I fire up World in Conflict the other night and within 5 mins the CPU overheat alarm is sounding. WTF? I open the case while it is beeping and the fan is spinning fine but there is noticeable heat in the case. I bring it down and get into the bios and sure enough this sucker is idling at 65c. The poor fan is going at 2000 rpm which for that size of fan is moving!
Upon further inspection the entire topside of the heatsink has a layer of dust that is preventing air from flowing over the fins, only around the outer edge of the heatsink. If anybody has worked with the retail heatsink for the C2D they will understand how it looks. Anyways the small area between the fins apparently can trap dust and it will build up to the point where airflow is compromised.
I take the thing off and clean the fins with a folded piece of paper. I pulled a lot of dust from that thing. Put it back on and it idles at 32-35c and plays games at 39c. Fan is also spinning at 700 rpm at idle.
If you start to notice a rise in temp on your C2D and you have a retail heatsink. Chances are high you have run into the same issue as I. This build is only ~10 months old. So dust does build up rather fast.
I have since got the gigabyte utility for the DS3 that works in Vista and will pay better attention to my temps.
Upon further inspection the entire topside of the heatsink has a layer of dust that is preventing air from flowing over the fins, only around the outer edge of the heatsink. If anybody has worked with the retail heatsink for the C2D they will understand how it looks. Anyways the small area between the fins apparently can trap dust and it will build up to the point where airflow is compromised.
I take the thing off and clean the fins with a folded piece of paper. I pulled a lot of dust from that thing. Put it back on and it idles at 32-35c and plays games at 39c. Fan is also spinning at 700 rpm at idle.
If you start to notice a rise in temp on your C2D and you have a retail heatsink. Chances are high you have run into the same issue as I. This build is only ~10 months old. So dust does build up rather fast.
I have since got the gigabyte utility for the DS3 that works in Vista and will pay better attention to my temps.
