Re: Will SETI@home roast my CPU?


"Phil H" <google@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

When any PC (or laptop) is switched on and working the energy and heat
dissipation by the CPU is not affected by applications. The CPU is
continuosly running the operating system when it is not executing
application code. The activity of the CPU at a physical level is the
same either way.

Total bull***. If you have a temperature sensor on your CPU, you can
see the effect of CPU utilization, which is driven by application usage.
My Mac Mini normally has a CPU diode temperature of 38°C when
just running normal apps. However, when I start-up SETI@home,
the CPU temperature very quickly skyrockets to 95°C.
That happens even on old computers, too. My PII 400 doesn't
have a sensor, but I can see from using a plug-in power meter
that it consumes an extra 19 W when running SETI@home.
That's an extra 19 watts of heat that the CPU has to deal with.
If the CPU fan stopped working, it would quickly overheat and
shut down.



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