Intel CPU temperature. what will cause damage?

Hi,

tryed to search an answer for this in the forums but found only answers about AMD.
I have Intel P4-2.4GHz running win XP. for the last months i had a lot of system crashs (no virus/spywares!). after consulting some people I tryed to monitor my cpu temp, and it seems to be quite hot (don't know exactly but i think all resets happened at hot days).

I took the computer to the vendor (still in warranty) and he took of the cooling part, cleaned it, also put a new fan in addtion to the existing one. now i am testing it to see if it happens again.

My questions are:
1) what are the nominal temp under winXP in that system ? is there any official Intel document on it ?

2) i used HardwareMonitor to log my cpu temp (MBM didn't worked - no temp found!). Can i trust its numbers ?

3) my computer had a lot of crashs in the last months. can it damaged in some way ? can the high temp cycles damage the cpu or decrease its reliability ?

4) about the last one. i want to ask my vendor to replace the MB and cpu, but i need some good Article or Intel Doc that prove that under this crashs he need to do it. (Can i prove the additional fan should have been installed in first place?)

thanks a lot.

The crashes shouldn't damage the hardware, P4's have a built in diode to turn off before getting so hot as to cause damage. If you're getting temps above the mid to high 50's (C) under load, you're getting pretty warm, once you're in the 60's I wouldn't be surprised if it's unstable. I think the cutoff is something like 75C, too lazy to look it up (should be in the technical stuff on intel's site).