I would try the latest BIOS and make sure to reset the BIOS to defaults as well.

The P5K SE does predate the Q9550 a bit (though your BIOS version seems to be a compatible version), so it's possible that there are quirks. I've seen boards totally misread the temperature on a chip before. The low wattage Xeon L5240 chips that can be modded from LGA771 to 775 have a much lower (I think 20C) TjMax, which means that some monitor programs (and presumably even motherboards) can misread the temperature. It looks like your CPU should actually be reporting lower than the actual temp if the TjMax is the problem, so I'm not sure if this applies, but I'd start with a BIOS update and go from there.

Also, if you can possibly get to the backside of the motherboard while stress testing the system, I'd be curious to know if any part of it seems like it is actually running that hot. If it's hitting 55C in the BIOS with a decent cooler (make sure the base is truly flat and doesn't have a defect) and the cooler doesn't even feel warm, there's either a reporting problem or there's an issue with thermal contact inside the heatspreader (which is not good). If its a real thermal contact problem, you'll be able to feel that heat somewhere.

I see that you have taken all troubleshooting steps to no avail. This means that there might be something faulty.
1. Either the CPU - get any cheap 775 CPU and check the temperatures.
2. The motherboard - it could be faulty or not properly detecting the CPU, update BIOS and reset CMOS.
Also, when you remove the heatsink, do you see that the thermal paste is properly spred?

Freezer 7 Pro is a pretty shitty cooler, but should handle a non-OCd CPU more or less OK. I actually had one (the first revision) on a QX6700 for years, and it never overheated (until the fan stopped working properly). So check that the fan is spinning at the proper speed.

Also, I agree with the suggestions to check if there is a BIOS update. It may not read the sensors correctly. Check RealTemp after the OS is booted; it is more accurate about reading temperatures of late Core 2 models.

Idle temperatures of 50+ are perfectly normal for a Q9550 with a stock or non-monstrous cooler. Ambient temperature also plays a role.
I don't know how this cooler performs though, if it's equivalent to the stock then your temperatures are pretty normal, if it's supposed to be better that the stock then yeah, 55 seems a bit too much.

dr_st wrote:

Freezer 7 Pro is a pretty shitty cooler...

konc wrote:

Idle temperatures of 50+ are perfectly normal for a Q9550 with a stock or non-monstrous cooler...

Ding ding ding ding ding. The Freezer 7 Pro isn't even quiet for the poor cooling it provides. The Core2Quad is literally two Core2Duos glued together, the surface area wanting heatpipes often doesn't match less than premium coolers.
I always saw the Core2Quad as a bit of a desperate stopgap before native quad cores could be made at 32nm, much like the super hot consumer 8-core designs Intel recently rushed out before 10nm is ready... And the Freezer 7 is just shitty whatever way you slice it.

I guess I'm remembering using a Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme (still using on my current CPU) when I had a Q9550, so perhaps those are normal temps for a much smaller cooler with half as many heat pipes. I remember it running decently cool with a moderate overclock on a Gigabyte P45 board. Still, I was able to sell that setup for about what I paid for my i5 2500K setup, which has lasted me 8 years now... so it was a good choice. The 45nm Core 2s were great chips, but Sandy Bridge was such an incredible leap in performance and efficiency. If we had that kind of leap now, Intel would never sell them as cheaply as they did then. 😀

aaronkatrini wrote:

I see that you have taken all troubleshooting steps to no avail. This means that there might be something faulty. 1. Either the […]
Show full quote

I see that you have taken all troubleshooting steps to no avail. This means that there might be something faulty.
1. Either the CPU - get any cheap 775 CPU and check the temperatures.
2. The motherboard - it could be faulty or not properly detecting the CPU, update BIOS and reset CMOS.
Also, when you remove the heatsink, do you see that the thermal paste is properly spred?

The thermal paste has been spread out nice and thin like it should've been every time. I neglected to mention this, but when I got the motherboard, the seller said it was "working." It wouldn't even POST when I first got it, and I thought I might have damaged it somehow, and I scoured it for issues. I found one, in the CPU socket itself, the idiot had somehow managed to bend three of the pins down a little, and it sure as Hell didn't happen during shipping, because it had a Core2Duo of some kind placed in the socket to protect it during shipping. I got a very small flathead screwdriver and pried the pins up, and everything has been working fine (seemingly, at least) since. I'm not sure how he managed to bend those pins, you have to be pretty dedicated to get damage on the pins where they were (the middle of one of the rows), so he must've either carelessly put the Core2Duo into the socket to where the corner hit the pins, or some other stupid thing. I'm not sure if that would have any bearing on CPU temps at all.

