cpu heatsink not hot???

[Pancake106]

basically i was fooling around with my pc today running prime95 small fft. i decided to take the side of the case off and feel the cpu heatsink. the fins on the heatsink were not hot to the touch nor were the heatpipes directly ontop of the cpu chip itself. it felt just a bit over body temperature. so i felt the northbridge heatsink and gpu cooler to compare....both were much hotter!!! i know the heatsink is properly seated at each of the four corners. i used as5 in a line as shown on their website. ive considered reapplying the TIM using the credit card technique or plastic-bag-over-finger technique. i havent bothered cause everything is stable but a not hot heatsink is bugging me

pc as follows:
e2140 @ 3.2ghz / bios vid 1.375 / under load vid 1.3
cooler master hyper tx2
gigabyte p35 ds3l
corsair vx450
2gig gskill ddr2 800
8800gt
antec solo case


running prime95 small fft for about 45 min (i have run it longer and is stable)

intel TAT: 60c

coretemp .97 (tj max 85c): 63c
(with tj max 100c): 78c

realtemp 2.1 (tj max 95c): 73c

these temps seem similar to others, although with people believing different tj max settings its difficult to compare temps when people dont state what tj max is at. so is any of this normal? should i be concerned? any help or advice is appreciated

 

[bailw]

my e2140 under water was almost same temp as yours, but after i remove the ihs, my idle and load drop by 10C. so your temps consider to be normal.

 

[cpemma]

If the bits of a heatsink you can touch get hot it's a sure sign the fan is broken. And your core temps would be in three figures.

Heatsinks aren't made of superconductor and at some uniform temperature, there's a steep thermal gradient from hottest next to the TIM to much cooler at the upper edges.

 

[Pancake106]

alrighty well i feel a bit better now just to clarify i can squeeze a finger underneith the fins and touch the copper pipes and copper plate ontop of the cpu and is not hot. if thats normal then im happy

 

[error8]

If your heatsink would have been hot, that means that it looses heat to slow and then the cpu itself would have been hot. But in your case this doesn't happen so your all right.

 

[Pancake106]

ok thanks a bunch guys i wont worry about it then!