Take an air compressor to the inside of your computers!
 

I just cleaned mine after a several months and it never ceases to amaze me just how dusty is can get inside of these things. My cooling fan was particurally clogged up and i'm now running 10 degrees C cooler then before :eek:

Or you can install filters so you never have to do this.... ;)

Nah, sounds expensive by comparison to walking out to the garage once every few months ;)

I invested in a nice computer case like 5 years ago, and continue to use it.. It has filters for my intake fans, and they do an excellent job of filtering in the dust.


Here are some add on filters for the fans.


http://www.xoxide.com/lascutfangri.html

Oh yeah, you should clean out your GFX card while your at it too. They do not like to be ran hot. :)

Still have to unclog the filter from time to time ;)

Should have mentioned that my cooling fan is like this one and the fan itself was clear but the dust was covering some of the spines and preventing airflow.

http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/357...0aled01b0a.jpg

I have the zalman 9700 in my desktop. i dont have problems with needing to opent he computer and clean the fan.... ;) no downtime, as i open the front flap of my case, and remove the filter.... :)

Filters help, but you still need to clean them out good periodically still.

I usually use a vacuum, it's a pain dragging it out to the garage.

We just had the geeks who maintain and service our mainframe come in and double the memory on our desktops. Needless to say, but given the dusty, warehouse-ish conditions, a significant amount of dust builds up over the course of two years since my case was last opened up. :D

Heck, the de-dusting alone would have probably drastically increased the speed.

Im running on a mac that is older that some of the members here. ;)

Impossible. I doubt you're running the forum on an Apple II. All that thing was good for was Oregon Trail and learning how to type.. ha!

Wow that takes me back......

http://img827.imageshack.us/img827/6267/oregontrail.jpg

You should see the layers of dust that collect in all the computers at my office. A stone yard is about as nasty of a dust environment as they come. Iv'e opened up units & seen literally a 1/2" layer of accumulated crud in the bottom, and the motherboard completely monotone brown/gray.
And, they were still working!

If you smoke near your computer you will find black goo caked onto the components too :)

be careful with your pressure if you use a compressor, better option is the deionized air spray cans from the computer store. Compressed air contains, water and oil and will end up causing the inside to be even more of a dust magnet after you spray it out. Too much pressure can spin fans too high and damage them, definitely if you have a centrifical blower type fan, it wont survive even a moment of high speed air before the blade explodes