New
#11
Voltage reading!
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New #12
From what I have gathered over the years is that the temperature and voltage sensor monitoring chips used on motherboards are very simple and very cheap components. When the chip is good it works well and when it is bad it does not affect system performance, so they just do not warrant any labor-hours to test on a production line. You've got that 5%-10% manufacturing defect chance that your motherboard has a faulty sensor. The argument over whether you can trust them at all has been the subject of many a flame war on newsgroups for years!
There is very little argument that the best way to test voltages is physically, using a digital multimeter.
The tech keeps changing too. It drives software programmers nuts. Ideas like this: Enthusiast System Architecture - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia can turn a formally reliable piece of software bad in a hurry.
Speedfan begs off with this disclaimer, found in their Frequently Asked Questions section:
Hardware sensor chips are generic devices that can be used to measure voltages from anywhere. The measured voltage must be converted to the range required by the sensor chip. Standard monitoring chips specify which external circuitry must be used in order to measure voltages outside some range. Voltages like 12V, -5V, -12V and some others need this external circuitry. Some manufacturers chose not to follow datasheets. If this is your case, then you will read unusual values from SpeedFan. Since this custom circuitry is not known, SpeedFan does not try to "guess" it as any reading wouldn't be safe. If you get really odd voltage readings, simply enter configuration and uncheck the relevant ones.And the beat goes on!
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New #14
I'm disappointed that Aida64's trial version has certain functionality disabled, and in particular apparently the voltages (or at least 12V) is one of those that does not perform as it will in the licensed version. I'd like to share my own license key just for the test on the problem machine, but that would be a no-no.
But if we had at least one (or more) other hardware monitor product (like Aida64) that DID show 12V results on this particular motherboard and PSU (and it would be helpful to see what value displayed), that would be very interesting and informative.
In my experience using Aida64 on a number of different Win7 machines (the most recent just this past week, on a Lenovo K330 IdeaCentre i3 desktop) the sensor voltage readings have never failed to display correctly. I suspect the licensed Aida64 version would, like HWMonitor, show correct 12V voltage values for the current problem machine, but of course that's just speculation. I don't consider Speedfan to be in the same class as these products.
(I am particularly a fan of Aida64 because of its configurable OSD display of lots of hardware information in a small desktop object, as shown by my screenshot earlier. It also has extensive larger system information presentations like HWMonitor if I want to probe very deeply with large open windows, but for a 24/7 desktop "gadget" this little OSD is ideal for me.)
It's just honestly hard for me to believe that this problem is actually rooted in Win7, rather than something odd or unusual in the motherboard hardware or BIOS. I had a problem on my Supermicro C2SBX mobo a few years back with temperatures being reported by Aida64/Everest way off after I upgraded BIOS (because I felt I should "keep current"). Speaking with their tech support, they contended the problem came from Intel, with a new method of reporting temperatures being simply "low, medium or high" rather than the true numeric values. Reverting to the previous BIOS of course fixed the problem and the temperatures were now once again reported accurately... though I really never knew if it was Intel or Supermicro who'd messed up for real in that updated BIOS version. I'm still running just fine with the original prior BIOS version.
I've got to believe it's something like that in the current story.
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New #15
The OS shouldn't make any difference. Some of the monitors may not be interpreting the PECI interface data correctly. HWiNFO is probably pretty accurate. It's one of the best monitors I've seen. Here's what mine shows.
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And since BIOS reports 12v, and now HWMonitor only reports an almost correct voltage, it confirms for me that it is a windows monitoring issue. IE: the sensors cannot be monitored correctly. A Guy
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