Computer Tips: Automatically Shutdown Computer When Temperature Rises

Running BOINC on your computer while you are away on a vacation? Want to make sure the temperature of your computer does not exceed normal values and cause damage to itself or other motherboard components?  SpeedFan will help you out here and will shutdown your computer when it’s value exceeds the threshold value that you set.

SpeedFan is free, so the first thing you want to do is download SpeedFan and install it.

Configuring Speedfan

• After installation, open up SpeedFan and spot the temperature you want to monitor.

As shown in the picture, Speed fan sometimes shows wrong values, Temp1 is my Motherboard Temperature, Temp2 and Temp3 are static. If you cannot spot your GPU temp here, switch to the Exotics tab and hit the show the magic button and you can find the GPU variable.

• Hit the Configure button and switch to the Events tab.

Use the Add button to add an event, in the If drop down box, select the Temperature to monitor, in the above picture, I have selected the temperature of my GPU, a GeForce Video card. In the next field choose > or >=, in the field after that, choose the temperature above which you want your computer to shutdown(keep it above 60).  In the For field and Allow every field, enter the value as 1. Choose execute in Then field.

• In the field, enter shutdown.exe and in the field after that enter /s /f .

Now your computer will automatically shutdown without user intervention when the Temperature rises above normal.

Speedfan can help you make sure your computer doesn’t overheat while you are away and want to leave it up for extended periods of time.  Other examples of leaving your computer running would be to render video content or 3D images, work with SETI@Home or Folding@Home as well.

Any problems or questions?

Feel free to leave us a comment and we will be happy to assist you.