Video Encoding Kills your Box's Components!

[Tuning]

Video encoding kills your PC.Is it true?.Do exhaustive CPU usage @ 100% for several days cause problems to your hardware?
Many of us are doing several encoding sessions a single day.Do anyone thought of any disaster occuring to your PC on account of over heating.(I know there are several methods of cooling,but I have only simple fan cooling)
Inspiration to this thread was a disaster that occured to my PC.
After longhours of encoding,my GeForce AGP passed away.The paste in between heat sink and processor vapourised and resulted in this disaster.
I thought many of you have similar experiences and want to share.
BTW,Do you think exhaustive cpu usage reduces the life of processor?

[mrlipring]

yep, parts getting used a lot reduces the lifetime, i'd imagine so.

thing is, we're all using the processor at load far more than most pc owners, and it's still not fast enough for us, so what do we do? we upgrade more regularly than most. us lot and gamers. i've never had any pc parts die of old age, because they don't really get old. with the exception of my monitor, which is ~5 years old, everything in my pc is less than 3 years old. everything is still under warranty, and between now and jan/feb, i'm planning on spending about £300 on it.

i think that the thing that holds most sway here is the psu. don't use a crappy no-name psu. i'd be more inclined to say it's crap psus that kill components, not overuse.

pc components can live for decades, so even while overclocked, and running at full load for periods, like mine is, i can't see anything dying before it's screaming to be replaced by faster/better/bigger parts.

[dani82]

my computer is almost 4 years old, been encoding little over 3 years now; for 2 1/2 years, 5-8 hours of video encoding with 2-4 hours of audio editing and about 30 min of video editing, and in that time, only 1 thing broke, the modem, i wouldn't be surprise if it lasted another 4 years under the same condition.

with 3-4 reformating a year and a defragment here & there, i notice my computer is somewhat slower than the day i got it.

i said i won't get a new computer until this one break, but i can only wait for so long.

i also believe old computer are built to last, and newer ones require an extend warranty (better safe than sorry)

[ppera2]

Encoding 'kills' PC nothing more than serious gaming. At least, desk vibrations are much less, than by hard FPS gaming :D

[Tuning]

As a Non-native English speaker,I took 3 minutes to understand underlying meaning:D .What if you play with joystick and away from your PC?:p

BTW,I have seen some clips of office executives throwing PCs out of window.(That definetly kills PC ) :D

One more advantage you have,(hint to all kids out there...:D ).You can sleep while encoding,while gaming requires..you know...rock..concentration...:p

[theReal]

If you do a lot of encoding, you need to care about good cooling. Even if your Athlon is still running "fine" at 60°C or more, I always experienced instability with temperatures higher than 52-53°C. You don't notice this instability when writing letters with word, but you'll notice when using avisynth for several hours...

My PC has two 80mm fans at the front, two at the back, plus one in the PSU. The ones at the front are voltage-controlled Noiseblocker 3,5W fans, the one in the PSU is a temperature controlled Noiseblocker 3,5W, the two at the back are Pabst 1,2W NGML. Also I use round cables and try to keep the inside as clean as possible for the airstream. This way nothing inside the box is getting hot, just warm - while the noise level is still ok (and adjustable).

My CPU is watercooled (using the very small Thermaltake Aquarius watercooling system). The radiator is outside the box, so the processor heat is dealt with outside the case - very nice :)

The cooling and the usage of only good brand-name parts guarantees my PC is always stable, even after days of encoding.

[Herske]

After longhours of encoding,my GeForce AGP passed away.The paste in between heat sink and processor vapourised and resulted in this disaster.

Replace those longhours of encoding with shorter hours of gaming: result would've been the same.

You just got a badly built card, under stressful conditions bad components show their weaknesses.

[Soulhunter]

I know PPL that let thier PC run 1 month or more to render CG animations, and they keep thier hardware for 1-2 years... :eek:

So I dont care about 24 hour encodes on my machine... ;)

Bye

[smiller667]

Semiconductors are one thing - but you usually have an active cooler for your CPU (and GPU if you are a gamer), so I wouldn't consider that a major problem if properly designed.

The other temperature-sensitive component are electrolytic capacitors ... running them at elevated temperatures will increase evaporation of the electrolyte, reduction of the capacity, increased resistance etc. and ultimately failure. According to a well known European PC mag, overheating (and not the use of improperly made electrolytes) can be a major reason for premature death of a mainboard.

Especially "silent" PCs with noise (and heat) insulation and/or less air exchange due to lo-throughput fans should be susceptible to this problem ...

And that GPU failure shouldn't have to do anything with encoding itself (maybe an innocent bystander death-by-heat thing) ... at least I can't imagine which encoder would use the graphics card for anything but a preview :).

[Tuning]

Oh! guys,now I got it.Why you are phrasing gaming.
I just need some clarification.First of all I use P4.And the main board is a unique one made by intel.That is its a intel motherboard in D850 series(D850 GB),runs only on Rambus DynamicRAM.The uniqueness in display mechanism,i.e the M/B doesn't have any in-built display device.For that I have a AGP slot.That is why I'm using AGP cards.And you all thought,I'm an Extreme gamer.By the way I have quited games by 2 years now.
[This M/B has retired from scene and intel now releases boards with integrated graphics with some varied model number]

Regarding cooling and stability,My PC always stays at 41-43 degree celsius while encoding,even if its for days.(I use intel active monitor to track down temperature).And as i previously mentioned I use only fan cooling.

The AGP was gone by encoding definetly,(ASUS GeForce2 MX 400)>if you notice you can see the hot air from CPU fan is blowing sideways and may pass over AGP card(depends on your M/B structure)which made it hotter and with in built fan getting older,the probability of damage is high.This way I think i lost card.
As said by smiller667 "maybe an innocent bystander death-by-heat thing".

By the light of your comments I'm now encoding with open cabinet....so all cool air might flow over the components.Its winter now and I expects CPU gets more cooler.


Thanks Everyone.:)

[ppera2]

Tuning:
I didn't think that you are gamer. It was just for fun, what I wrote.

Instead keep opened case, you may using extra fans - it's very common today.
Btw. my overclocked AMD TB doesn't goes by encoding over 35 C this days. (It's 100% CPU load)

[Tuning]

@ppera2,
Thanks for the sugestion,but I could not do that:(.I'm living near a Highway and there are plenty of duststorms.If I use extra fans then whole CPU gets dusted and every thing need to cleaned.Just by using single fan I had to clean CD/DVD drives once in every 2 weeks.:(.

Thanks :D

[Soulhunter]

If I use extra fans then whole CPU gets dusted and every thing need to cleaned.
Maybe you could use some sort of dust filter for the fans... !?!

Like the ones used in cars... Is something like this available ???

Bye