Hardware support – heat issues
My computer has begun having heat issues. I haven’t noticed any preformance problems yet, but this evening it began to smell faintly of the magic smoke they put in computers (if ever this smoke leaves a chip, it smells bad and the chip stops working). I don’t think anything important broke, but I’d like to stop this problem before it gets worse. Currently, I have the side of the case off, and a desk fan blowing into it. What can I do as a more permanent solution? I removed the plastic curvy piece that directs the big cooling fan on the back to the CPU, so the desk fan can reach the CPU. Should I put that back? I could take out the parts I’m not using (floppy drive, firewire card, and 56k modem), but they don’t generate much heat (the main heat sources are the two GeForce2 video cards and the Pentium 4 CPU). I don’t want to install a cooling system that uses something besides air. I don’t want to buy a new case. I would be willing to install more fans, if someone can tell me where they should go and how to install them (I am comfortable soldering stuff if necessary). By removing the side of the case, have I made the airflow worse?
The case currently has 4 fans: one on the power supply, one in the back with the curvy plastic onto the CPU (which has another directly on top of it), and one on the heat sink on one of the GeForce2s.
My apartment does not have air conditioning, and when I’m not here I close and lock the doors (there are no windows in the main room; just 2 doors), so that when I come home it is uncomfortably hot and stuffy, even for me. I’d like to keep my computer running when I’m not home, because I sometimes SSH in to it to get files. Any help would be appreciated.