Bitcoin Forum

It would be nice if the next version of Bitcoin had the ability to monitor the temperature of computer components and automatically reduce the number of threads generating bitcoins whenever the temperature reaches dangerous levels. Or even just a scheduler to turn bitcoin generation off during the hot of the day would be great. I recently moved my computer into a closet of a spare bedroom that doesn't get air conditioning and I'm a little worried about the temperature. Perhaps I'll just turn off bitcoin generation until the weather starts to cool down.

You could do that in linux using a small script and lm-sensors.

Unfortunately I don't think I have a CPU temperature censor, or if I do, I can't manage to enable it, but I do have GPU as well as internal and external hard drive temperature censors. I wouldn't know where to begin and I'm not really interested in figuring out how to write a script that keeps the CPU at a good temperature by monitoring the temperature of the other devices and then changing how many cores are being used by Bitcoin. I haven't checked the BIOS yet. I suppose it could just be disabled, but I don't know why it would be.

You could try to clean up your computer and but some thermal paste on the cooler. Arctic Silver 5 is a must. Careful no to put too much and to even it with a razor or so.
Bitcoin is an intensive-processor app, so it does heat up your CPU, but shouldn't be very high. In my case, 65 degrees Celsius are reported by a quadcore CPU even in the hot days.

Scheduling should be easy; on Linux, just run a couple of 'at' jobs that either talk to Bitcoin via bitcoind command-line arguments or use curl to turn on/off coin generation.

Windows and Mac have similar, built-in abilities to schedule commands.

I think less time, effort, and attention should be paid to coin generation, and more to making bitcoin as easy to use as possible for trading.

I don't think you can realistically make a program control the CPU temperature - it's just too indirect and you'd just create a weird oscillation at best, at worst it just wouldn't work at all.  The fan speed, duty cycle and target temp are options that can be set in the BIOS of enthusiast level motherboards usually, not in regular OEM computers though.  Most motherboards, even OEM stuff, have some support for 'smart' fan control where they spin it up faster when the temp rises.. you could try to disable that so it's always 100% but if it's still not reaching the target temperature then the only thing you can do is install a better cooler and improve the air flow in the case.

Intel CPUs made since the Pentium 4 have the ability to stop the clock in response to overheat conditions.  Pentium 3 had a similar ability but it just locked up hard and never restarted.  The current Intel CPUs oscillate the clock so what ends up happening is your CPU is about as fast as 486 from 15 years ago but it doesn't melt.  This 'feature' ends up being used on pretty much any laptop because they have such poor cooling.

If the thermal protection is kicking in, it's only to save the CPU from melting and it means that the CPU can't work so you're losing a TON of performance in your bitcoin generation.  On Linux there is a kernel compile option to monitor these interrupts and print a message, so you can tell if it's happening.. but in general if your CPU is getting over 70C you probably have this problem.

I personally would not recommend using a laptop for bitcoin or anything like that..

I got my processor temperature sensor working. It's HOT! :o

In my 3 year old laptop, I run it on 1 out of 2 CPU cores because otherwise it will overheat. Still good for 300 khash/sec :P

61C CPU / 38C Mobo here with all 4 cores being used.