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Pushing a CPU to Heat Death, Intentionally

Posted by timothy on from the or-maybe-it-will-loaf-along dept.

sdougal writes "This site is showing a Pico-ITX board running Ubuntu with no cooling whatsoever. They even let the public guess how long it would last: 'Last week thousands of you placed bets on how long the new Pico-ITX board from VIA, the VIA EPIA PX5000EG, can last without any cooling whatsoever. An ARTiGO Builder Kit was offered as the grand prize. Yesterday afternoon the voting stopped and the Naked Pico Challenge started in earnest. We simply loaded up Ubuntu 8.04, set it to work playing an mpeg-4 video and then removed the heatsink, leaving the CPU and VX700 chipset bare to the world. We recorded the event here in this video and set up a live video stream so you punters can keep a watchful eye on the PX5000EG as it works away.'"

13 of 291 comments (clear)

  1. Ehh, it's been done before by elrous0 · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Anyone remember Patrick Norton frying that CPU on "The Screen Savers" back in the TechTV days? Patrick and Leo were building their annual "Ultimate Gaming Machine" (using all the best components available at the time) and his Nortoness forgets to put the heatsink on the CPU. They turn it on, and within minutes, they smell something burning. They had just fried one of the most expensive CPU's you could buy at the time, right there in front of God and the nation.

    It was an expensive lesson in the importance of the heatsink.

    Of course, many of us can remember back when CPU's didn't even need heatsinks. My first build was a 486SX with a zif chip slot and no CPU cooling--hard to believe now.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
    1. Re:Ehh, it's been done before by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I was at one of the audience tapings for 'TSS' in san francisco, a few years ago. very sad to see the show leave, taking all that good geek (true geek) talent with it.

      I once sent an amd k8 system to a friend in the mail. I made the mistake of leaving the big heatsink (I think it was a barton chip and those were VERY hot back in the day) attached. the pc was sent ground, I think, and so it didn't get the best treatment. turns out that the heatsink came off the cpu socket and was doing some kind of 'round the world tour' inside the pc case! when he opened it up, there were ding marks from the sharp edges of the heatsink all over the mobo ;(

      that was bad. but it gets worse. my 'genius friend' decided to just try it as it was and not even bother to fix the heatsink back to the chip!

      I think in 5-10 secs, he -guaranteed- that that system will never run again. I would have liked to know if the mobo was still working - but now, the whole thing is toast.

      he didn't know? really? a BIG HUGE HONKING heatsink and he thinks he can turn on a system without it?

      sheesh.

      now, that was years ago. today with the core2 arch, you almost don't NEED a heatsink. its amazing. I have overclocked core2 chips (see 'BSEL mod' for changing 800fsb to 1066fsb via some conductive paint) and STILL the chip is cold to the touch when I run memtest86. my bsel mod photos are here, btw: http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=bsel&w=47907743%40N00

      its now my usual procedure to install a fan speed control and set it to MIN for all my core2 systems that I build. I love the fact that even at slowest rpm, it still never gets hot enough to even pull your hand away from the hs/fan. amazing..

      I also do have a via epia that I use for my mythtv box:

      http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2010/1890660635_273662e3c9_o.jpg
      http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2299/2005750966_a1b8d242b3_o.jpg

      in that 2nd photo, you can see its drawing 24watts (with a kill-a-watt lcd meter). its 100% fanless, uses a 1ghz cpu but it DOES get quite hot to the touch so I leave the top case skin off; that way I can get by with no fan at all. its been doing my myth-tv recording (using hdhomerun HD tuner box, networked) for about half a year now; no reboots and very reliable.

      low power systems are cool ;)

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    2. Re:Ehh, it's been done before by Feanturi · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I've seen a few power supply deaths, in which case two of the systems had been working fine right up until the last time they were turned off. One of them had a bad switch (old AT) which made it difficult to turn the system on, so the user had stopped turning it off altogether, for about a year. Then I needed to install a network card in their system so of course had to turn it off. It never powered up again after that, once the system had cooled, rewiring the switch didn't change anything, and the PSU needed to be replaced. Temperature change killed it.

      Another one was one of my own, that was near a window, and that side of the room got very cold in the winter. My systems always run 24/7 because this way the internal temperature stays somewhat consistant, avoiding chip creep and spreading solder joints. But then one day, when it was particularly cold out and so also very cold in that corner, I wanted to move another hard drive into it. At first it powered back up for about 30 seconds then shut down. Tried starting it several times but each time the running interval got shorter, until finally, it just wouldn't turn on at all. Replaced PSU and all was fine. Temperature change killed it.

      A third one, this time the one in my gaming rig, developed its problem while in use. I was playing Oblivion or something intensive like that, and it was summer, very hot outside and in - my apartment is very poorly insulated as you may have guessed by now. The system started shutting down about every half hour, so after a couple instances of that I stopped playing, but later in the evening when things had cooled down, it was still doing it. Replaced the PSU and it ran fine after that. Temperature killed it.

      Quite a few hardware failures I've encountered, CPUs, hard drives, video cards, whether my own or friends or work-related, I've been able to blame on temperature one way or another.

    3. Re:Ehh, it's been done before by Lord+Apathy · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Have any of you lost the power supply in a PC?

      One morning I woke up and noticed my computer was off. I never turn my computer off. So I did what came natural, I turned the fucker back on. The powersupply blew the fuck up! I mean Boom! There was smoke billowing out the side and flame shooting out the fan port. The fucking fan in the power suppy was on fire! It was cool as fucking hell!

      Fried everything in the damn computer but the CPU, memory, and graphics card. Harddrives, cdroms, tapedrive, ethernet/sound card, MB.. Gone. The only thing I can think of is it fried everything on the +5/+12V connection and since the surviving parts where 3V they lived. That is the best I can come up with.

