I decided to clean out the computer this morning. It gets dust bunnies in it, and if enough dust collects on the heat sinks, it can cause the computer to overheat and let the smoke out.
Computers really run on smoke, you know. You can tell it’s true because if you let the smoke out, the computer will stop running. That happened to this computer a few years ago because I didn’t clean it out.
So, I opened the hood to expose the guts of the computer, and blew out the dust.
The part I am cleaning in the photo is the heat sink of the CPU. Here is a closer view.
All of those fins have to be clean or it will smoke itself.
The thing that I am using to clean the computer is a Giottos Rocket, which I bought from Amazon for about $10. It replaces expensive, wasteful Canned Air for blowing out the dust. It is a rubber bulb with a valve on one end and the spout on the other. Squeeze it to pump air. Simple. The rocket works fine, and air, after all…. is free… right? Get the Large version if you get one.
Here is another photo of the Rocket.
Ignore those two stuffed shirts sitting next to it. They think that they are Rocket Scientists, but they are really only Linux Mascots. They act up in order to get attention. Ignore them, or they will never stop.