Ever wonder what temperatures your computer is running at?

Has you desktop or notebook ever suddenly powered itself off after a duration of use?

When you are playing games, do you ever notice a lag after a number of minutes of consecutive gameplay?

One should always be aware of their system… namely the components with that can generate dangerously high temperatures that can ultimately affect the life of the computer.  A CPU should not really exceed 80-90 C degrees Celcius.  A HDD (hard disk drive) should never exceed 60-65 degrees Celcius for a long duration or it will diminish the life of the drive.

For those that play pretty high-end 3D games (like Crysis, Unreal Tournament 3, Bioshock), your GPU (graphics processing unit) or videocard should always be monitored because they can reach temps near 100 degree celcius, which is cosidered the boiling point.  A healthy GPU should never exceed 90 celcius… in a desktop or notebook.  If a GPU reaches a danger temp, you will usually notice a huge loss in performance (when playing a game), this is because it downlocked itself in order for it to cool down to a safer temp.

If you do see your temperatures in the danger zone, you should:

1. Immediately turn off your computer and examine the hardware
2. If a desktop, open the case and give a good cleaning out of dust with air cans or an air compressor (set to 50 PSI or less)… focus on the CPU heatsink/fan, the case fans, the power supply unit’s vents/fan, the hard drive, and any other place that you see dust accumulating.
3. If a notebook*, you can just get compressed air cans (or compressor set to 50 PSI or less) and give a good dusting out of the vents, and fans.  I recommend blowing the air is bursts of one or two seconds… especially around the fan(s) since you can affect the fan’s bearings if its overspun.
4. After giving a good dusting out, close the system up (if you opened it) and monitor the temps as you do your work or gaming again.  If the temps have decreased, then you have done a good job cleaning the system out from the clogs.  If the temps are still high, then the following could be the explanation.

*If the temps are still is the danger zone, it could be:

• For notebooks: you should NEVER use the notebook on soft surfaces (laps, beds, couches, pillows, etc.), especially since over 95% of the notebooks today require that the bottom be cleared from obstruction since the fans pull air from the bottom then exhausts the heat through the back/sides.  If you block the bottom of the notebook system, the heat will build up and will cause your system to either shutdown due to overheating and/or cause instabilities from hardware damage due to excessive overheating.  I recommend to always use a notebook on clean, hard, flat surfaces… or even better a good notebook cooler.  If you really want to use the notebook on a soft surface (like your lap), go get yourself a hard, flat board or an inexpensive lapdesk type item.
• If heat still occurs, then you might have to contact your vendor/manufacturer of your system to see what it could be… if you monitored your temps, you whould know which component is overheating (e.g. CPU, GPU, HDD, or etc..)
• If your system is out of warranty, you can be bold enough to open the system to check out the heatsinks that are mounted onto the CPU (and GPUs as well).  They might require a re-securing of the heatsink, as well as a re-application of some thermal compound (like Arctic Silver)…. remember to clean off the previous application of thermal compound before the new application.

In Part 2, I will cover how to properly… as well as simply… monitor the components inside your computer to make sure they are healthy just by looking at their temps.

-Gophn

Tagged with: clean out dust • compressed air • monitor • monitoring • overheating • temperature • temperatures • temps

Filed under: Computers and Technology • News and Articles • Tutorials

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