Classic British Flight Sim

I seem to be forever asking questions these days - must be my age.

Anyways, my PC is a 30 months old 3.4ghz with 2GB RAM, 2 x 250 GB HDs, FX 5700 Graphics. Up until now it has run reasonably well and as advertised.

2 weeks ago I purchased a Epson V700 Photo Scanner to try and digitise my millions of negatives - the Nikon Colscan being far too slow for the job. So, having managed to get over a thousand negatives done in just over ten days things are looking good. Until the other evening when my PC turned into a roaring tornado of fan noise. A heavy duty fan of some sort had cut in at the end of an hour or so's session of digitising and was pumping out a great deal of hot air from a decidedly warm CPU case.

I was somewhat startled at this new sound - it never having happened before no matter how long I had the unit on or how hot the ambient temperature. The PC is under my desk on a plynth to aid all round cooling and is mile away from any heat source.

When the same thing happened again last night - again after a heavy digitising session I began to worry just a little bit.

Is my PSU being over worked, my graphics card about to die, or my motherboard about to melt?

I am due to get a 'mid life upgrade' soon to bring everything up to as new so should I get on with it now before something goes 'pop' or am I being paranoid?

Any help would be appreciated. Finance is no real problem if throwing money at the PC is the answer - I got a deal when I stopped smoking that said my fag money would be saved up and could be spent on flight sims and computers. Amazing how much money I've saved over the years just by stopping smoking - it has even financed my electric wheelchair (buggy).

Anyway, over to you clever people...................


TTFN

Allan

Hi mate,

Over the past 30 months your PC would have accumulated a lot of dust inside. Your imaging work will be making your CPU work hard and therefore it's temp will increase. There is more than likely a layer of dust covering the top of the CPU heatsink that needs removing to aid cooling.

Until this is done, the heat will increase and so will the fan speeds in order to disperse the heat.


What I usually do is lay the PC on it's side, unscrew the fan from the CPU heatsink, scrape the dust away with a flat headed screwdriver then blow the remains away with the aid of a deep breath and a drinking straw.

If you don't want to unscrew the fan then you may get away with using a can of compressed air instead.

Thanks for that CB

I do a regular twice yearly 'dust bust' with a can of air and, having had a quick look, it seems relatively clear of debris, fan blades clean etc.

Not quite sure if I dare delve into bits with any sort of tool as with unsteady hands and unfeeling finger tips it could be a recipe for disaster. This is where having a tame techie is a boon - I lost mine when we moved to Scotland.

Anyway, thanks, I'll get another can and give the innards a good blasting.


Allan

Other than that it may be that the current heatsink just isn't very good.

There are many different types available but you need to know your socket type before purchasing one.

If you dont have compressed air and you dont fancy blowing and inhaling lots of dust, I find that a soft (but old) artist's paint brush of reasonable size is very helpful for removing dust. Depending on exactly what the dust is composed of (e.g. if it is conductive) then you might get little capacitances of even small connections forming between contacts, pins or tracks so its worth removing for that reason in addition to its insulating and fan-throttling properties!

sounds like a fan going bad
bearing or a worn bushing
not a hard fix unless you delay
a CPU can get to critical temps
rather quickly , I wouldn't delay
in giving it proper attention
ATB

I had a similar problem not long ago, it turned out to be the CPU fan bearing had gone and was whining like a banshee under load conditions. I replaced the fan and heat sink (don't forget the grey heat conducting gooey stuff) and put a larger case fan in just for fun and green neon lights. As this summer was somewhat warmer than usual I took a side cover off the case and had a desk fan blowing into the thing. I've been doing a lot of graphics art stuff using Lightwave, Terragen and Carrera and that sort of thing has put a load on the CPU and the fan.

Just a tuppenyworth

Regards

Sean

Its actualy that the incresed heat / fan speed has disapated all of the grease on the bearings in the fan motor. Don't be temped to use WD40 or something similar as its too thin. I would simply replace the fan and/or fan&heatsink.

It seems to me that Allan is not describing the sound of a fan on it's last legs but the noise of a fan or fans increasing in speed/noise.

Most modern PC's have fans that are all temp controlled ie the case fan, the CPU fan and the PSU fan.
Allans work has been stressing the CPU leading to an increase in temp and therefore the fans have upped the rpm.


I'm guessing the PC was purchased from a shop? If so, most if not all shop bought PC's use very cheap cases with poor ventilation.
Do as Avant-Garde-Aclue said and remove the side panel. If the noise dies off then theres your problem.

I managed to get a can of air (only ten quid at PC World) yesterday. So had the side off the PC and was absolutely gobsmacked at the amount of crud inside.

Half an hour and judicious use of a soft typewriter cleaning brush and compressed air and the insides looked like new again - I only did this at the beginning of Summer. The case fan and the CPU fan were given a gentle going over with an artist's brush - again lots of crud. Confirmed that the sound I reported was the case fan at full speed by using a burst of air to make it go. Will probably buy a new fan next time I get the chance.

Put it back together and it still worked - must be getting better at this.

Have given everything a 'heat' test by digitising 70 negatives and no sign of any excess heat build up. So fingers crossed, it is fixed.

One good thing has come out of all this and that is I have remembered the importance of having an up to date back up of all those files that reside on the HDs. Suffice to say that I really (really, really) will back up more frequently from now on............

Thank you everyone for the kind advice - really very much appreciated.

BFN



Allan