CPU overheating

[slaphapy]

I have had my computer for a long time now... three or four years now I'd guess.  Up until just recently it has been running very smoothly.  I've been able to run it for hours on end without it even coming close to overheating.  but the past week or so it has started to overheat (?)  it's set to warn me when it reaches about 70 degrees C.  I have 5 fans and a geforce video card (could the video card be the problem? but why wouldnt it have been causing this before?)  Does anyone have any ideas of why this is only recently happening, and any way to fix it.  I recently cleaned the inside of the computer. getting rid of all the dust to see if it has helped.  It hasn't seemed to have a major effect on it...  :-

thx for advice in advance

[Megashrap]

[Ice_Cube]

Try putting a fresh coat of thermal paste between the CPU and the heat sink, this tends to degrade over time and may fix your CPU overheating problems.

[erjin999]

If its grafix card then you tend to notice it crashes more while playing games or any other activity that uses grafix card. If it crashes at windows, then probably is not the grafix card.

Does your computer warn you when you get to 70+ oC ? When it crashes go to BIOS and take a quick look at temps. See if they seem hot. Heck, sometimes/usually, I just touch the components to see which ones hot. (power off, myself grounded, etc...).

[slaphapy]

wow, uhh, I'm not a hardware person guys lol...

1) I cleaned everything in the case I could see.. I cleaned all the fans, cuz there was a LOT of dust build up and I figured, maybe they just arent able to move well enough to keep the air flow... I blew out all the dust I could find, and then went through it again to make sure I did not miss anything. 

2)where is the heatsink, and do you mean fans? if so, yes. as explained above.

3) a) what is thermal paste?

  b) where can i find it?

  c) how do I apply it? lol

4) I think it may be the grafix card because it tends to happen after I have been working with photoshop or flash or programs like that for a long period of time.

5) Yes, it warns me when it gets to around 70 degrees C, it starts beeping... anyway, last time it happened I turned off my comp for 5 minutes, then turned it back on to go through the BIOS, it said the temp was 71 degrees C (!) so I turned it off for a few hours, went and got some compressed air sprayers to clean it out with, and cleaned it.

[Ice_Cube]

Well photoshop uses a hell of a lot of CPU power too so its not necessarily your graphics card ... and  > 70 degrees C is a problem.

Ok, the heatsink is the big metal thing with a fan that sits above your CPU too keep it cool. Thermal paste is available at nearly every PC store, and instructions on the packaging are pretty clear. If you ask a tech guy who works at the store they should be able to give pretty good advice (not so useful if you order over the net).

http://sysopt.earthweb.com/paste.html

That gives a fairly technical description of what thermal paste is.

http://www.neoseeker.com/Hardware/faqs/kb/5,61.html

Gives a fairly straight forward guide

Obviously if you are really unsure then try another option as there is a possibillity of complications when re-applying the thermal paste....

A tempoury solution is to run the PC with an external fan...but thats not a very good long term idea.

[erjin999]

I would say photoshop and flash are more CPU intensive. Try a 3D game.

When you switch it off when it beeps, restart instead of shutting down for 5 mins. Go to BIOS, quickly check the temps, and then switch it off, to cool down.

That way you get a better idea of the temps.

[slaphapy]

I tried the splinter cell 3 demo... (omg that is frigen amazing graphics... they were even chugging on my PC!) and it didnt seem to have a problem... maybe the dust cleaning is helping. I cleaned out more thorouly still today.  I realized I missed the fan on my video card... wow that was dusty.  I will report if it keeps happening... other than that... I don't think it is having major major problems for the moment. thx though

[slaphapy]

Well, I guess the cleaning did the trick after all, doesnt seem to get much past 51 degrees C now.  Thanks for the help guys... at least now I'll know what to do if I have this problem in the future, and cleaning dust doesn't work. 

Thanks again.