Curt Christianson wrote in message ...
Hi ddd,
Richard was actually right on in his answer. It *is a vague* (but
certainly not bad or stupid) question, and one that cannot be summed up in a
single answer.
Heat is indeed the greatest enemy of electronic components. A good place to
start would be the manufacturer of your CPU--they generally have what they
consider to be the operating parameters of your processor.
As I said, it is a rather vague question, but the accepted ideal is "the
cooler, the better".

You'd think that you'd be safe making that statement.
Alas, you'd be wrong.

If you make it too cool, relative to the surrounding surfaces,
you get condensation on the motherboard.

It brooks NO argument that motherboards HATE condensation.