Is there somthing wrong here with this new CPU?

[attachment removed] I just recently had the opportunity to buy this AMD 2.7GHz AthlonX2 CPU from a friend of mine who pulled it from a 'Shuttle' that he had used for Power Point presentations, so he could sell the Shuttle "bare bones" as he originally bought it. It only cost me $40 and it was a nice little upgrade for me from my 2.4MHz ADM64 Duel core to 2.7MHz ADM64 duel core. The guy is a close friend and has given me a 'money back' offer if I find anything wrong with the CPU. I'm worried about the big differences in the core1 and core 2 temps as shown in the PC Wizard photo attachment (at idle). Is there something wrong or possibly damaged with core 2 as it's temp is so much lower than core 1 ? I did a proper instillation job installing the CPU (not my first) and used Arctic Silver No.5 paste. I have put in AMD duel-core optimizer software for both W7 and XP (separate versions). I can't see how the cores are very optimized ! The temp. problem if there is one, is the same on both XP and W7. Cheers, Lee

Hi Lee
Sounds pretty "cool" to me in all senses of the word.
With some of the AMD chips temp differentials can be wider than normally expected.
More info from here:
http://www.overclockers.com/measuring-cpu-dual-core-temps/
Regards
paws

It may look like a big difference but it is not alarming to me. Just looking at my quad core i7, I see Core 1 - 51°C Core 2 - 44°C Core 3 - 43°C Core 4 - 43°C Looking at my other system, Core 1 is higher by a similar amount on all. I suspect that is because not all code is coded to use multi-core CPUs and so my guess is the first core is always busier, even at so called "idle". I say "so called" because there really is no such thing. If you the user are idle, Windows sees that as a time to start doing housekeeping chores in the background.

Thanks guys for the info. My low reading for core 2 seems to be more about 'idle' temp. differences only. Core 1 is doing most of the work at idle it seems. Probably the way the AMD Athlons were designed to work. I put a game on for 15min. and core2 quickly kicked in. The temps. evened out within a few minutes and there was only 1C or 2C difference between both cores over several readings taken. it looks like I bought a keeper Cheers, Lee

Probably the way the AMD Athlons were designed to work.

Nope. CPUs are stupid. They don't know how to do anything and always have to be told what to do next. And that is done by the OS in concert with the chipset, and the running program.

Thanks for that clarification Digerati. So it's the mainboard and chipset that control CPU behavior. Another byte of PC knowledge for me to lock in. "Correct is best"