How To Fix A Noisy Computer

Step 1: It could be the fans:

Hi, I'm Dean and I'm going to show you how to fix a nosiy computer. Most of the time if your computer starts squealing or growling, its caused by one of the cooling fans. There can be as many as six cooling fans in a computer similar to this.

Step 2: Leave your computer plugged in:

You can start by leaving your computer plugged in (this one is not at the moment), but with your computer plugged in, the fan similar to this up here is the power supply fan and those tend to get a lot of heat so those are usually one of the first ones to fail.

Step 3: Look for noise changes:

With it plugged in, you can tap it and see if the noise changes. If it changes, it's a good possibility that this is the one right here that's causing the problem. The easiest way to fix that is to replace the entire power supply. On my website there's an article describing exactly how to do that.

Step 4: Checking case fans:

You can also check some of the case fans in an area like this. Tap near that.If the noise changes, that may be your culprit. It's not always this one. It may change the noise because it could, the vibrating, could change some of the other fans in the computer and change its sound.

Step 5: Use a flashlight:

Another thing you can do while it's running, using a small flashlight (any flashlight), take a look at the fan itself. Watch it spinning. If it's slowing down and hesitating, stalling, that's a bad thing going out and needs to be replaced.

Step 6: Remove cover:

Now, if you don't find the problem to be one of the external-facing fans, go ahead and remove the cover to your computer. With it plugged in and running, you can check each of the internal fans using the flashlight method, checking each one, see if there's any stalling. If you don't see anything with the flashlight, you can check it with something like a pencil eraser and just tap those different fans. See if the noise goes away or changes and that'll help you identify which fan could be bad.

Step 7: PCI slot fan:

Now most of these fans in these computers are standard off-the-shelf items from your local pc-electronics store. Some of them can be difficult to find. The ones on the mother board, they're small, special-purpose fans that can be very difficult. If you can't find them, one thing I have done in the past is if there's, for example, a chip set cooler fan on the mother board, you can remove the fan if you have a reasonable amount of air flow through the computer. You can add one of these, which is a PCI slot fan, which will pass air by, leaving the heat seek on the mother board and providing other air flow. You can usually get away with that; not always, but you can try.

Step 8: When installing a fan:

Another thing to consider if you're adding fans or replacing any fans in your computer case, specifically the case and power supply fans, you want to pay attention to the direction of airflow. Generally, you want all the air flowing the same direction. In a case like this it's front to back which is very common.Pay attention to the current fans in it; replacing any these fans, make sure it faces the same direction.

Step 9: Evacuate hot air:

Again, in this case, all the fans face backward so the airflow goes front to back.so the air flow goes front to back. If you create, a lot of people think you just blow air in from the outside. It doesn't work. All you create is, you're holding all the ambient and hot air inside. You want to evacuate that hot air.Fixing stuff, out.