The BIOS update is that last I can download from ASUS's website that will work. The newest BIOS version won't POST with the Q9550 in there, but it will POST with other processors, so I kicked the BIOS back a notch.

I really don't want to have to unmount and mount that stupid Freezer 7 Pro back on, it's a pain and those stupid little clip things seem to work on their own terms, even when I'm technically doing what I'm supposed to. Sometimes they click, sometimes they don't, and sometimes the idiotic things just fly off even when I'm putting all downward force on them, forcing me to stop, find them, and put them back on so I can continue mounting the cooler. I'd vouch that the clips on an actual Intel cooler from the time work better, and those things are absolute sin as well.

dr_st wrote:

Freezer 7 Pro is a pretty shitty cooler...

I've gathered that over my use with this thing. It had great reviews on 2008 Newegg, 5 eggs with around 1,800 reviews, but I guess my PC-building predecessors were none the wiser at that time. That's why I got it in the first place, plus it was cheap on eBay and I was strapped for money.

Ozzuneoj wrote:

I guess I'm remembering using a Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme (still using on my current CPU) when I had a Q9550, so perhaps those are normal temps for a much smaller cooler with half as many heat pipes. I remember it running decently cool with a moderate overclock on a Gigabyte P45 board. Still, I was able to sell that setup for about what I paid for my i5 2500K setup, which has lasted me 8 years now... so it was a good choice. The 45nm Core 2s were great chips, but Sandy Bridge was such an incredible leap in performance and efficiency. If we had that kind of leap now, Intel would never sell them as cheaply as they did then. 😀

I used to have an i5 2310 for my main setup in a Dell Inspiron 620 that I threw a GTX 1050Ti and a 1TB HDD in, and it did okay for what I needed it for (I used it until I upgraded to my current one, a base model Dell Inspiron 5676 with an upgraded 12GB of RAM, in August of 2018).

That's common issue for core 2 quads - some thermal sensors has tendency to "stuck" at high values. Check all thermal sensors readings, not the average.

The Serpent Rider wrote:

That's common issue for core 2 quads - some thermal sensors has tendency to "stuck" at high values. Check all thermal sensors readings, not the average.

I was using the temperature reading in the BIOS, so I had no choice. I set up a flash drive with Ubuntu 18.04 and installed hardinfo on it, and I'm getting strange results that reflect what you've said for the most part.

The two middle temperatures stay at a solid 33c, unless load has been applied, but the other two seem to like to idle at nearly 10c higher, with the top core there staying at 39-40c most of the time, and the core at the very bottom doing the same. I'm not sure what this indicates, if anything, but I'm hoping that this will give more insight as to what's going on.

Everything looks pretty normal.
As someone said earlier, it's basically two core2duos stuck together so the core temps will be paired. One pair of cores will always be hotter than the other.
Temps in the BIOS will likely be higher than expected because speedstep won't be active (to slow the CPU when idling).

Most importantly, idle temps are mostly irrelevant (as long as they're below 70/80). Worry about the temps when under load...

There is this little freeware program that shows a similar output:

https://www.ccleaner.com/speccy/download

Your temps are perfectly fine considering the hardware you're using. The AC Freezer 7 is a pretty weak cooler, so 50C idle is to be expected for a Q9550 (depending on case model and case ventilation of course). My Q9550 machine idles at 40C and tops out at 67C, and I'm using a Tuniq Tower 120 witch should perform quite a bit better then the AC Freezer 7. I'm using an Asus P5K64-WS mainboard and 4GB of DDR3, and the case is a big, old, poorly ventilated chieftec bravo full tower.

My LGA 775 XP machine runs a QX6700 @ 3.4GHz cooled by a Thermalright Le Grande Macho (huge piece of kit) and the CPU idles at 40-41C although I'm running it at stock voltage. It does tend to run a bit hotter on the motherboard I'm using (EVGA nforce 780i) but these old 775 chips are pretty hot compared to LGA115x hardware.

I've now ascertained that I should probably dump the 'ol Freezer 7. What coolers would you guys recommend to use, given the following two variables:

1) The cooler must have been available to purchase from June 10th 2008 to June 20th 2008.

2 ) The cooler would be preferred be found on 2008 newegg, as this is a newegg build (all of my parts' prices are gathered from there).

