What actually fries when your processor overheats

[racronus]

Does everything burn up when you have overclocked too far, or only some parts of your computer?

[majik_mushi69]

hmmmm Let me think, U just answered your own question..
the processor generally (the core) and sometimes your chipset.

[racronus]

what about your video card, ram, and pci cards, are destroyed too?

[gibsinep]

Possibly if you overclock throught the FSB. And go way higher than you should.

[dmoltrup]

When you run your microwave and a blow dryer at the same time, and then the refrigerator kicks on, what blows?

The fuse blows, not everything in your entire house.

Essentially, the hottest component that isn't capable of taking the heat, will break down and if it is substantial enough to completely cut the power, it will shut the system down. If it isn't capable of shutting the power down, it will just screw up your display, memory contents, etc. Until the next component overheats and shuts down.

For example, if the cache part of your processor "melts", the processor will probably continue operating, but when it requests data, it will get whatever the data is stuck at. If it's stuck reading the number 234, that is all it will get. Over and over billions of times a second, it'll retrieve 234. This will undoubtedly crash your computer, but it will still be operating, until the overheating processor blows another part of itself and the motherboard detects complete failure and shuts off all power.

This is done in millionths of a second, though, so you won't see it happen. It is kind of like a GFI outlet in your bathroom. If you do get shocked from it, the electricity cuts off so fast, you barely notice the 12 amps of power that just surged through you!

Anyway, the simplest answer is the weakest part will blow, and that is it. The weakest part is usually the processor, only because it is so complex and incapable of taking high degrees of heat because of the size of it individual circuits and wires inside.

[racronus]

Thanks guys, i think I feel better now :):(

[WyreTheWolf]

Unless your system catches fire, and burns to the ground. I have seen the aftermath of a heavily overclocked water cooled athlon experiment go up in smoke ! QUITE LITERALLY up in smoke... luckily we had a fire extinguisher handy. 1.0GHz AMD Athlon (200fsb) running at (10X148) or 1.48GHz The pump stopped working ... and we didn't realize it .... the water block was made out of plastic, with a copper base ... the water all boiled out ... and the plastic caught fire ... after that ... it was kind of a chain reaction. :( wish that I still had the pictures ... but, My RAID Array went to **** ... and I had to reformat.

[Vernon Frazee]

Tom's Hardware: How Modern Processors Cope With Heat Emergencies (http://www6.tomshardware.com/cpu/01q3/010917/heatvideo-01.html)