On 22 Mar 2001, at 8:07, Jukka Marin wrote:

> Athlons are said to run hot and it seems to be more than just a
> rumour..

Hi,

you could also check the AMD (or intel) homepage for the allowed 
temps for specific cpus. They are not easy to find. From what I can 
tell a Athlon CE 700 will run as hot as a celeron 500 in the same 
case. 

Running a distributed.net client a celeron 500 "boxed" with Intels 
heatsink/fan/thermalcompound the Celeron500 will have more than 
60-70C, removing the thermal compound will result in about 5-7C 
less and using a USD 5,-- thermal paste will reduce another 7-10C 
resulting in about 50-60C. Using an "overclocker" heatsink/fan 
(Alpha) combo without thermal compound gives 45C, with thermal 
paste only 35-40C. The Intel spec for this CPU is about 70-90C (!).

I have not seen Athlons with bundled heatsinks, warned from the 
reports I got an "overclocker" heatsink/fan combo (global win) by 
default and a good thermal paste allowing the Athlon CE 700 
running at about 30-40C and at 900MHz. at under 60C. (I tested the 
maximum stable speed then, of course it runs at 700 now).

If you are concerned about the temps, be shure to examine your 
case. Most mobos have the CPU  at a place, where they have the 
AGP card at the left, the backside of the case behind and the side 
of the PS on the right, so that there is almost no air flow. Ventilation 
openings or output fans in the case behind the CPU are rare, but 
having and using them (or making them) can give a CPU temp drop 
of more than 10C! 

Tom