I suspect that my new computer is running way too hot.

Just sitting in the BIOS temps climb to:

processor thermal margin: 21c
motherboard temp: 55c
ICH: 85c
MCH: 82c

This is 100% factory with 1 SATA hard drive added.

Now, if I add a 30cfm 80mm fan to the case and run the factory outlet fan at 100% I can get down to:

processor thermal margin: 24c
motherboard temp: 51c
ICH: 72c
MCH: 67c

Strangely if I run the factory outlet fan BIOS controlled again with the new 30cfm 80mm I get:

processor thermal margin: 26c
motherboard temp: 49c
ICH: 76c
MCH: 70c

So the processor and motherboard temps are lower with the slower outlet fan speeds.

I don't really know what I'm dealing with here since I don't know what temps are considered 'normal'. I do know that Intel lists the max ICH at 92c and the MCH at 97c. Factory cooling gets me very close to those numbers just sitting in the BIOS!

I have no idea what temps do when in windows since the Intel monitoring software does not seem to support the G33 motherboard. Once windows loads I use riva tuner to get the video card down from 67c to 52c so that is one plus, but I suspect these ICH and MCH temps get very high.

First of all, just saying factory cooling is not enough of a description, as you have provided no make and model of computer. Several factors are missing:

1) Factory outlet - is this an intake fan at the front or an exhaust fan at the back? I assume by outlet you mean exhaust, but if so, where exactly on the chassis is it located, and in particular with reference to the CPU?

2) When you add an 80 mm fan to the case, I a assuming also that this is an exhaust fan, correct?

3) Using http://www.extreme.outervision.com/PSUEngine and taking the basic calculator at face value, and adding a single SATA drive takes the power consumption from 38 W to 59 W - jsut a single HD. In addition, you'll be using a lot more energy throughout the system, including the North bridge, CPU, RAM, and all of them will definitely get hot.

4) Your values do, indeed look high - but your CPU type and exact motherboard specifications would be very helpful in determining these temperatures, especially if the BIOS is actually reporting temps in degrees C as opposed to degrees F (which, although it *says* C, might actually be F - in which case you are good to go).

5) Your video card running at 67 degrees C is also suspect.

Taking all of these factors together, I *highly* suspect that your intake vents are clogged, and thus air is simply not getting inside your system.

have you tried running the system without the door present? I have a very very old case that I have recycled through 3 builds - (what can I say, I like the case) and with my hot Prescott CPU I found it was running hot in there a lot - HDs, CPU and North bridge especially. So, I started testing, but every time I tested I left the door off and the temps were not nearly as high.

One day it finally occurred to me to test with door on versus door off - and now, using the same Tuniq Tower 120 CPU cooler my CPU temp rarely rises above 37C at full load.

Thanks for the reply.

The computer is a 'Gateway FX7024'.
The motherboard is DG33TL Intel G33 microATX
Processor is Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600
Video card is NVIDIA 8800GT512mb
3gb DDR2
Vista home premium

The factory cooling solutuon is like this:

1. Main air intake is the left side of the case...almost 1/2 of the side is a huge grid of vent holes.

2. CPU heat sink has an 80mm fan on it that changes speed with temp.

3. 80mm fan at back right next to and slightly below the cpu. This only runs at like 600 rpm most of the time and hardly seems to do anything

4. Power supply is at the top/back of the case right next to the exhaust and cpu fans...so the power supply fan forms a 1/2 cube with the other 2 fans such as (facing motherboard): power supply top, cpu back, exhaust left.

5. ICH and MCH both have heat sinks on them

That's it for the factory cooling. There is almost no front ventilation since there is a color panel snapped on there. Since the case is designed to pull air in from the side what I did was take off the front color panel and mount an 80mm fan blowing air out the front. I realize that this goes against conventional wisdom, but I figured it would blow out the hot air from the video card while maintaining the air flow into the side of the case. This does have a positive effect on temperatures versus the factory solution as you can see in my first post.

The problem with this is that it is loud and tends to make the hard drive cage warm as hot air is pulled past it. Also since the stock exhaust fan at rear does not spin very fast most of the time, this makes the front bottom of the case the main exhaust.

I suspect the factory design tends to just pull air in the side and right out the back again without providing enough air flow over areas like the ICH and MCH. Adding the fan to the front improves this aspect I suspect...but again has downsides.

The video card did indeed idle in Windows at 67c and would reach 83c in Crysis. Knowing what I do now about the temperatures in this system I'm surprised it survived a few hours of that game at all.

Using riva tuner I set the gpu fan to run at 60% all the time and higher as the temperature passes certain thresholds. This keeps the idle temp at 52c and max load temp around 73c.

I bought this computer since the price was cheaper than I could find the components for but it is becoming a nightmare.

I have read the technical documents on Intel's site for my motherboard and it lists the max ICH and MCH temps at 92c and 97c respectively. Since I am in the 80's with stock cooling just sitting in the BIOS I assume these temps rise even higher in windows and, shudder, when gaming.

Make sure that your fan configuration isn't causing air flow short-circuiting. See for example:

http://www.heatsink-guide.com/case.shtml

I'm not sure. I have the fans set up like the bottom left 'wrong' example, but since the side of the case is the main air intake I don't think it matters...since each fan pulls in its own air from this location.

The problem with the factory cooling solution is that there is no airflow over the ICH and MCH. Adding the fan to the front as I did corrects this and lowers temperatures in those areas. The hard drive cage gets warmer though as the hot air is pulled past it. Plus the improvement is relative since the temps are still around 70c.

Try increasing the chassis fan speed. You mentioned that it runs @ 600 rpm; the spec says it can run @ 2450 rpm.

Yeah, I have tried that. The 600rpm that I was referring to was the way the fan ran from the factory. What I did was unplug that fan from the motherboard and use one of those converters to plug it into the power supply. Doing this does not have that much of an effect on temperature though...I suspect since air just comes in the side of the case and right back out again -never flowing over the MCH/ICH.

I am really unhappy with this whole situation. It seems crazy to me that this system is sold this way...within 7c of critical ICH temp (15c MCH) out of the box...idle! I am almost positive it must have gone over that limit, I mean...I played Crysis before I knew what was going on.

I have tried just running the system with the side open and a big fan pointed in there, and that obviously works well. I may just stick to that.

I have a similar set up from Gateway; g33 board with the 2.4ghz quad processor, mid-atx case. It seems that these boards just weren't made to handle anything more that 2gb of ram (even 4gb ddr2 667 was too much to handle). The one thing that I have done that had the most signifigant impact was to replace the thermal paste on the ich heatsink. You wouldn't believe how much they had not only on the core itself, but the entire surrounding chip. With 2gb ddr2 667 I was able to lower the idle temp from +-72C to +-57C. All in all this seems to be a design flaw with the particular chipset. I'm contemplating picking up an active sink like I added to my nVidia 8500gt. This also came stock over heating. I was able to find an efficient active sink from vantec for less than $15. Pretty soon every component on my board will have it's own fan! :>