A Word file makes computer run hot? 1

[yalamo]

I have Win XP Home. A very strange phenomenon occurred today.

I downloaded a Word file from a perfectly legitimate site so as to use it for work. After I had opened it and read it for a few minutes, I got an alert from the Intel Active Alert that came with my Intel motherboard that one of my "system temperatures had exceeded its recommended maximum temperature" (50 degrees C). According to the alert history, it was going above and below this maximum every few seconds. So I shut off my computer, and after a few minutes, I turned it on again.

I started monitoring the temperatures using the monitor provided by Intel. When I opened up this particular file, the processor temperature in the Processor Zone rose by about 17 degrees in 8 minutes, in System Zone 1 it rose by 8 degrees, and in System Zone 2 by 13 degrees. The System Fan 1 speed dropped from 3247 to 3193, and the 12 v voltage from 12.063 to 11.813 volts.

I then closed this file, and opened another, slightly larger Word file. The system temperatures dropped quickly (in about 3 minutes) to what are apparently the normal ambients (34, 32, and 33 degrees). The fan speed went up to 3247, and the 12V supply voltage did too. Any other files or applications I opened didn't move these temperatures very much.

I downloaded the original file from the site again, and opened and watched it. Same increase in temperature. I scanned for viruses - I have none. I defragmented, just for the heck of it. Same phenomenon after I opened the file. I "Selected All" and copied the file to a new file with a different name. Same phenomenon.

Does anyone know what's going on?

 

[tfg13]

Are there any graphics within the document? Tables, jpeg's, can all have an effect on your processor.

 

[yalamo]

Just one more phenomenon, I just noticed. Opening the suspect file, I see that the Task Manager shows a CPU usage of about 50%. Closing it, and opening the slightly larger Word file I use as a reference, the CPU usage is 1-3%.

 

[yalamo]

The file is about 70 pages and under 600 KB. There are about 5 tables made using Word, and a small (1/4 page) line drawing.
The Word file I used as a refence is almost 4 MB and has about 10 graphics made of busy jpg files, but doesn't move the processor at all.

 

[gbaughma]

Interesting.

Is the processor load that high even after the document is finished loading? If so, I would HIGHLY suspect a macro of some sort. I mean, it doesn't take any PROCESSOR power to have a document sitting in memory (other than repagination and so forth, which is done in the background by word anyway). Try turning off macros, and see if that eliminates your processor hit. If so, I'd do some serious digging into what your document is doing behind the scenes!

Just my $.02

--Greg

 

[Jump1ng]

Well even if its only this document that you have seen thats causing this problem now I think you need to look into your cooling situation. If you say that the temprature climbed that high on a utilization of 50% imagine what would happen if it was sitting at 100% for an extended time.

I would check that the heatsinks are properly on the processor. If they look ok remove them and redo the heatsink paste make sure its a THIN even layer. As to much will reduced the heat transfer rate and to litle will also reduce the heat transfer.

To test if your cooling is ok I would download some kind of program that will use your processor at 100% load and then monitor the temprature.

50 degrees is nothing really for a processor a new Intel or AMD processor can run as high as 90 degrees+ without taking any damage. So 50 degrees is quite a low warning level as the temp of a machine running in a hot office in the summer will probably be near or above this with virtually no load.

But the thing that sticks out is the rapid increase in heat when the cpu has load which isn't normal. Obviously the more strain you put on a cpu the more heat it will generate but it shouldn't shoot up like what you described.

So please check it out ASAP as there is something wrong here and if you don't have CPU overheating protection you might end up frying your cpu if you aren't there to shut it down when its warning you.

 

[yalamo]

tfq13 and gbaughma, thanks for your help.

There are no macros in the document, and yes, it did finish loading and read about 50% CPU usage.

I just tried something else: I broke the document up into 2 approximately equal (in number of pages) parts, and opened each one separately. I opened the first half, and the temperatures didn't budge, and CPU usage was 1-3%. Then I closed that, and opened the second half: cpu usage was about 50%, and temperatures started rising to about the levels shown with the complete document.

So I broke the second part into 2 approximately equal documents, and looked at each of those, running alone. Neither budged the temperatures, and both showed CPU usage of 1-3%! I then ran both together. Again. no affect on temperature or usage!

Just to make sure that I wasn't dreaming, I ran the complete second part again, and then the complete document. Both increased the temperatures as previously, and showed approximately 50% usage.

Thing are getting wierder and wierder!

 

[yalamo]

Jump1ng, thanks for the tip.

I've had the PC for about 9 months, and run it with heavier loads than I'm doing today, and never had an alert (50 degrees is the temperature threshold for System Zones 1 & 2; the Processor Zone threshold is 60 degres. These were set by the motherboard manufacturer, and I haven't changed them.)

Today wasn't a particularly hot day, and before I start playing around with heat sinks, I want to be sure it's not some anomaly of the measuring software that's causing the problem.

 

[Jump1ng]

If you don't trust your measuring software you could try downloading motherboard monitor which I have used and its one of the most popular temp monitoring software it supports most mobos.

http://mbm.livewiredev.com/

You could also check in your bios if it has temp monitoring their. I have noticed that MBM usually reports the temps a bit higher than my bios does even if you conisder that the cpu temp has gone down whilst windows is shutting down.

Another nice feature with MBM is that you can set it to execute a shutdown command when the cpu reaches a certain temp. Thus saving it from frying.

 

[gbaughma]

Perhaps there's a problem (something looping) in the document itself. Try loading the document then re-saving it to a different filename. Or, better yet, try saving it as an RTF document, then re-loading it, then save it as a word document again.

My thinking on this: Saving it as an RTF will cause word to re-evaluate the document in the conversion process. Then, loading it back up and saving it as a DOC file again would cause it to re-evaluate it again.

It may just be a bug in word where it's stuck in a loop doing pagination or something, and that's why you have the high processor usage.

Let me know. I'm curious now.

--Greg

 

[yalamo]

gbaughma, you hit it right on the head! I saved is as an RTF file, then as a doc. file, and voila! no more heating! I gave you a star!

Thanks a lot. Word is strange, though.

 

[gbaughma]

Hooray for our side! <Smile> Glad you got it resolved.

--Greg