CCD cameras normally have both electronic cooling and water cooling in series. The dissipated heat from electronic cooling has to be taken away by water cooling. Therefore, cooling water runs constantly to the CCD cameras. In most cases, the CCD camera is simply left ON all the time until the microscope and/or camera chamber is vented. Furthermore, we need to let CCD be cooled long enough before using the camera. The advantage to have low operating temperature for CCD imaging and elemental analysis (e.g. EELS and EDS) in EM is low thermal noise.

If the temperature is higher than the specified operating temperature, some cameras are automatically shut off by the software in order to protect the camera itself and/or to avoid incorrect signal collection. Once it is shut off, then the user needs to restart the camera controller or the software, or to manually reset the temperature back to the desired value. In other words, even though the reset procedure is different from system to system, the temperature can always be checked and reset using their software. For instance, for Gatan DigitalMicrograph (DM) interface, one can check menu Camera - Temperature. However, you need to select the corresponding camera if you have multiple cameras on your microscope. You are suggested to check your user manual or ask vendor to find out where to set temperature on your software if you do not know. Table 1353 lists the operating temperature for some typical CCD cameras used on electron microscopes.