i wanted to know whether ne1 knows why my computer heats up so quickly when i use windows media player? normally it runs at about 50C but when i use windows media player it quickly goes up to about 70C and then switches off?

im not sure if its a problem with my fan or what?

my specs are:
AMD Athlon64 3000 Socket939
1GB Corsair RAM
200GB Maxtor Serial-ATA Hard Drive

im using everest home edition to check the CPU temp

Check if your fans are running. All of them. Just to give you a checklist:
Check all fans on the casing.
Check the fan on the CPU heatsink (it should be on a huge aluminium/copper block).
Check the fan on the graphics card (if there's one).
Check the fan in the power supply (just see if its running/blowing hot air out at the back).
That should cover it.

While you're at it, you might want to clean them too, just give them a shot from an air can if you have one available. Also, check the heatsinks for dust. Dust traps heat well, which is not good. Again, use that airspray. Do not use a vacuum cleaner or electric blower of sorts. An air can is the best, although you may use dry tissue paper/cloth and wipe it.

If they are running, check the ambient temperature. If its high, then you'll have to do something about your ambient temperature (add an air conditioning system to your room?). Chances are that your room temp should be fine.

Another problem might be the airflow within the casing itself: not enough hot air is going out of the casing, and not enough cold air going in. You'll need to add more fans if this were the case.

You might not have installed the heatsink on the CPU properly. You probably would need to reinstall the heatsink if thats the problem. Use Arctic Silver 5. Its the best out there, even compared to other Silver pastes.

somethings wrong....... really wrong

how do u check that the CPU heatsink is working? should the fan be blowing air up or down?

Its quite hard to tell if the fan is blowing up or down... It should blow down into the heatsink, but experience tells me that you can't really tell, either way will feel about the same, albeit alot weaker. But given the number of strong fans around, they can feel as if they're blowing on your hand even when they're sucking air.

The CPU heatsink just sits there. Its the fans that you have to worry about. If the fans work, then your heatsink may not be installed properly, and there's no real way to tell.

the cpu fan should blow down onto the heatsink itslef.. the easyest way to test which way the fan is blowing (or any sort of wind) is to hold a tissue paper (or a realy flimsy material) loosly very close over it, if it moves away = out and in = in..

and also taking care that the tissue doesnt slip your hand and get caught or fly to a destination you wont want it going to...

oh yeh.. 50`C idle is kinda abit hot (although bearable) for my tastes..

consider getting yourself a bit more cooling headroom -> fans (in a good airflow direction - bottom to top, front to back, sides in), reapply some real thermal stuff like arctic silver, clean out the dust (especialy heatsink and fan filters) with an air compressor or dust blowing device..

Why didn't I think of the tissue paper thing....

There's hardly any chance that a CPU fan is blowing the wrong direction. Its plugged into the m/b and it'll take quite abit of forcing to get it in the wrong direction.

The casing fans are a different story, as these could be screwed onto the casing the wrong direction.

At this time, I'm betting you'll need to re-install the heatsink. I'll recommend getting another one instead if you can afford it. There are many cheap ones below 50 bux. Some even below 30 bux, and most of these will be better than the current heatsink.

Wing: You have received some excellent advice from all the above replies and the only thing I can add is that if you look at the case of any fan, it will have stamped the direction of air flow and direction of rotation on any one side, if you need to know this information. BTW, what are you using to measure your CPU temperature?

50C is way too hot for an Athlon64 to run at. Depending on what core you have... even with a stock cooler it should run high 20's to low 30's ide, and no more than 10 higher under load. AMD64's can only handle 65C max.

The fans on stock heatsinks (and probably all HSFs for that matter) always blow down onto the heatsink fins. this is very easy to tell, ever watch wild west movies where the cowboy wets his finger and points up to feel which way the wind is blowing?

as far as cleaning the dust out is concerned, compressed air is great for removing dust from the HSF fins, but its just going to put it other places in your case. I have been vacuuming my rigs for years, i have never had any issues (either static or otherwise).

definetly remove the HSF, clean it with alcohol, apply thermal paste (I used AS5 the last time I cleaned my HSF out, and I didn't notice any difference from the generic white grease I've always used... maybe it's just me?)

On the AS5, its just you. I used some generic silicone grease (with great results on a new HSF) for a few months. I can immediately see a 5C difference when I applied AS5 to the same HSF.

And for some reason, the same number (5C) always come up when people use AS5.

70C I agree is way hot. I wouldn't run my GPU on that, but I saw that with stock cooling it runs till that, but even then I changed over and made sure it never got above 60.

I freaked out when my old celeron hit 47.

And there is a way to tell what way your fans are blwing, it's flawless. Look at the middle of teh fan, if it has a round sticker facing you, thats the way its gonna blow. Please don't ever peel that sticker off, it's important.

that's true most of the time, but not always

first of all... why would he peel it off?
and second of all who cares if he does?
the sticker on a case fan is about as important as the "do not remove under penalty of law" tag on mattresses... lol :giddy:

lol nice one

First of all, its a freaking sticker. Whats the big deal on a sticker?? Unless it says "Danger, High Voltage. Human Frying Possible at Physical Contact" It probably doesn't say anything important.

Second of all, there are better ways of determining which way fans blow. Just take it out, check the angle on the fins, and see which way (clockwise/anticlockwise) it turns.

Either way, most fans inside your case (not on) most probably are blowing the right way. There's no point checking. Really. Unless you've been messing around with the leads like I did.