Is this too hot?

[Zachary Cartwright]

Im very new to overclocking but I have found it very easy but i have a question... I have an AMD FX 4300 that i have been overclocking to see where it runs best and i did something crazy and shot it to 5ghz! I'm using MX-4 thermal paste and a ThermalTake Contac Silent 12 cooler and my temps at idle are about 50 to 55 celsius... is that too hot at idle? or is that ok because it should throttle itself down if it does get too hot right? Any input is welcome and i have no money for better paste or fans right now just an fyi.

[BubblyCharizard]

what is it at load? thats all that really matters idle temps are not always indicative of the true thermal situation

[wONKEyeYEs]

55C won't hurt your CPU but it seems a little high for idle.

You don't want to get hot enough to activate throttling.

Here is a list of standard CPU temps...

http://www.buildcomputers.net/cpu-temperature.html

[Zachary Cartwright]

I just ran a cinebench and at 100% load it hit 75-76C max temps

[Samsterstorm]

55 is fine idle, FX chips dont have a onboard temprature sensor they use an algorithm to work out temprature! The load tempratures seem good which is when the algorithm is most accurate, 5GHZ for one of those chips is not bad, if u give them enough voltage u can get 5.2 out of one under water! Well at least I used to

[Guest]

Your idle temps are fine, if you overclock your CPU to the point where the temps are too high and frantically unstable, the system will either shutdown or downclock itself to reduce the temps to something more stable, your CPU will also thermal throttle. You could push it higher, if you had some sort of adequate AIO liquid cooling, you could push it to 5.2GHz with the right voltage applied.

44 minutes ago, Zachary Cartwright said:

I just ran a cinebench and at 100% load it hit 75-76C max temps

80C is the sweetspot in terms of temps, 90C is the max temp I wouldnt go past and anything exceeding that temp is potentially unstable.

[Zachary Cartwright]

10 hours ago, TheBeastPC said:

Your idle temps are fine, if you overclock your CPU to the point where the temps are too high and frantically unstable, the system will either shutdown or downclock itself to reduce the temps to something more stable, your CPU will also thermal throttle. You could push it higher, if you had some sort of adequate AIO liquid cooling, you could push it to 5.2GHz with the right voltage applied.

80C is the sweetspot in terms of temps, 90C is the max temp I wouldnt go past and anything exceeding that temp is potentially unstable.

alright thanks!