Is my cpu burning up creating a smell?

technarch · Post by **technarch** » Wed Jun 29, 2005 9:09 pm

Ok here's the situation.. increasingly, I'm finding the room full of a 'electronics' smell. Not burning, just a 'hot equipment' smell, mildly fumey Problem is, the smell bothers me.

There's only 2 possible things it could be, the CPU which is a Palomino XP 1700 using Arctic Silver 5 (does this compound smell?) and the power supply.. I really doubt it's the hard drive.

Thing is, I'm not so sure it's the power supply despite the fact that it runs a little warm because the smell/heat seems stronger UNDERNEATH the supply rather than outside or around it.

Speedfan says the CPU is at 51 C right now with the case open, but if I touch the heatsink, the heatsink is hot and noticably radiating heat.

I'm thinking the smell might actually be cooking plastics.

Anyways, what do you guys think the hot electronics smell might be?

qviri · Post by **qviri** » Wed Jun 29, 2005 10:34 pm

51^C at idle isn't all that great, especially since this is a desktop chip. Additionally, you'd better hope this is the core temperature and not the socket temperature, which some motherboards (*cough* mine *cough*) report. I was told the core is usually about 10^C warmer than the socket.

Having said that, desktop XPs are ranked at 85^C IIRC, so yours shouldn't really be cooking yet.

FWIW, my XP-M 1900+ is running pretty much idle at 44^C socket temperature. Stock, smallish heatsink and 7V stock fan. No burning smell to speak about.

I burned a power supply once, and it was giving off that "hot electronics" smell right before. This was right before breakdown though, and seeing as yours continues to work I'm not sure what might be behind that smell. One thing I can think of is to take the PSU cover off* and see if the location and/or intensity of the smell changed and how.

* (voids the warranty, but I doubt you still have warranty on it if you've a Palomino chip in that machine)

(Oops, not a very helpful or informative post, but off it goes.)

nbac · Post by **nbac** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 2:28 am

I would say it's the PSU. Some smell awful some don't.
The good thing: it fades with time.

Natronomonas · Post by **Natronomonas** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 5:33 am

Last time I had an electronics smell the PSU failed about a week or two later, after various "random" lockups of my PC. When I checked the 5v line and it was running at 4.2 or something like that I began to get suspicious, and it was about a day after that it died.

I would switch off the PC and take the PSU out and have a smell - I don't think you can identify the source when it's all running etc. If it's not that, I guess you're going to have to look a bit odd and stick your head inside the case and sniff : )

Arctic silver doesn't smell in my experience, just capacitors etc. Have a look inside the PSU if you can, or at the parts on your motherboard - if any are bulging at the top or leaking, you might have found the source of your problem.

Big Pimp Daddy · Post by **Big Pimp Daddy** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 6:16 am

Last time I had an electronics smell, it was accompanied by thick grey smoke, as my (full) 300Gb hard drive went bye-bye. I guess that'll happen when you accidentally switch the +5v and gnd wires.... Whoops.

technarch · Post by **technarch** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 7:22 am

Thanks for the replies guys..

If it's the PSU I'm not having much luck then with them. Previous mb blew up so I bought an Enermax Noisetaker and couldn't use it because it smelled too much, so I RMA'ed it and got back a scuffed up one that was only marginally better. So I shelved it and bought a Phantom and it died several weeks later, then I RMA'd it and got another Phantom back which works 100% perfectly, the Phantom worked pretty well but may be producing an increased aroma now that the weather is warmer, even though I am able to rest my hands on the psu casing. I miss my old PSU.

A quick look at MBM5 says the cpu is 52C and is probably the socket (K7S8XE). A look at the voltages shows the core fluctuating between 1.77v and 1.75v, rest are 3.26v, 4.88v, 12.00v but will occassionally fluctuate. Those readings seem 'ok'.. will get different voltage readings in speedfan. (1.71v, 3.18v, 4.76v, 11.19v).

I guess I'm going to have to try the 235w ancient emergency PSU (loud) I kept around for emergencies. I'm going away for a day or two so I will turn the computer off and it'll give the thing time to dissipiate so I guess I will have to unplug everything again sigh.

alglove · Post by **alglove** » Thu Jun 30, 2005 1:01 pm

Could it be that what you smell right now is actually burning dust? For example, some dust has settled on or near your fanless power supply, and now that it is warmer, the dust actually starts cooking? Also, because the power supply is fanless, it does not move the air around like the others do.

I have noticed a similar smell on computer monitors that have been in storage for a long time. Dust that has settled inside can emit a truly foul odor when heated.

By the way, 51 degC is not a bad temperature for an Athlon XP, even if it is the socket temperature.

CX23882-19 · Post by **CX23882-19** » Fri Jul 01, 2005 4:19 am

I've had several Nexus PSUs for my machines and every one of them smelled when new. The smell goes after a week (keep windows open).

technarch · Post by **technarch** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 7:31 pm

Hi, a followup.. I've been away from my comp for a couple days, so I left the power off.. basement smells fine, so it was definitely the computer and not stuff nearby.

I still haven't had time to change the PSU to the old one, but I did turn it on today briefly. Within 1 minute of poweron I was able to start smelling the fumes.. I checked the cpu temperature with speedfan, and it said the CPU was 32 degrees C.

So I think it's safe to say at this point that while the CPU might get hot, it's not actually the CPU that is cooking.

Groan. I think I'm going to have to RMA the damn PSU. I wouldn't feel honest just selling it as-is to someone.

I think fanless PSUs probably just get too hot and start boiling capacitors or something.. I looked at a chart on a chinese website comparing PSU's and one of them was the Fortron Zen, and in one of their tests it hit 109 C. Given that water boils at 100 C, that can't be good for nearby components.

It's not a 'new' Phantom, in fact it's been in use for a couple months already now.. I think the heat however has probably triggered premature leakage of 'something' even though voltage is stable.

I'll toss in the old turbine PSU sometime this week and see if smellies continue or not. But at this point given the 32 C temp of the CPU I am 95% sure it's the PSU.. unless it's the CPU fan or the hd or something weird.

freefall · Post by **freefall** » Wed Jul 13, 2005 5:59 am

What you describe in the first post sounds exactly like roasted Athlon Thunderbird.

A reckless experiment with an inferior HS just lying on top, with a fan on top of that.
Then this smell and pc stops working permanently. No visible damage anywhere,
so I don't see how it could be anything other than the CPU.

There are small rubber thingies on the athlon, but they are on the ceramic plate,
not on the hot exposed copper area. Maybe it's silicon or ceramic burning?

Coming with a 5000 rpm fan, the damned thing probably deserved beeing toast.