Question CPU temp is abnormally high during gaming ?

Ajhellout

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Aug 17, 2015
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Hi friends,

System specs
Mobo: AsRock B450M
CPU: Ryzen 5 3600 OC'ed to 4200
GPU: Asus RTX 2060 12GB OC'ed via GPU Tweak 3
RAM: DDR4 16GB running at 3200Mhz


The issue

Like I mentioned in the title the CPU temps are high to an extreme
I have had this system since 3 years now... so I have played all sort of games on it. bot demanding and not so demanding ones, and CPU temps never exceeded 70 degrees.

Now I know some would say the CPU is bottlenecking or GPU is old. But you know when you own a car or a bike and you know something is not right because you drive it daily. but you cant explain it to people. People would be like everything seems alright but you know its not.

Like for instance, games like GTA 5, RDR 2, Uncharted Lost Legacy or Thief's end etc which used to run butter smooth with temp never exceeding 70°c...and usage never above 60% but now all of a sudden when i play those (installed them again to test) the CPU temp exceeds 100°c and usage are always above 70% sometimes reaching more than 80%. That's scary and after a while PC shuts down and restarts.

Note: In the past, GPU usage would always be 95% and above while CPU usage be under 60%.... thus keeping the temp below 70°c. But now the GPU Usage never exceeds 70% while CPU Usage has shot above 70% and that leads to Temp more than 100°c.

I have attached few Screenshots of Last Of Us 2 Remastered which I installed today. and you can see the temp. Also I would like to bring to your notice that this also had the same issue where the GPU Usage was low but CPU usage was 90% and above until I bumped the graphics settings to high which did Increase the GPU usage to 100% which I am used to but no difference to CPU temp and usage issue.

FYI - CPU at Idle throttles between 53-62°c (HWInfo)

Images
 
Last edited:
System specs
Mobo: AsRock B450M
CPU: Ryzen 5 3600 OC'ed to 4200
GPU: Asus RTX 2060 12GB OC'ed via GPU Tweak 3
RAM: DDR4 16GB running at 3200Mhz

+

FYI - CPU at Idle throttles between 53-62 Degrees (HWInfo)
When posting a thread of troubleshooting nature, it's customary to include your full system's specs. Please list the specs to your build like so:
CPU:
CPU cooler:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:
OS:
Monitor:
include the age of the PSU apart from it's make and model. BIOS version for your motherboard at this moment of time. Please be specific on the make and models of the parts(not a DxDiag readout) as I feel you didn't state the model for your motherboard properly.

used to run butter smooth with temp never exceeding 70%
You mean 70 Deg C? Have you tried reapplying the thermal paste for your CPU? Ambient room air temps?
 
This is my system spec
Ryzen 5 3600 OC'ed to 4200
Asus RTX 2060 12GB OC'ed via GPU Tweak 3
RAM DDR4 16GB running at 3200Mhz
MOBO AsRock B450M

+
FYI - CPU at Idle throttles between 53-62 Degrees (HWInfo)
When posting a thread of troubleshooting nature, it's customary to include your full system's specs. Please list the specs to your build like so:
CPU:
CPU cooler:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:
OS:
Monitor:
include the age of the PSU apart from it's make and model. BIOS version for your motherboard at this moment of time. Please be specific on the make and models of the parts(not a DxDiag readout) as I feel you didn't state the model for your motherboard properly.

used to run butter smooth with temp never exceeding 70%
You mean 70 Deg C? Have you tried reapplying the thermal paste for your CPU? Ambient room air temps?
My bad ive fixed the initial post with correct details... ill soon reply with details that you asked for. Yes reapplied thermal paste and cleaned the entire pc this morning. And room temp would be around 24°c as AC is always on while i am playing. If not ... India is a hot humid country.. as of now room temp would be around 30°c compared to outside temp of 37°c...

I dont know the exact model for cpu cooler but i guess its a Cooler Master 221 Evo.
 
Since your system ran smooth and now changed a question would be are you using an AIO water cooling system and it possible that the pump is failing? Tell us about what type of cooler you're using.
Cooler Mater 221 Evo... m not sure of exact model but yeah it's of the same series. And its old... 5 years old. Ive got the AMD stock cooler which i never used.. ill try to replace it tomorrow. Will see if there is any difference.
 
I don't think the 221 Evo exists. Did you mean the Hyper 212 Evo? This is an air cooler so if the fans are still spinning normally then it's working. However, you should make sure the heatsink is clean. Remove any dust with an air blower. You could also try to play some games with the case open, just to make sure it's not an airflow issue.
 
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I don't think the 221 Evo exists. Did you mean the Hyper 212 Evo? This is an air cooler so if the fans are still spinning normally then it's working. However, you should make sure the heatsink is clean. Remove any dust with an air blower. You could also try to play some games with the case open, just to make sure it's not an airflow issue.
Yes that's the one, Tried all that. Still same. Ill try changing the CPU cooling fan.
 