      --

      Supporting World Peace Through Nuclear Pacification

    4. Re:Ehh, it's been done before by beav007 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Your ideas intrigue me, and I would like to subscribe to your newsletter. There, fixed that for you.

      My 3 favorite tools are made from paperclips.

      The power supply tester
      Creation: Unbend a paperclip, and then bend it into a big U shape.

      Usage: When you are unsure whether a PSU works (a) disconnect it from anything it is connected to (b) insert one leg of the U into the hole in the 20/24 pin motherboard power plug for the green wire (c) insert the other leg into a hole for a black wire (d) plug the PSU into power and turn it on.
      If the fans spin up, then the PSU at least partially works. At this point you can use a multimeter to verify the voltages of the different rails with no load.

      The CD ejector
      Creation: Straighten a thick-gauge (strong) paperclip, and then put a loop in one end that is big enough to put your index finger through, at least to the first knuckle (this helps with gripping it during use).

      Usage: When you need to eject a CD from a powered-down computer (laptop OR desktop), push the paperclip into the emergency eject hole. On a laptop, this requires very little force, but on a standard (5.25") Desktop CD-ROM drive, this will take quite a bit of effort.

      The multipurpose grabber
      Creation: Straighten a regular paperclip, and put a loop on the end, as you did for the CD Ejector. On the other end, put a 90 degree bend, 2mm from the tip.

      Usage: You can use this tool to remove or move jumpers (very handy for IDE hard drives), and to remove stuck floppy disks from floppy drives (use the R/W hole or 1.44MB hole as an anchor point).


      Hope that was helpful to you.



      Note: why use "creation" in the instructions? Well, I've had all the necessary components sitting in my drawer for years, and they stubbornly refuse to evolve into anything useful...
  2. The rule of thumb is.... by Ancient_Hacker · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The rule of thumb among engineers is: One square inch of flat aluminum surface will dissipate one watt at room temperature and rise about 20 degrees Farenheit.

    A CPU chip with 900+ pins run a bit cooler as it's a it more than one square inch if you an include the substrate, and a certain percentage of the heat will conduct itself down the pins.

  3. Ummm, copying VW folks? by R2.0 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    They've been doing this with aircooled VW engines for probably 50 years at shows and races. Pull the fan belt, drain the oil, and put a brick on the accelerator. Everyone pays a buck to bet on the time, and with any luck the engine explodes spectacularly, much to the crowd's pleasure.

    Yet again, "on the internet" somehow makes it original...

    --
    "As God is my witness, I thought turkeys could fly." A. Carlson
  4. AMDs don't need CPU fans, either by Anna+Merikin · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Like the ole Timex watch that "took a licking and kept on ticking" my desktop box, an ancient AMD Sempron 2600+ with a VIA chipset, unknown to me, lost its power connector to the CPU fan, which I only discovered by accident when replacing a hard disk drive. The CPU was hot enough to scald my finger, but neither its performance nor its stability has suffered one bit.

    Of course, the heatsink was still connected. But the Sempron was IIRC most definitely NOT a low-power cpu.

    Yes, I reconnected the CPU fan. But at least I know my sh*t can take the heat.

    No video is available ;o{ .

  5. "Heat Death" by ObjetDart · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Sorry to nitpick, but doesn't the term "heat death" usually mean death by maximum entropy (i.e. no heat), and not death by heat?

    --
    I read Usenet for the articles.
  6. Done, accidently, before by Toreo+asesino · · Score: 3, Interesting

    We had a headless linux server that one day started beeping constantly for no apparent reason. With every intention on fixing it, after a couple of weeks of it still running ok, we just assumed the speaker had died so just ignored it (the server room being sealed away as it was). Then one day we had to move the servers to another room, went to pick the machine up, and "Jesus! This thing is boiling!".

    It was some ancient AMD chip that we literally couldn't buy new fans for any more, so we just snipped the speaker cable and let it carry on.

    Naturally, the Linux guys claimed if it had been Windows, we'd be looking at a dead server at this point in time :)

    --
    throw new NoSignatureException();
  7. My experience with no heat sink by VAXcat · · Score: 5, Interesting

    A few years back, I was troubleshooting a problem on my desktop. It had a Duron 800 in it. I got tired of putting the heat sink and CPU fan back on every time I made a change, so I figured, what the hell, how hot can it get in the time it takes to try and boot. It made it through the boot fine. I mused "Works great! I bet it doessn't even get that hot. Wonder how hot it is?" With that thought, I reached in and touched the top of the CPU. It was so hot that it instantaneously branded the text and logo etched in the top of the chip onto my thumbtip, before I could react and yank my hand back. For a few weeks, until it sloughed off, it was readable in reverse on my thumb...taught me new respect for the current consumption & heat generation capabilities of CPUs.

    --
    There is no God, and Dirac is his prophet.
  8. /var/log/messages: by dannycim · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I've made my home machine almost totally silent by using some really large heatsinks. Up 24/24 7/7. One 12V fan running super slowly at 5 volts.

    If I re-encode a movie I get:

    May 21 07:48:00 ganymede kernel: CPU0: Temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 4742833)
    May 21 07:48:00 ganymede kernel: CPU1: Temperature above threshold, cpu clock throttled (total events = 4742833)
    May 21 07:53:00 ganymede kernel: CPU1: Temperature/speed normal
    May 21 07:53:00 ganymede kernel: CPU0: Temperature/speed normal
    Do I care? Not really. Been like that for 3 years now. When it dies I'll swap it for a less powerful CPU and go totally silent. :)
  9. Re:hardhack? why? by Smauler · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Hardhack is short for hardware hack.