a bit unrelated but try btop instead of htop, it has realtime rmon updates including temps, network, processes, memory and disks.
this post was submitted on 09 Mar 2025
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When I htop, I don’t see anything to hint me to what is causing the heating.
Bad cooling. If nothing presents itself as the obvious answer, then you have to go with what's left.
Check your thermal paste. Is your cooler seated properly? Do you have sufficient/unrestricted air flow if you have air heating. If you have liquid cooling, do you have enough fluid to make a loop?
This is my project tomorrow. CPU temps have been much higher than normal, so new thermal paste should hopefully do the trick
I've repaired thousands of computers over the past 30 years. It's really not that rare to see cooler brackets find ways to loosen themselves over time. I highly suspect if this is a new thing, just un-seat your CPU cooler, reapply thermal paste, and then properly re-seat your cooler again, and you'll most likely be fine.
Also, i know it sounds stupid, but check it anyway....have you removed the plastic cover (if there is one ) on the cpu cooler side.
I built this rig ages ago, so definitely not that. I probably didn't use enough when I upgraded my CPU last year so redoing it should fix it up
fair enough
As others have said without hardware info you will not solve this.
List your CPU, motherboard, cooling type, and if possible pictures of the case and location.
The CPU will never run cooler than it's environment so if the room or case is hot so is the CPU.
What’s your utilization? On how many cores?
Starting blind, I’d start with cleaning the case, fans and heat sinks with compressed air (canned is fine, do it outside). Dust builds up, and prevents proper cooling. DO NOT LET THE FANS SPIN WHILE CLEANING THEM, the reverse current will damage your system.
Check for any failed fans.
After that, changing the thermal paste might help depending on how well or how long ago it was applied originally. Paste is cheap so no need to be stingy. Generally lasts about 5 years before beginning to degrade.
The backflow current from fans is extremely minuscule and extremely unlikely to damage anything from that. There are even tests using a damn leaf blower on the fans and it barely generated any current. Even if it did generate a backflow, diodes on the mobo should prevent it from becoming an issue unless it's a power so great that it just fries everything, but that's basically impossible with a fan.
Here's one such experiment.
Yeah. You're more likely to physically damage it by hitting the little plastic blades with too much force at the wrong angle.
You are looking at the software, but how’s the hardware?
How old is the server? Could the thermal paste be old and dried up? Is the cooling fan working?
A CPU with bad cooling can still run, up to a threshold and then it will throttle itself to avoid going over, but since the cooling sucks just being on will keep it there.