K6-III+ runs good with passive cooling

Discussion relating to Socket 7 hardware.
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a_tewinkel

K6-III+ runs good with passive cooling

Post by a_tewinkel »

Hi everyone,

This weekend I've taken another step in silencing my system...
I've got a K6-III+ 500 which has a Vcore specified at 1.8 V on a Gigabyte GA-5AX 4.1. I haven't tried running it without a fan up till now, because I read everywhere that these chips get very hot. I'm running it with a medium-sized S7 heatsink, previously with a fan. I've taken the fan off, brought back the Vcore to 1.5 V, and it runs perfectly, even with a closed casing :D ! I'm very surprised, even when running games like Quake III the temperature seems to remain within reasonable levels. At least, that's what I concluded after opening the casing and touching the heatsink. The temperature would be approximately 40 -50 degrees Celsius, I think. I would like to know if there is any possibility to monitor the actual temperature of the processor?
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Stedman5040
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Post by Stedman5040 »

I thought the GA-5AX had a temperature thermocouple to measure the temperature of the cpu? It should be readable in the BIOS or by a suitable hardware monitor.

That besides I am sure that if your cpu gets to around 45C you will be running very close to the edge. In the real world these K6plus cpuz start to crash out of windoze at that temperature.

Stedman
DonPedro
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Post by DonPedro »

I own a GA-5AX rev 5.2 and I can report that the board lacks the logic to report any temperatures or voltages. :(

it is interesting though that the board features a temperature reading "device". some metall stripe that touches the underside of the cpu when inserted into the cpu-socket)
a_tewinkel

Post by a_tewinkel »

@ Stedman5040: Do these chips really crash at around 45C? I've seen an Athlon (K7) 1000 MHz run at up to 65C -75C before freezing. That chip survived that dozens of times, before I put on a bigger heatsink and fan.
Jim
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Post by Jim »

@ A Terwinkle : Would advise you be careful w/ passive cooling. Running a K6-3 400 ATZ @ 5.5 x 100 w/ passive cooling was how TA152H baked one of his processors. At least get the biggest heatsink you can fit in there for it; and then still be carefull to check temps w/ an added external sensor if you are going to run 550Mhz. For $19.00 CDN I bought my "Enermax" unit (See What is a Superpuppy Page 10 for details of it); and that allows you to monitor temps.
Last edited by Jim on Wed Nov 01, 2006 8:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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tazwegion
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Post by tazwegion »

I concur with Jim... and I seriously wouldn't use anything less than a high end (Athlon) socketA heatsink ;)

Additionally a 7v modded fan would be quiet and have improved airflow, especially when compared to no fan @ all :)
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a_tewinkel

Post by a_tewinkel »

Thanks for the advice!
I'm running it at its normal clock speed, 5 * 100 MHz and like I said, I've tuned down the voltage to only 1.5 V, so I believe "baking" the chip will not happen very fast. I'll be looking for a bigger heatsink which would fit on the socket, though. The Enermax Thermal Monitor unit costs 34 Euros, so I'm not sure if I will buy one.
Anyway, I'll just keep on testing the unit with passive cooling, gradually increasing CPU load, but I'll regularly check the temperature "manually". If it runs too hot, I'll surely put the fan back on.
Super7Dude
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K6-III+ going great, fast and passive!

Post by Super7Dude »

Hey guys,

Haven't been in for a while, but I finally got my AX59 Pro going with my K6-III+ 450. The chip is 13 hours prime stable at 450MHz with 1.3 volts. Raising the voltage to 1.5v allowed me to hit 500MHz stable (priming 4 hours and counting). The temperature is about 50C load with only a large heatsink on the chip (about 6cm tall) :lol:
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