After getting over my embarrassment to post in the forum and PMing one of the experts on this matter over at the Simforums, I wanted to see what you guys think. Well, what can I say. I did something really stupid today, thanks to my impatience. -You have my authorization to laugh at me and call me names.- :( I just bought a new Q6600 to replace my old Pentium D CPU. I installed the new Q6600 but since my Arctic Silver 5 still hasn't arrived and I wanted to make sure the CPU worked, I turned on the computer WITHOUT putting the heatsink on. The only fan that was on was the front intake fan that passes air to heatsink (if it was installed) and the air passes above the socket. Anyhow, I just went into the BIOS and made sure everything was good and then I loaded up windows. But as windows was loading I could hear that the fan kept on getting louder and louder. As the windows logged in and everything was loading, the fan just kept on getting louder and louder so I immediately shut the computer off. This whole careless, stupid and childish action of mine took only about a minute. My (stupid?) question is, did this damage the CPU?Even though I still don't have the arctic silver, I put the old heatsink on with the excess thermal compound that was left from the last CPU installation and I am closely monitoring the CPU temps and only doing very light things like browsing the net and so forth. The temps are all below 45C. Once the Arctic Silver arrives, I will be using that.I did some research on this matter and found mixed results. Some said that the Q6600 will fry in 10-15 seconds if no heatsink is installed, which didn't happen in my case, thankfully. Some others said they accidentally ran it for more than 10 mins and one guy claimed he even installed Windows on it even though the heatsink wasn't properly mounted onto the CPU. I mean everything is working fine, I am using this very computer (Q6600) to write this post. But is it possible that some hidden damage was done? My computer is the Dell E520, by the way.Thanks in advance for your time.

Should be OK, there is built in thermal protection within the BIOS to do exactly what it did. Shut the machine down.Lesson learnt. LoLBTW the processor can be damaged if subjected to long term operation at the upper limit. I have my audio warning set at 70Deg C but try never to operate over 60Deg C.Edit: Sorry see where you shut it down. The BIOS should have done it for you! At least your automatic fan control is working!

Thanks for the comment Bruce. Let me just clarify something. The machine did NOT shut itself down. I was the one who shut it down by holding the power button for several seconds and I did that because the fan was just getting so loud.But yes, lesson learned!

I wonder what people used before Arctic Silver..... guess they just didn't have heat sinks back in the day.