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I noticed with the help of psensors that my CPU overheats to 90-97 degrees celcius if it gets above 2.5GHz. I am using a Lenovo Y720 laptop. I tested this both in games and by CPU stress test. I found a script on:

http://seperohacker.blogspot.com/2012/10/linux-keep-your-cpu-cool-with-frequency.html?m=1

that lets you throttle the CPU, which I have used to throttle it down to 2GHz and the temperatures are fine. The bad thing about this however is that this means I can never use my laptops full power which is not acceptable for me as my CPU has the power to get up to 3.8GHz (i7 7700HQ). I also have a NVIDIA GTX 1060 GPU, but it seems it has nothing to do with this (which I first thought) as the overheating happens regardless of using the GPU or not. This does not happen on Windows so it must be something on Ubuntu (I use 18.04). Does anyone know something about this or perhaps a fix that does not limit me to only be able to run Max 2GHz.

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    The tool that is designed for this is thermald. It will allow whatever performance up to whatever temperature limit you want. Suggest you use that instead of something you found elsewhere. Some will suggest tlp, which is also a supported tool, It is just that I don't use it. – Doug Smythies Aug 16 '18 at 23:49
  • Thermald is already installed by default I see, since I haven't installed it but it is there. I just couldn't find how to use it. Is it a tool that is supposed to be used or is it just something that runs in the background and does things automatically? –  Aug 16 '18 at 23:51
  • It does thing automatically. If you want to set lower temperatures yourself try this version of the config file. – Doug Smythies Aug 16 '18 at 23:52
  • https://wiki.debian.org/thermald provides useful information. – K7AAY Aug 16 '18 at 23:53
  • Thank you both I will take a look at it as soon as I get on my laptop. –  Aug 16 '18 at 23:55
  • You should be able to run your CPU at full load in any OS without its temperature going much over 60. I'd check heatsink seating and thermal grease. Since it's a laptop, also check for blocked air path. – thomasrutter Aug 17 '18 at 01:13
  • I tried your script and it actually works :) My CPU now goes to 3GHz and 3.4GHz and still being on 76-80 degrees celcius. Thank you so much! I have one question though. The conf file you have written is much shorter than the original, am i supposed to replace everything in the original conf file? –  Aug 17 '18 at 08:16
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    @mth1417: Who was your previous comment to? If me, then yes I toss out the default thermald config file, which I find overly complicated, and use mine. Additionally note, that I don't normally even run thermald, because I don't need it. – Doug Smythies Aug 18 '18 at 15:47
  • @DougSmythies could you please add your conf file as the answer to this question. Thank you. –  Aug 30 '18 at 21:16

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I have completely forgotten about this topic. Since the one to answer (Doug Smythies) which gave the right answer in the comments haven't made his comment as an answer, I will post it here:

The answer it to use a modified version of Thermald, made by Doug Smythies:

https://askubuntu.com/a/897856/838117

After using that script I experienced no overheat at all without sacrificing CPU freq.