Invaluable hardware tip!

[AH_Viper]

Ok, this totaly belongs in the hardware section but honestly its to valuable to just go there and be unnoticed.

Basicaly, for about the past 2 month my computer been acting up. I've tried various drivers and such like but it's just behaving strange, like locking up in games and even the desktop! Another strange phoneomon was that simple graphics apps seem to be overly intensive and cause my AMD 3400 64bit, 2GB RAM and X800 XT PE to stutter. As it was a beta download of some app I assumed it was the app and not my computer.

I thought it might have been a ram issue, so tried various combos of sticks but to no avail.

Anyway, today I thought I would try reseating all the components in my case. Having built the computer myself (as I have done for many years) I know that it can sometimes cause problems. However, upon removing my graphics card the issue was right there infront of me! The GPU heatsink had more dust in it than a desert! I'm honestly surprised when the gpu was reaching 78C in games that it wasn't setting itself on fire!

Needless to say, I got out the hover, sucked the heatsink and the rest of my case clean and now im getting 33C idle temps for my GPU apposed to, what I thought was quite resonable before, 45C. That's 12C drop!

Comp now runs flawlessly as ever and am over the moon I didnt go splashing out cash from my new job on a whole new system... as I was contemplating doing

Anyway - VACUM YOUR COMPUTERS!!! I used to do it quite a bit, and now I remember why!

 

[DiSTuRbEd]

Yeah its been almost a year for my pc since I blew it out. I do mine about every year or so in October.

 

[Fliko]

Its valuable to go into the hardware section, because when people want to look for tips or need help, they will see this and look at it.

If you put it in off-topic, well then, everyone sees it and they don't want to see it in that section because it isn't related in that section

 

[KagePrototype]

I'm moving it anyway!

HAR HAR HAR

 

[AH_Viper]

Its valuable to go into the hardware section, because when people want to look for tips or need help, they will see this and look at it.

If you put it in off-topic, well then, everyone sees it and they don't want to see it in that section because it isn't related in that section

When you put it like that it does make sense

I still think there's folk out there though, like myself, that wouldn't have even looked in the hardware section. I just thought my computer was getting a little bit old

 

[Krynn72]

I wouldnt have come here if it werent still linked to in the general chat.

But then again... I thought it was common sense to remove dust from your computer and not an "Invaluable hardware tip" :thumbs:

 

[Unfocused]

Is it safe? Cause I heard once that if you touch some parts of the computer with a hover there might be a dangerous electrostatic discharge or some shit like that that will screw your PC.

 

[Asus]

I wouldn't trust a normal vacuum near my PC. I have a mini for this kind of thing. Or canned air. FYI 78C itself isn't alarming for gfx temp but that dust is!

 

[AH_Viper]

I knew someone would point out that it's "common sense" and as I said, its something I used to do, maybe twice a year out of habit - either from buying a new component or just generaly giving my room a really good clean.

However, as Asus correctly said, 75 even 80 isn't an unreasonable temp for a GPU (esspecaily considering mine was overclocked a little) and at no point, even with 15 years of computer building under my belt (yes I started with 386's and was over the moon when i got an Overdrive for my 486 ), did I think "Hum, my computer is locking up... my temps throughout my case are normal... and my RAM checks out OK... IT MUST BE DUST!"

Look, im not trying to be cocky, i'm just trying to help. It can obviously make a difference, its not always the first thing people think of, and only takes 10mins.

As to what to use... I just use a my vacum cleaner extension, without the brush. As long as you don't HIT your components with the thing I don't see what could really go wrong. Ok, if it's hugely powerfull then you might be fearfull it rips out a component, but having done it for years I can say it's ever happened to me. Infact, if it did, i would probably just blame the mobo for being crap with low quality soldering, rather than blaming myself.