This has made it a fair bit harder to find parts, though over time I've managed to get the parts I need. A lot of the coolers from newegg at that time don't seem to exist on eBay, and when they do, they're usually ~US$100. The Arctic Freezer 7 Pro seemed great, because it had fantastic reviews from builders of the time, and it only cost around US$20 on eBay. I guess I now know why it was so cheap...

Thanks for the help so far! At least I have a primary source of the problem that I can now turn to to fix this cooling issue. As far as looking at idle and load temps, I can't. The system doesn't yet have an HDD and I'm using a bootable Ubuntu 18.04 thumb drive, meaning no Windows programs (without Speccy things suck), no Prime 95, etc., and finding "Linux Alternatives" is usually time consuming and irritating. In any case, it's really the only choice I seem to have right now.

athlon-power wrote:

I've now ascertained that I should probably dump the 'ol Freezer 7. What coolers would you guys recommend to use, given the foll […]
Show full quote

I've now ascertained that I should probably dump the 'ol Freezer 7. What coolers would you guys recommend to use, given the following two variables:

1) The cooler must have been available to purchase from June 10th 2008 to June 20th 2008.

2 ) The cooler would be preferred be found on 2008 newegg, as this is a newegg build (all of my parts' prices are gathered from there).

This has made it a fair bit harder to find parts, though over time I've managed to get the parts I need. A lot of the coolers from newegg at that time don't seem to exist on eBay, and when they do, they're usually ~US$100. The Arctic Freezer 7 Pro seemed great, because it had fantastic reviews from builders of the time, and it only cost around US$20 on eBay. I guess I now know why it was so cheap...

Thanks for the help so far! At least I have a primary source of the problem that I can now turn to to fix this cooling issue. As far as looking at idle and load temps, I can't. The system doesn't yet have an HDD and I'm using a bootable Ubuntu 18.04 thumb drive, meaning no Windows programs (without Speccy things suck), no Prime 95, etc., and finding "Linux Alternatives" is usually time consuming and irritating. In any case, it's really the only choice I seem to have right now.

The Tuniq Tower 120 I'm using has been available since 2004-2005 and it performs quite well considering it's a vintage cooler. As a bonus, it comes with mounting hardware for socket 478 as well, witch makes it the best socket 478 cooler I know of. The stock fan is noisy as hell at high rpm, but moves a lot of air and the cooler comes with a potentiometer that can be installed in one of the expansion slots at the rear of the case, so turning it down is quick and easy. You should be able to find the Tuniq Tower 120 new, and it's not too expensive either. The only real downside of this cooler is the mounting hardware witch is a bit.... odd, but it's a compromise you have to make if you're looking for a performance period correct cooler. The AC Freezer in comparison is merely adequate. It did well at the time because it was cheap and most people were using it on dual core builds, where it did perform well enough.

Here are a couple of purchase links for the Tuniq Tower:

https://www.amazon.com/Sunbeam-Copper-Cooler- … 5/dp/B000CHSD64
https://www.newegg.com/p/N82E16835154001
(you could probably find it for 30-40$ shipped on aliexpress)

And reviews:

https://www.anandtech.com/show/2152/5
https://bjorn3d.com/2005/07/tuniq-tower-120-cooler-review/

Socket3 wrote:

The Tuniq Tower 120 I'm using has been available since 2004-2005 and it performs quite well considering it's a vintage cooler. A […]
Show full quote

The Tuniq Tower 120 I'm using has been available since 2004-2005 and it performs quite well considering it's a vintage cooler. As a bonus, it comes with mounting hardware for socket 478 as well, witch makes it the best socket 478 cooler I know of. The stock fan is noisy as hell at high rpm, but moves a lot of air and the cooler comes with a potentiometer that can be installed in one of the expansion slots at the rear of the case, so turning it down is quick and easy. You should be able to find the Tuniq Tower 120 new, and it's not too expensive either. The only real downside of this cooler is the mounting hardware witch is a bit.... odd, but it's a compromise you have to make if you're looking for a performance period correct cooler. The AC Freezer in comparison is merely adequate. It did well at the time because it was cheap and most people were using it on dual core builds, where it did perform well enough.

