Monday, September 21, 2015

cpu usage - What's more harmful to a CPU? High load or high temperature?






I wonder which case is more harmful: high percentage of usage (>90%) vs high temperature (> 70 or 80 celcius degree), both for several hours?


I only know high temperature is bad, but I am not sure about high percentage of CPU usage.


If one can choose between "higher usage and lower temperature" vs "lower usage and higher temperature", by for example scaling CPU frequency and using command cpulimit in Ubuntu, what is the recommendation for choice?


Answer



High percentage of CPU usage should not be harmful, since CPUs does not have any moving parts, that degrade after some amount of usage.


Theoretically it could, but I've yet to see a failed CPU because of high usage. (You can even safely use them 24/7/365.)


Heat is another problem which will reduce CPU life. (Another one is overclocking.) It correlates with usage and the more heat is produced, the shorter the lifetime.


But again, appropriate cooling that keeps temperatures in the „middle region” of the specification range will enable continuous usage.


In my opinion it boils down to this: if you can keep the temperature low, the percentage of the usage does not matter.


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