This is my system spec
Ryzen 5 3600 OC'ed to 4200
Asus RTX 2060 12GB OC'ed via GPU Tweak 3
RAM DDR4 16GB running at 3200Mhz
MOBO AsRock B450M

+
FYI - CPU at Idle throttles between 53-62 Degrees (HWInfo)
When posting a thread of troubleshooting nature, it's customary to include your full system's specs. Please list the specs to your build like so:
CPU:
CPU cooler:
Motherboard:
Ram:
SSD/HDD:
GPU:
PSU:
Chassis:
OS:
Monitor:
include the age of the PSU apart from it's make and model. BIOS version for your motherboard at this moment of time. Please be specific on the make and models of the parts(not a DxDiag readout) as I feel you didn't state the model for your motherboard properly.

used to run butter smooth with temp never exceeding 70%
You mean 70 Deg C? Have you tried reapplying the thermal paste for your CPU? Ambient room air temps?
CPU: Ryzen 5 3600

CPU cooler: Hyper 212 Evo

GPU: Asus Dual GeForce RTX 2060 EVO OC Edition 12GB GDDR6 192-bit

Motherboard: ASRock B450M-HDV R4.0 (Nuvoton NCT6793D)

BIOS: American Megatrends P3.90 AMD Agesa COMBO AM4 1.0.0.6

Ram: Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 3200Mhz 8GB x 2

SSD/HDD:
Windows Installed On: Kingston NV1 500GB M.2 NVMe Internal SSD
Games Installed on: WD HDD 1Tb (WDC WD10SDRW-11A0XS0 (WD-WXD2A919LD81))

PSU: GIGABYTE GP-P550B 80 Plus Bronze Power Supply

Chassis: Ant Esports ICE-130AG RGB (ATX) Mid Tower Cabinet

OS: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro Build 19044

Monitor: Samsung IPS 24inch 1920 X 1080 60hz
 
If you manually set every cpu, gpu and case fan to 100 percent maximum what happens then?
I don't know if its solution or not... but i was fiddling a bit with my bios. When i saw the Overclock tab. I simply undervolt my Processor. Before it was 4.2Mhz on 1.2V.... i reduced the voltage to 1.5V. played the game ... and pc got shutdown. Again went to bios and changed it to 1.6V. Kept doing this.. until I found the sweet spot of 1.8V. And now the max temp that the CPU reaches while playing graphics intensive parts of the game is 83°c. Which is acceptable for me. So i guess... it was just the ambient temperature affecting the CPU temp and load. Had to reduce that. ..... i dont know if its a permanent fix or temporary. But its working as i intended as of now.
 
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I don't know if its solution or not... but i was fiddling a bit with my bios. When i saw the Overclock tab. I simply undervolt my Processor. Before it was 4.2Mhz on 1.2V.... i reduced the voltage to 1.5V. played the game ... and pc got shutdown. Again went to bios and changed it to 1.6V. Kept doing this.. until I found the sweet spot of 1.8V. And now the max temp that the CPU reaches while playing graphics intensive parts of the game is 83°c. Which is acceptable for me. So i guess... it was just the ambient temperature affecting the CPU temp and load. Had to reduce that. ..... i dont know if its a permanent fix or temporary. But its working as i intended as of now.


FYI: 1.5v is greater than 1.2v.

I hope you're not actually pumping 1.8v into your CPU.

Reset BIOS to default settings.

Remove cooler entirely. Clean old paste from heatsink and CPU. Apply fresh thermal paste and mount cooler to CPU.
 
According to CPU World, the maximum temperature for the Ryzen 3600 is +95°C, the same as my 7950X. This is the normal maximum designed operating temperature. It is not dangerously high.
https://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Zen/AMD-Ryzen 5 3600.html

Electrical / Thermal parameters
Maximum operating temperature ? 95°C

When I'm running a video render, all cores on my 7950X hover around +89°C to +93°C, whilst it dissipates up to 190W. The RTX3060 GPU sits at roughly +80°C and generates a constant 170W. The system runs fine at these temperatures for 24 hours + without a break. The air cooler is a Noctua NH-D15, but a Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120SE would be equally good.

Modern CPUs are designed to run hot (AMD up to 89/90/95°C, Intel up to 100°C). When the Silicon die reaches the maximum permitted temperature, thermal throttling commences, to prevent further temperature increases. The computer should not crash when throttling at stock BIOS settings.

I am not overclocking my 7950X, i.e. no PBO and no XMP. I need long term stability, not a few hundred extra MHz and occasional crashes. Some rendering apps do not benefit much from fast XMP.

I am concerned your "ad hoc" voltage adjustments could lead to the early death of your CPU. For some years, Intel and AMD have tweaked their CPUs to boost really hard "out of the box", without the need for manual overclocking.

With a manual CPU voltage increase, you might get a slightly faster maximum all-core frequency, but this will prevent automatic boosting to even higher single/twin core frequencies.

As others have suggested, it might be a good idea to return your BIOS to stock settings and check your cooler's performance and TIM again.

Try a few gaming benchmarks and note down the FPS or completion times. Compare when overclocked and at stock settings. There might not be a significant difference.

As for the Hyper 212 with a single fan (if that's what you've got) I consider this only a mid-range cooler. When I want to reduce temperatures further, I fit a large twin-tower dual-fan air cooler. A 360 or 420mm AIO would be even better.

If you can get something similar to the Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120SE or Peerless Assassin 120SE in India, consider a cooler upgrade. Take care though, these coolers are quite big and may not fit in a small case.
https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/thermalright-phantom-spirit-120-review