When I asked a senior computer hardware expert about how frequently we should replace the thermal paste for a processor chip on the motherboard, I was told “once every year”. Some other experts might not agree with it and give you different answers, but replacing the thermal paste after some time is needed for regular PC maintenance.
After replacing the thermal paste, how would you know if it has been applied correctly and that it is giving good performance even in extreme heat conditions? For finding this out, you can play some power hungry games like Call of Duty for a couple of hours. You can also use a software like TThrottle to prevent the processor from overheating.
TThrottle is a small useful tool that does two things – first it keeps an eye on the CPU or GPU temperature and secondly, it can also cut short the running of a program if it is heating up the processor too much.
In the user interface of TThrottle, we can set the maximum temperature for both the CPU and GPU. When a program that is causing the CPU or GPU to cross this temperature threshold, TThrottle automatically stops that program. This way your CPU and GPU keep running without getting overheated. But you have to set it to monitor some programs first.
In the TThrottle, we can select a number of processes that are running on the PC. These processes are going to be monitored by TThrottle for the CPU or GPU usage. You can set how much CPU pr GPU usage is allowed for these programs. For example, you can set the maximum 80% CPU usage after which these programs are auto-terminated.
TThrottle is meant for only advanced users who wish to keep their computer’s processors and graphic card working quietly without getting overheated.
You can download TThrottle from https://efmer.com/tthrottle/.