Will Dolphin Overheat my Laptop?

05-01-2021, 05:36 PM #1

Talking about temperatures, will a laptop with i5-7200 get overheated by playing games on Dolphin Emulator?
Also what temperature would you expect SMG to run on this laptop ?

***MayImilae*** · 05-01-2021, 05:46 PM #2

Random is not a support thread.

*waves her magic moderator wand*

Moved to a new thread!

05-01-2021, 07:20 PM #3

But can someone answer?

***MayImilae*** · (This post was last modified: 05-01-2021, 09:07 PM by MayImilae.)

Short answer: Nope, you're fine. Dolphin will not overheat your laptop.

Long answer: Modern CPUs do not "overheat", they thermally throttle. So at 100°C, they'll just lower their clock speeds to make sure the hardware cannot reach dangerous temperatures. That being said, I don't think you will encounter throttling either. An i5-7200 is lower-mid-range part with very few cores, and its 7xxx series so its power usage is quite low. It's an easy to cool part, in other words. Dolphin is single or dual threaded application so it won't tax the full capabilities that the CPU cooler is designed to cool, so it should never even approach thermal throttling. Even if the GPU shares the cooling system with the CPU, with a i5-7200 you'll probably be CPU bound before GPU bound unless you run SSAA so, probably fine there as well. Just make sure you keep the intake clean of dust and don't smother the poor thing and you'll be fine. If you are still concerned just get HWInfo or something and run Dolphin while keeping an eye on the temperatures.

05-03-2021, 03:45 PM #5

(05-01-2021, 08:37 PM)MayImilae Wrote: Short answer: Nope, you're fine. Dolphin will not overheat your laptop.

Long answer: Modern CPUs do not "overheat", they thermally throttle. So at 100°C, they'll just lower their clock speeds to make sure the hardware cannot reach dangerous temperatures. That being said, I don't think you will encounter throttling either. An i5-7200 is lower-mid-range part with very few cores, and its 7xxx series so its power usage is quite low. It's an easy to cool part, in other words. Dolphin is single or dual threaded application so it won't tax the full capabilities that the CPU cooler is designed to cool, so it should never even approach thermal throttling. Even if the GPU shares the cooling system with the CPU, with a i5-7200 you'll probably be CPU bound before GPU bound unless you run SSAA so, probably fine there as well. Just make sure you keep the intake clean of dust and don't smother the poor thing and you'll be fine. If you are still concerned just get HWInfo or something and run Dolphin while keeping an eye on the temperatures.

i5 7200u has t-junction of 100 celsius, but many websites say that temp must be 30 degree less than the t junction

so will the most powerful games run under 70 celsius....i dont want to install hwinfo or any other unknown software...

***MayImilae*** · (This post was last modified: 05-03-2021, 06:48 PM by MayImilae.)

T-Junction is just the maximum throttling point. Here is how Intel describes it.

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/...ssors.html

Intel FAQ Wrote:Tjunction max is the maximum thermal junction temperature that a processor will allow prior to using internal thermal control mechanisms to reduce power and limit temperature.

An Intel CPU can run at 100°C all day long and it will be totally fine, and many laptop manufacturers have proven that by shipping laptops that will just go straight to 100°C and stay there. 100°C however is the point where Intel will reduce clocks below the CPUs specifications, and it will keep reducing the clockspeed and power usage however much it takes to make sure CPU never goes above 100°C. Thanks to that, it is impossible to overheat a modern CPU.

As for the sites that said it "must be 30 less than t junction" they are misunderstanding how this works. Likely they are thinking of CPUs newer than yours that use "Intel Thermal Velocity Boost" and other such boost systems. Basically on newer Intel chips, they will overclock themselves above spec for a set number of cores for as long as the CPU is below 70°C. But over that threshold the CPU will disengage that overclock and return to the spec speeds. When the CPU is over 70°C it is not thermal throttling, it is turning off its overclock to return to its rated speeds. Only when the CPU passes 100°C does it thermally throttle to below it's rated speeds. That distinction is misunderstood by a lot of people. Also "Intel Thermal Velocity Boost" is a very new feature that your core i5-7200 does not have.

05-03-2021, 07:46 PM #7

@MayImilae
Does that means there is no need for hwinfo or other temp display software since the i5-7200U cpu or recent ones will never reach the point of overheating?
And hence no need to worry about the laptop getting hot.

Also thanks for explaining all the details Smile

***MayImilae*** · (This post was last modified: 05-03-2021, 08:15 PM by MayImilae.)

You can use a temperature checking software if you want to, but it isn't needed. Your hardware is aware of its temperature at all times and will make sure it never reaches dangerous temperatures.

Of course there are many uses for this software, such as configuring a cooling system in a DIY machine or checking an overclock to make sure the system isn't thermal throttling, but none of that matters for your system. Your laptop can't overclock and the cooling system was configured for you, it's a laptop after all. One potential use of temperature displaying software for you is to check if there is something wrong with your laptop's cooling system, like if it needs a repaste or something, but that laptop's CPU is not that old and it's pretty easy to cool anyway so, eh, I wouldn't be worried about it.