Compaq Presario V3000 overheat!

Hello everyone,
I made this mistake and bought a second HP Compaq notebook after first one died out on me.
But whatever it was not too bad here are the related specs:

AMD Turion 64 X2 1.61 GHz
1.5 GB of RAM
256 MB NVidia Geforce Go 6150

First of all, the laptop overheats. With that I mean as shown in Display Settings, GPU core temperature reaches about 120 C. That is one problem.
Other one and probably the most irritating one is that whenever I play a game, after 10 minutes or so games slows down, starts to skip as if my graphics card is not good enough to play. But I do play smooth initially for some time. When it does that, I minimize the game, close the lid and wait for couple minutes. After that it is fine again. If I don't do that after a little while whole system freezes, forcing me to restart.

Did anyone have these problems? Or any suggestions?

I use XP but I have the same problems on Ubuntu it doesn't matter.

Oh, it is Compaq Presario V3000.

Thanks.

Problem one is easily fixed. Go to a Staple or CircuitCity or Walmart and buy a can of compressed air. Spray out the interior of the laptop to get rid of the dust. Dust and pet hair is the WORST enemy of laptops. The cause of problem number to is also most likely overheating. The fix to number one may actually fix number two. let me know if anything changes.

Heat often causes slowdowns as the hardware can't cope with it. I'm surprised your system hasn't shut down on you a few times yet. Anyway, yes uncover anything that you can and spray it out and also blast the air through the fan intakes. Best way to clean it.

Actually, another thing you need to check, speaking of fans, is make sure that your fans are actually pushing air.

This is very TRUE! And seriously unfortunate for the lower middle class guy like me who even can’t afford 5k/month. Since I am software student I needed to upgrade to VISTA which is bit graphics intensive. After upgrading to VISTA, within 10 days my display chip (called GPU) bowled- up because it was unable to bare the heat generated. AND I AM GETTING PUNISHMENT FOR CHOOSING COMPAQ PRODUCT. My college project is incomplete and I have to go to my friends place to complete it.

May I make it clear to all reader the AMD is very good processor and has no problem. It is Compaq who has not used it properly

I AM TAKING PLEAD “I WILL NEVER RECOMMAND HP/COMPAQ PRODUCT TO ANYONE”

this version does not use proper fan cooled heatsink for the GPU. The fan and heatsink are only for the processor. The GPU is only dissipates its heat on the metal below the key board...