Originally Posted by
MaxxxRacer
Final Notes About Your New System
This section is to address one point that seems to escape most users and has been a point of much frustration: onboard temperature sensors.
When many people upgrade to watercooling, the first thing they do is run to smartgaurdian, MBM5, or whatever temperature monitoring software they use, and see if their temps improved compared to their previous air cooling setup. While I can’t stop you from doing this, I can inform you about those so-called temperature sensors. Plain and simple, they are useless. They can be up to 10C off and are NEVER accurate. Yes, I said never. So please do not rely on the onboard sensors for CPU temperature readings. Furthermore, many CPU temperature diodes are affected by air movement around the CPU. The more air movement (ala: Thermaltake TT w/ 220CFM delta fan) the lower the reported CPU temperature, regardless of what the actual CPU temperature is.
At this point you are probably wondering what is causing the inaccurate readings. Your first guess is the software. Dam those software engineers. WRONG.. Your next thought goes to the CPU manufacturer.. Your getting warmer, but Intel/AMD are only part of the problem. Yes, you guessed right now. It’s the motherboard manufacturer. That is indeed correct. Motherboard manufacturers use IC's (integrated circuits) from various companies, to monitor temperature and voltage. Depending on which IC they use, it may have absolutely horrid accuracy, or high accuracy. However, there is another factor. While a particular IC may be of high quality and have the capability to display highly accurate voltages, the IC temps/voltages still MUST be calibrated. This is where the system starts to crumble. To my knowledge there has never been an accurate temp/voltage reading ever reported from a motherboard. This is because the motherboard manufacturers simply will NOT take the time to calibrate the IC's they use with a known standard.
So the next time you look at your temperature monitoring software, please remember what I have said, and all but disregard the useless numbers it reports to you.