Just thought I'd ask...

[orangecat]

What or how does a processor become unstable? Why is it when the voltage isn't high enough for a given clock speed it makes mathematical errors? I know that mathematical error cause glitches in software code and can even cause a entire system to crash but i just got to thinking about it and thought maybe someone on the forum knows the answer to this.

[Maskot]

Not enough voltage = the CPU is given a problem but doesn't have the power to execute it

Unstable = the CPU runs a muck when doing tasks and sometimes stays on and sometimes overheats and sometimes fails

[T.Vengeance]

I'm guessing it's because each calculation needs a certain amount of power. The more calculations you do, the more power you need.

[orangecat]

Not enough voltage = the CPU is given a problem but doesn't have the power to execute it

Unstable = the CPU runs a muck when doing tasks and sometimes stays on and sometimes overheats and sometimes fails

But what is the more technical reason for a error occurring? I think everyone knows what happened when the error occured but i dont think anyone knows why exactly the error was present.

[Wulfgar]

There is error checking within a CPU to halt itself when it starts to become unstable. Overheating will trip the built-in thermal protection, causing it to shut itself down. Over time, the transistors within the CPU degrade and can become more unstable/susceptible to overheating. That's about as complicated as I'm willing to get, CPU engineering is vastly complicated and you would need a lot of engineering knowledge behind you to understand the more technical details of it.