which temps are right

I've now been playing Crysis 2 for a number of hours and I have had hwinfo32 open all that time however the Alienware M15x EC temp 0-5 never get that hot temp 0 has got to a maximum temp of 90c which is not to worrying however further down where it has the ati on die temps some of them are getting to a maximum of 110c which is very worrying can anyone tell me if this is something to be concerned about and which of the temps should i be looking at

 

yes those are very high temps. are you running stock? prolly best to clean out the vents and fans and repaste the card along with some new thermal pads. i think its your vram temps that are going crazy.

 

well it is the memory(io) and the disp(io) that is getting up really high so i would assume that you are right in that its the vram. I have just cleaned it now and the temps are only going to a maximum of 104c now and yes this is at stock clocks. This M15X is only 7 months old do you think it needs re-pasting and thermal pads already. i should mention that my laptop is sat on a zalman 2000 laptop cooler

 

104 is still way too hot, especially stock clock speeds (assuming you are running stock clock/voltage). Check to make sure there is good contact between the memory and the thermal pad as the memory is often at a slightly different height than the core. What does your core temperature get up to? Obviously less than 104 but are we talking high 90's or low 90's or even lower? If the core is fine then I'd think the space between the heatsink and the memory isn't filled with a thermal transfer compound correctly. If the core is also high then you probably need to redo everything :-/

 

yes i would highly recommend repasting, and new thermal pads.

 

At stock clocks, a well loved 5850m, properly pasted and padded, should almost never exceed 70C on the core (DispIO) and should very rarely exceed 80C on vram (MemIO), except in Furmark-type stress tests or the occasional Crysis I-type games at Very High settings where you might see 85C on Vram/Shaders. This is particularly true when used in conjunction with a low-heat CPU like the 620M. Remember that factory paste jobs are slap on and go using packaged grease packs, not just at Dell, but across the industry, so it is no surprise to see excess, even dangerous, heat levels on a relatively new notebook. You need new paste and pads immediately or there is a good chance you'll kill that card very soon.

 

Agreed... heat to a computer is very similar to radiation for us. A low dose over a long period of time could hurt the lifetime a little bit (90C), however, you are exposing that card to a high dose (>110C) ... a human would be dead already

I'm betting you use good thermal paste/properly sized thermal pads and your temps go down 20C

 

Ok so what thermal compound should i get and were can i get thermal pads from

 

Arctic Cooling MX-4 paste is excellent. Non-conductive and easy to handle. i.e., Arctic Cooling MX-4 Super High Performance Non-Conductive Thermal Compound (4g) - FrozenCPU.com. Also available at Newegg (for more), etc.

Fujipoly pads are considered first rate. Fujipoly Premium System Builder Thermal Pad - 1/4 Sheet - 150 x 100 x 0.5 - Thermal Conductivity 6.0 W/mK - FrozenCPU.com

There are other options, particularly with thermal paste, and each has its advantages, but in my experience MX-4 is a great choice for relative newcomers (or anyone else). Highly effective and safe to use.

Inap is our real pro in this area. I'm sure he will join in with guidance. Be sure to download and review his thermal paste guides shown in his signature above. Indispensible.

 

MODERATOR, please delete this post

 

I recently repasted and padded my cpu and gpu. I used the Fujipoly pads and one of the vram strips took two layers of padding to make contact. Also HW32Info was showing one bank of memory getting hotter than the other. I suppose that is why. Now after the latest pasting and padding, I get no hotter than 75 with Rift on Max settings!

 

really???? Never had this problem....

 

My temps after 1 hour of hard playin in Crysis 2.
I must add that I have the NVIDIA GTX460M.