Here are a couple of purchase links for the Tuniq Tower:

https://www.amazon.com/Sunbeam-Copper-Cooler- … 5/dp/B000CHSD64
https://www.newegg.com/p/N82E16835154001
(you could probably find it for 30-40$ shipped on aliexpress)

And reviews:

https://www.anandtech.com/show/2152/5
https://bjorn3d.com/2005/07/tuniq-tower-120-cooler-review/

I can't find it on AliExpress or newegg (it's out of stock), but I did find one or two of them on eBay for a pretty penny (US$60ish). I'm going to have to wait for my next paycheck, for now I have roughly US$21 left so it won't be enough for something like that.

Though that cooler does look very nice. I'd also like to get a new one because this Freezer 7 Pro seems to be bending my motherboard slightly even with all of the motherboard screws in their proper places.

Of course, on the product page for the P5K SE, you can actually see that it's bent already- I'm not sure if ASUS designed the thing this way, or what.

I'd recommend a Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme (also known as TRUE). There are several versions out there and they are excellent. You can mount pretty much any standard 120mm fan on it as well. It is also period correct for the time. I used mine on a Core 2 Duo E6750, then migrated it to the Q9550 and then migrated it again to the i5 2500K. All of them have been overclocked and I've always run fans at low speeds with no heat issues.

Because it's an "old" model, they often turn up for sale used, and they generally have brackets to fit most older systems. Even if you get one that's missing mounting parts, Thermalright actually developed a new universal mounting kit to make it work on everything from Socket 775 to AM4, which is amazingly cool. The brackets are only like $12 on amazon too, which is a steal considering it'll allow you to use one of the best heatsinks ever made on basically any motherboard made in the last 15 years and likely well into the future (except for Threadripper boards). I plan to move mine to my next build as well. 😀

I put in an old 500GB SATA II HDD that I had laying around into the machine and installed Windows 10 from the same USB stick, just formatted and made using the USB maker tool. I installed Speccy and Prime95, and ran a generic stress test to see what it did with the Freezer 7 Pro. This is what I got:

At idle, it runs at roughly 42-48c. I ran the stress test for close to 5 minutes, and it hung around 55-58c, but one of the cores was a fair bit hotter than the others, even though the test I ran put stress equally across all of the cores. This one core remains hotter than the others throughout usage, and I don't believe I've ever seen a temperature discrepancy this large between different cores on a processor, even on other Core2Quad models.

At least the cooler was putting out sufficient amounts of heat this time, I could feel the hot air coming from the back of the case.

Speaking of such, here's a picture of it to give you guys an idea of the ventilation it has:

This case has a little fan controller built in, and you can adjust case fan speeds using it. While running these tests, I had the case fans (one in the side and one in the back, both are visible) running as fast as that little controller could push them.

athlon-power wrote:

I've now ascertained that I should probably dump the 'ol Freezer 7.

You are probably overreacting; as you saw from running more accurate tools, your temperatures are fine.

One of the best coolers of the time, and yet not a very well-known one, is the SCMN-1100, Scythe Mine Rev.B. I chose it based on the linked review, because it strikes a rare balance of being amazingly quiet for the cooling it provides, while also being fairly light and not expensive. I've been using it in my LGA775 build with QX9650 since late 2008, and it has always worked great and stayed exceptionally quiet (knock-on-wood). I have not had any other cooler last so long without the fan starting to make noise at some point due to wear-and-tear on the motor.

There are 2 downsides to the Mine:

1. The shape of the heatsink can prevent it from being mounted on certain motherboards in certain ways. There are two possible directions - with the fan blowing air back or with it blowing up. On my P5Q Pro, I believe it only fits with the air blowing up, which is fine if you have a top-mounted PSU or a top-mounted exhaust fan.
2. Not likely you will find one now. 😀

I may want to rescind my prior statements about this cooler. I decided to remount it with Arctic Silver MX-4, and this time, the cooler felt a whole lot more secure. I got cocky, and decided to overclock it to 3.6GHz, and these are the temperature results I got at full load:

These are essentially the same results I was getting before at stock speeds at full load. At 3.6GHz, this thing is keeping my processor somewhat cool at load. It occasionally heats up to an average of 62-63c, with the hottest core topping out at 66c, but for the most part it runs more like it is shown in this screenshot.

Here's a picture of it when it gets hot:

I've been having an odd phenomenon with this system since I changed out the thermal paste on this cooler. This also was happening before I started overclocking anything- when I would boot up Prime95 and put it under load, this strange semi-quiet coil-whine like sound is audible from somewhere around the CPU socket. I checked, and it's not any of the fans- it sounds similar to when some of my PSUs have gotten coil whine.

It alternates between being there and not being there. I'm not sure what this is about.