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Performance dropped to abysmal levels after cleaning fan and replacing thermal paste

Tags:
  • Performance
  • Fan
  • CPUs
  • Thermal Compound
  • Dell Studio Xps
Last response: in CPUs
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August 26, 2013 6:54:03 PM

I have a Dell XPS M1330, cpus are Intel Core 2 Duo T6400. I've had overheading and fan noise problems for years so I decided to handle the problem by cleaning the fan and replacing the thermal paste as shown in this video. Since then, performance has been terrible, everything is extremely slow (several minutes to do things that should be done in seconds like starting an app) and my system monitors, both in gnu/linux and on windows 7, indicate a cpu load of 100% pretty much all the time, though Windows' resource monitor says cpu load 100%, 22% maximum frequency. Temperatures usually stick around 50°C but is seems the fan never starts. I don't know what to do or how to explain the symptoms.
- Why are the cpus so slow now that the fan is cleaned and new thermal paste is on?
- Why do the system monitors believe cpus are running 100% all the time? If it really is, what is it doing?
- Why doesn't the fan ever start? I made sure I reconnected it and I was careful when I pulled it off.
I'm hoping these are typical symptoms of something that can be fixed, maybe someone knows about this?

More about : performance dropped abysmal levels cleaning fan replacing thermal paste

August 26, 2013 7:03:57 PM

geoffmen said:
Temperatures usually stick around 50°C but is seems the fan never starts.


Your CPU fan is not running? If so, that's a serious problem. When you took it off to clean it an reapply the thermal paste, did you remember to plug the wire back in in addition to putting the heat sink back on the CPU?
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August 27, 2013 6:16:33 AM

Yes I plugged it back the way it was, I think!
When I pulled it off it was a little hard to come off and at some point I tried pulling the wires lightly, it didn't budge so I didn't force it and went back to pulling the plug. The wires didn't appear to have ripped off and I don't think I applied excessive tension. It's the only thing I can think of that could have damaged the device.
Tonight I'll try pulling it off and back...
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