CPU out, they will hit around 145°F. But there isn't that
much more performance boost, so I generally leave them at 633MHz. Those
netbooks use the keyboard as a heatsink. And it seems to keep them much
cooler. The fan is on the other side of the motherboard and doesn't help
the other side with the keyboard too much.

> "BillW50" <> wrote in message
> news:ho0gg3$lme$...
>> In news:hnvu5d$3vn$,
>> BillW50 typed on :
>>> ... something must have been wrong with
>>> the CPU from the start. I'll try swapping the CPU out with a known
>>> good one here in the next couple of days.
>>
>> Yup, I got curious and swapped CPUs between two laptops and the
>> problem follows the CPU. Not too often do I find a bad Intel Celeron
>> CPU anymore. They are usually pretty rugged. Good thing they are
>> cheap (especially used).
>>
>> --
>> Bill
>> Gateway MX6124 ('06 era) 1 of 3 - Windows XP SP2

--
Bill
Gateway MX6124 ('06 era) 1 of 3 - Windows XP SP2

In news:ho0gg3$lme$,
BillW50 typed on Fri, 19 Mar 2010 13:41:21 -0500:
> In news:hnvu5d$3vn$,
> BillW50 typed on :
>> ... something must have been wrong with
>> the CPU from the start. I'll try swapping the CPU out with a known
>> good one here in the next couple of days.
>
> Yup, I got curious and swapped CPUs between two laptops and the
> problem follows the CPU. Not too often do I find a bad Intel Celeron
> CPU anymore. They are usually pretty rugged. Good thing they are cheap
> (especially used).

Ouch! Something else is wrong! The known good CPU is reading low
temperatures too in this laptop. So where is the temperature sensor?
Isn't it built into the Celeron 370? If so, the motherboard is reading
the temp much lower than it is. Thus not kicking the fan speed up when
it gets hotter. If it is external, it has to be on the heatsink/fan
assembly. There are four wires going to the fan and that is all I can
see.

So heavy duty use of the CPU will burn out this CPU too in time I
believe. If I can get manual control of the fan speed and max it out I
suppose during heavy use then it would never burn out the CPU. I didn't
buy any thermal paste yet and I figured if the sensor was in the CPU it
would just get a bit hotter if it wasn't making good thermal contact.
But it is just the opposite, the CPU temperature reads low. Anybody has
any ideas what is going on here?

--
Bill
Gateway MX6124 ('06 era) 1 of 3 - Windows XP SP2