cleaning (dusting) out computer CPU

[Gerianne]

my computer  stopped working. the power went on for my monitor, not for my CPU. I had an electronics friend look at it and he told me about "dusting coolant" product. as a computer owner, you need to clean out dust from your CPU every four months. It must be done outside. The dust goes everywhere. [you should know that too] No one tells you this when you buy one. I suppose many people are buying new computers unnecessarily not knowing it costs about five dollars for the solution.

[Liquidfire_43]

To be honest, CPU does not need to be dusted unless you literally have a thick sheet of dust and you smack it across the cpu.... It's actually the heatsink or the cpu fan that needs to be cleaned... If you don't clean your cpu's heatsink or fan for a long period of time, your cpu will overheat and eventually fail... I think you will know when your computer needs a compressed aerosol when your computer fan gets loud (that means the cpu is getting hot and your fan is trying to cool your cpu from overheating)... Other then tht it could mean your computer components are getting old


"No one tells you this when you buy one"

I think they assume people will know this because a computer has a fan vent... As any other fan related things, central air filter, car filter, and regular fan accumalated dust and need maintenance.

[natashaspy]

we always use the canned air to clean things out every now and then.  its important for laptops as well as for desktops.  also it's smart to use a cooling fan for laptops to keep them from overheating

[lvstephanie]

I so wanted to do this to the DVR... It would complain about overheating etc. and since I have pets, I know how dirty my computer could get. But unfortunately the DVR had a tamper-proof tape over it with the statement that the warranty would be violated if the unit was opened. I called up tech support to ask if I could open the unit just to dust it off, and they told me that they couldn't allow me to do that, but rather wanted me to claim the unit as defective and get a new one shipped to me instead.

[LenoraMinogue]

The CPU doesn't need dusting. It's usually well protected from dust. However, it doesn't hurt to carefully dust the inside of your case every once in awhile. Make sure to discharge any static electricity from yourself first before touching any parts inside by touching the side of the metal case first though.