Computer Overheating!
- Thread starter Austin
- Start date
Try cleaning out any dust and sponge rainbow kitty hair with some compressed air. Make sure all of your fans are working (replacing them is easy). If you are still having problems, try adding a new layer of thermal paste to the processor. There are a few guides out there that can walk you through the steps. If all those fail, add more fans or switch to a better cpu cooler.
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2010
- Messages
- 1,948
how old is the PSU? If it's at the end of it's life, it's most likely it's going to overheat fast. Also, the PSU is the hottest component of your PC i learned at school. I bet i'm wrong lol
One thing that I noticed on my GPU. The fan wasn't cycling up whenever it was under load. So instead of going up from 40% of air, it stayed at that level, which always led to the GPU getting up 60 degrees Celsius, and inevitably shutting the PC down. I have to manually set the fan to increase to 60% of fan speed, and that brings the GPU temp down to 50 degrees or lower. Still looking at this, trying to understand why its acting like that for me, but it's something that could be affecting you.
^^^^^This.
Also the checking your fans thing is really important. Fans tend to die (especially cpu fans) so check each one individually to make sure they haven't lost their RPMs. Some fans just die completely and even though they light up and show getting power the bearings are shot and they don't rotate...this goes for GPU fans and PSU fans too. If you are one of the lucky few that has a detachable GPU and PSU fan that you can replace w/o splicing you can replace them fairly easy. If not I'd be super careful if you try it on your own.
Nother quick question. How much power and how many components? If you are trying to draw too much power over the rails you can stress out your PSU and GPU to the point of overheating and shutting down. Alot of people overlook this.
For example.
I run 650w for 4850 HD ATI, 3 HDD, 2 4pin MOBO, 1 24pin MOBO, 1 DVD and 4 fans.
I tried to run 530w for it.. and it was not enough. That should give you an idea.
Some display drivers have been known to cause overheating. I run 11.1 because they give me the best results for my card type. Newer drivers are causing the display driver to stop responding and some odd voltages.
If you need an older driver and can't find it.. let me know.
If you take it in for warranty have them check all your fans.. (yes even the ones in the front and back) a gpu fan doesn't mean much w/o airflow to get the hot air out XD. Have them check your PSU for proper voltages on the rails.
Hope this helps <3
Also the checking your fans thing is really important. Fans tend to die (especially cpu fans) so check each one individually to make sure they haven't lost their RPMs. Some fans just die completely and even though they light up and show getting power the bearings are shot and they don't rotate...this goes for GPU fans and PSU fans too. If you are one of the lucky few that has a detachable GPU and PSU fan that you can replace w/o splicing you can replace them fairly easy. If not I'd be super careful if you try it on your own.
Nother quick question. How much power and how many components? If you are trying to draw too much power over the rails you can stress out your PSU and GPU to the point of overheating and shutting down. Alot of people overlook this.
For example.
I run 650w for 4850 HD ATI, 3 HDD, 2 4pin MOBO, 1 24pin MOBO, 1 DVD and 4 fans.
I tried to run 530w for it.. and it was not enough. That should give you an idea.
Some display drivers have been known to cause overheating. I run 11.1 because they give me the best results for my card type. Newer drivers are causing the display driver to stop responding and some odd voltages.
If you need an older driver and can't find it.. let me know.
If you take it in for warranty have them check all your fans.. (yes even the ones in the front and back) a gpu fan doesn't mean much w/o airflow to get the hot air out XD. Have them check your PSU for proper voltages on the rails.
Hope this helps <3
Last edited:
- Joined
- Apr 6, 2011
- Messages
- 177
How do you know its overheating for sure? Is it just randomly locking up or rebooting and you are assuming its overheating?
How hot is the CPU getting?
Do as others suggested and Check the fans, especially the cpu and gpu fans.
Open up side of case, put a box fan blowing directly in there.
And see if it improves.
If it does, its a heat/air flow issue, if it still locks up or reboots, that's not the problem. I would start checking the PSU first.
btw-
GPU's run hot. 60c is not all that hot for a GPU.
