You say you know lil about computers etc-....
If you can find anywhere in the thread that I claimed to be anything more than an ignorant computer user, I'll insist that someone edited one of my posts. I don't claim to be anything I'm not.
What about how clean things are- dirt dust etc. Do you smoke or in same room with the system- Smoke is worst than dust and dirt it is sticky- tar etc. If you can see a light coat of dust on your vid card etc- it acts like a blanket and temps can run 4 to 9f or so more hot.
The fans can be dirty and will move less air or the cooler its self under the fan etc can be dirty. Remove the cards from the system- use a can of air and blow it out good- always hold the can upright so no fluids come out and maybe 4 to 6 inches or so away- use some qtips and and rubbing alcohol- but only the isopropyl type- 70 or 90% no real matter. Dip the qtip's then roll it/them on a dry paper towel so it is not dripping wet- clean the whole card front and back and the fan and the cooler under it as best you can might help. I guess you understand when 1 qtip gets dirty use another. Never re dip a dirty qtip- use a clean one each time..
It's a no-smoke house, but have cats and a dog, so was expecting a fur coat inside. When I opened it, I was surprised at how clean it was for a system that's almost a year old now. I did have to vacuum the fins of the radiator for the CPU cooler but everything else had a very light dusting. I know better than to try to vacuum the hard parts and I was going to use some compressed air to try to clean it out more but have not done so yet.
As for cleaning the fans, here's my pickle. I have muscle tremors and motor tics, meaning my hands shake a little all the time and jerk drastically every once in a while. The reason my house is full of store-bought computers now is because when I used to work on them, I invariably killed them. I don't have steady enough hands to deal with the intricate parts. I live in a very rural area with two computer stores, both of which I've dealt with and would never trust with something more than a hard drive or PSU install. As for friends, the only people I know are even less electronically inclined than I
Which leaves contacting Dell(and why I'm not really over the top worried about this issue). This computer is actually a replacement for another that I bought from them, which had a nasty habit of hard lockups. I managed to record a memory fault during one of the lockups and thought it would be a pretty straight forward deal with them. Three months later, I was still trying to get it resolved. They drove someone out to replace the vid cards, then the CPU, I had reinstalled Windows twice at their insistance(losing tons to gigs of games that I had to re-download). Finally a support operative told me that it had taken so long to resolve the issue that the computer I had purchased was no longer offered, would I like to "upgrade" to the Alienware Aurora? Being happy that I was getting another machine, I agreed.
So I know when I call them with anything other than a completely DOA system, I'm going to be in for a world of heartache. I know the temps are still out of normal boundaries(thanks to you guys on the forum), but I also know that I'll be tasked with doing things for months that have nothing to do with my issue. First, they'll wipe my OS install, again causing me to lose probably 100 gigs of data. After that, they'll get rid of the latest device drivers and put it back to the year old "safe" drivers which are insufficient for any of the latest games. After that, I'll begin the "did anything catastrophic happen? No? Let us know if the problem gets worse" phase of the phone calls.
I've begun to hope is that the cards do completely take a flying jump through a ring of fire and pass away. That way, it's a very clear cut issue. I'm under warranty and I need a system that works. There can be no OS installs, visits from people representing Dell that brought one part with them and are not authorized to touch anything but that one part and very little talking to people that I have trouble understanding over the phone.
I'm very sorry for the long response. I'm very appreciative of your help and just wanted to explain my situation so you didn't think I'm taking the situation lightly or that I didn't believe what you were telling me.
