Is my pc overheating?

[philehidiot]

I remove thermal paste using pre-injection swabs which are little pads soaked in IPA as above. They work well but you have to get the worst off manually with something scrapey that won't damage the surface you're working on (plastic spudger is good) and then once it's down to near residue it's worth using some of the above type of swabs. They're particlarly suited as they don't leave bits of lint but be wary that if you do get them there are two types, one is just IPA and other have chlorhexadine or some other antiseptic in which you really don't want to be using as it leaves a residue. You can get them off amazon.

Yes, I use the swabs issued for injecting myself to clean bits of PC. And also bits of motorbike. Occasionally I use them before sticking a syringe in myself.

[watercooled]

well my issue is when playing games (wow mostly) my pc gets noisey and i drop a lot of frames. i have lowered the settings but i still have the issue where its almost a slideshow

I see, it sounds like some games are pushing the card to its throttling temperature, and if fans are spinning faster than usual, the first thing to try would be to clean as much dust as possible out of the computer, before you start tearing things apart. Start with the simple stuff first! It's surprising how much dust you can find in a GPU heatsink if it's been used for a while.

The CPU still has some headroom before it hits throttle temperature, so main suspect would be GPU heatsink.

Combination of an air compressor and a hoover work well, just be careful to tie the fan blades in place so they don't risk spinning too fast and breaking things (not sure how big of a risk that really is but it doesn't hurt to play it safe). Also be careful where you point the vacuum if you're waving it around inside the system, e.g. don't knock off any components etc. Lastly, if you're using cans of 'compressed air' be aware it's usually butane/propane propellant i.e. flammable, so avoid sucking that straight through a hoover, just to be safe!

If, having tried all that, there's no real improvement, then consider stripping stuff apart.

[satsuma]

yeah gpu temp was peaking at 98 earlier, so I think its an issue

[satsuma]

woop! temps went down a bit ^^
https://prnt.sc/ldc8g3

thanks for all the help!

[Ravens Nest]

woop! temps went down a bit ^^
https://prnt.sc/ldc8g3

thanks for all the help!

Wow thats amazing, nearly cut in half whats gaming like now?

[Zak33]

now you know it was the GPU... and you're sorted short term, may I suggest you get a new GPU soon anyway?

Because that 2gig card you have now isn't really particularly good compared to your BENQ 1920x1080 120hz monitor.

I think you'd be genuinely surprised how much faster all your games would run on that monitor .. you're not in need of a CPU to be fair.

Your screen shots show 8gig of DDR3. in single channel mode. Do you have 4 sticks of 2gig DDR3?

moving from 8 gig to 16 would be useful, and many games now use all that 8 and more and DDR3 is cheap enough second hand....its only DDR4 that's painful to afford.

[philehidiot]

16GB of DDR3 is around £100. I'm not sure it'll provide enough of a performancce boost given the games are going to be more limited by the GPU. I would consider a new GPU first (IF it's limiting gaming - some people have a few older games and just don't really play newer ones so it's just not worth it for them until their current GPU dies) but only extra RAM if there's extra monies sitting around. Getting it into dual channel mode would be helpful though!

[watercooled]

woop! temps went down a bit ^^
https://prnt.sc/ldc8g3

thanks for all the help!

Just dust clearing, or replacing TIM too?

[Zak33]

16GB of DDR3 is around £100. I'm not sure it'll provide enough of a performancce boost given the games are going to be more limited by the GPU. I would consider a new GPU first (IF it's limiting gaming - some people have a few older games and just don't really play newer ones so it's just not worth it for them until their current GPU dies) but only extra RAM if there's extra monies sitting around. Getting it into dual channel mode would be helpful though!

i think he only needs 8 ... it's why I asked what the ram config is... and second hand 8 gig won't be £50

but you're right.. card first 100%

[satsuma]

Wow thats amazing, nearly cut in half whats gaming like now?

i noticed a improvement, i didnt have fps lag so i'm happy

now you know it was the GPU... and you're sorted short term, may I suggest you get a new GPU soon anyway?

Because that 2gig card you have now isn't really particularly good compared to your BENQ 1920x1080 120hz monitor.

I think you'd be genuinely surprised how much faster all your games would run on that monitor .. you're not in need of a CPU to be fair.

Your screen shots show 8gig of DDR3. in single channel mode. Do you have 4 sticks of 2gig DDR3?

moving from 8 gig to 16 would be useful, and many games now use all that 8 and more and DDR3 is cheap enough second hand....its only DDR4 that's painful to afford.

i have 2 x 4gb ram and noticed i had them in the wrong slots haha, must have been when i cleaned teh pc and reapplied thermal paste in the summer.
What are good gfx cards now at the £200 mark?

[satsuma]

Just dust clearing, or replacing TIM too?

I cleaned the dust on the GPU heatsink and replaced the thermal paste, I had previously just used compressed air to clean but it didn't do much so decided to do a thorough clean

[DanceswithUnix]

What are good gfx cards now at the £200 mark?

Right now, I would go for an RX 580 8GB.

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/power...gx-18l-pc.html

though this close to black Friday you could wait and see what pops up.

[Andy00900]

I'm thinking to replace my cpu cooler, any suggestion would be appreciated

Depends on the size of your case and budget. Generally I'd recommend air cooling because it much cheaper, can reach similar performance to the best AIO coolers, they're quieter and most importantly the only failure would be a fan.

[satsuma]

after more testing sadly cleaning my pc and gpu has not solved the issue, slight improvement overall but still really low frame rates when raiding in wow (20 man)

Do you guys really think its the GPU and/or ram that's holding my system back?

[DanceswithUnix]

after more testing sadly cleaning my pc and gpu has not solved the issue, slight improvement overall but still really low frame rates when raiding in wow (20 man)

Do you guys really think its the GPU and/or ram that's holding my system back?

Probably GPU. There are separate graphics options for raiding in WoW for a reason
8GB of ram should still be enough.

Turn the raiding graphics settings right down, and see if that helps. If it does, then that proves your gpu isn't coping. They do turn the graphics requirements up with every expansion though, and a newer card would get you DX12 support so it might be worth doing anyway if you can afford it.

[satsuma]

Probably GPU. There are separate graphics options for raiding in WoW for a reason
8GB of ram should still be enough.

Turn the raiding graphics settings right down, and see if that helps. If it does, then that proves your gpu isn't coping. They do turn the graphics requirements up with every expansion though, and a newer card would get you DX12 support so it might be worth doing anyway if you can afford it.

yeah its on the raid settings also, even when i lower them to the lowest settings there isnt much gain but when there is a lot going on (i.e lots of mobs/adds etc) the fps just drops really low (10fps)