Processor overheats in OCCT test. Z170 Pro Gaming, 6700 stock HSF, 3000 MHz DDR4

[THX1139]

I recently got a new motherboard/CPU/RAM and when running the OCCT CPU test, the CPU overheats and the test aborts about 20 mins in with temperature ~94 °C (201 °F). I bought the combination together, preassembled, figuring they'd go well together since that's what was promised on the vendor's website. The two main points of interest are a) it has a stock HSF and b) the memory is 3000 MHz so I think that might have overclocked the processor?

Is this okay? Should I try to counter the CPU overclock somehow? Should the CPU really have had a better cooler to work with this RAM? What will happen in the future when my CPU usage is high for an extended period (e.g. transcoding/rendering video)? Why didn't the CPU throttle itself to prevent reaching 94 °C?

OS: Win 10 Pro 64-bit
Mainboard: ASUS Z170 Pro Gaming
CPU: Intel i7 6700 (6th gen)
RAM: Corsair 2x8GB DDR4-3000
Graphics: Gigabyte NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950
Sys Drive: Samsung Evo 750 SSD, 250 GB
Data Drives: OCZ Vertex 2 SSD, 60 GB; WDC WD1002FAEX-00Y9A0, ~1 TB; WDC WD2003FZEX-00Z4SA0, ~2 TB; WDC WD2002FAEX-00MJRA0, ~2 TB; RAID 0, ~300 GB [Maxtor 6B160MO x 2]
PSU: XFX TS 750W (P1-750S-NLB9)
Bluetooth: Parani UD100 Bluetooth USB Adapter
Logitech G500 mouse, K120 keyboard.

[Nate152]

Hi THX1139

It would be good to invest in a good cpu cooler but in the meantime you can lower the voltage, on auto voltage your cpu is getting over volted.

On the extreme tweaker tab set the cpu core/cache voltage to adaptive mode then enter in 1.20v in the "Additional Turbo mode cpu core voltage", run the test and see how much voltage the cpu is drawing, however much it's going over 1.20v set that as a negative offset.

For example if your cpu is drawing 1.240v during the test use a negative offset of -0.040v, this should keep the voltage close to 1.20v which should dramatically reduce your cpu temps.

In the DiGi+ secction of the bios set LLC to level 4.

[THX1139]

Thanks for replying, everyone.

Nate152 wrote:
Hi THX1139
On the extreme tweaker tab set the cpu core/cache voltage to adaptive mode then enter in 1.20v in the "Additional Turbo mode cpu core voltage", run the test and see how much voltage the cpu is drawing, however much it's going over 1.20v set that as a negative offset.

For example if your cpu is drawing 1.240v during the test use a negative offset of -0.040v, this should keep the voltage close to 1.20v which should dramatically reduce your cpu temps.

In the DiGi+ secction of the bios set LLC to level 4.

There are only Auto, Manual and Offset options for CPU core/cache voltage. Can adaptive be enabled?

[Chino]

If you use your PC for extended periods of time, it would be wise to buy an aftermarket heatsink. The stock heatsink sucks.

[w4tch0]

Manually lowering the cpu core voltage is a good start. These motherboards tend to overvolt on auto quite a bit. Setting a more agresive fan profile in UEFI BIOS might also help. It's definitely a good idea to get a good aftermarket cooler, though. Does not have to be a super expensive highend cooler. Even a cheaper one like Cooler Master Hyper 212+ will do a lot better than the stock one, cooler and quieter.

That being said, while the stock CPU cooler is rather weak, it should be enough for normal day to day usage. Just avoid running stress tests like OCT or Prime while on the stock cooler, they are designed to load and stress the CPU far beyond what normal usage would do.

[Nate152]

Apparently the i7-6700 doesn't support adaptive mode, try using the offset to get the voltage to 1.20v.

You may be able to get a little lower than 1.20v, you'll just have to keep lowering the voltage with the offset until it becomes unstable then bring the voltage back up .01v.

For the offset use increments of .01v, -0.010v, -0.020v, -0.030v etc.....

Let us know what you end up with.

[THX1139]

Nate152 wrote:
Apparently the i7-6700 doesn't support adaptive mode, try using the offset to get the voltage to 1.20v.

You may be able to get a little lower than 1.20v, you'll just have to keep lowering the voltage with the offset until it becomes unstable then bring the voltage back up .01v.

For the offset use increments of .01v, -0.010v, -0.020v, -0.030v etc.....

Let us know what you end up with.

When I entered the BIOS and switched to Offset, the value set was 1.296 V so I set offset -0.10 V and got 1.196 V. During OCCT testing, the value increased to 1.248 V and did not come back down when testing stopped. The CPU did not overheat in any case. I will increase the offset to -0.15 V to bring 1.248 V to ~1.2 V. Edit: the voltage was 1.072 at its lowest when idle but has increased again to 1.248 during stress testing. The LLC is set to Level 4. According to ASUS AI Suite 3, the temperature hovers between 71 and 75 °C, which while hot is not so hot as to trigger shutdown of the test. I'm not sure there's any point increasing the offset since the final voltage is ending up at 1.248 V at load for offset -0.1 and -0.15 V?

Incidentally, the OCCT interface seems to freeze at the beginning of the test and only updates when I stop the test but the test processes are using up the CPU in Task Manager so I figure the test is running fine.