How to fix overheating on Thermalright PA140 in TLOU 1?
While trekking through those overgrown ruins, my fans suddenly started screaming, and I knew the temps were spiraling. The CPU cores hit 95-98℃ instantly, triggering a brutal thermal throttle that tanked my FPS from 90 down to 35. I first tried setting the fans to 'Full Speed' in the BIOS; it dropped the temp by 5℃, but the noise was absolutely unbearable—I couldn't even hear the game. I eventually tore down the cooler and swapped the stock paste for a high-performance phase-change thermal pad, then set a stepped fan curve that ramps up aggressively after 75℃. Monitoring with HWInfo, full-load temps are now suppressed to 72-78℃, and clock speeds are steady between 4.2-4.5GHz. I actually had a nightmare start where the pad wasn't seated evenly, causing a 12℃ core delta, but I fixed it by readjusting the mounting pressure. Fans are now steady at 1200-1500 RPM. Long-term stress tests confirm I'm no longer hitting the thermal wall, and the cooling is finally verified.
