VERY loud Studio XPS 8100

Hi all, thanks in advance.

My issue is with my 5 year old Studio XPS 100 with a GeForce GTS240. It's very, very loud. As in, a fan revving real high.

I'm not sure if it's the CPU fan, case fan or a fan on the GPU. The thing is, it's only loud when the computer is POSTing. When Windows 7 is up and running, the fan settles down and returns to normal operation.

I recently wanted to use the computer as a server, so I installed Windows Server 2008 on it (have recently returned to Windows 7). During the install process of Windows Server the fan was running crazy loud, just like it does during POST. When the installation was complete and it booted into Win Server, the fan STAYED loud, it didn't calm down like it does when Windows 7 loads.

It also stays super loud if you boot into something else, for example, Acronis Live CD to make an image file.

I'm going to take a video of it tonight and post a link. I'm at work right now. I've also just learned of the Dell self-diagnostic tools available through this support site. I'm going to let it run a full diagnostic and see what comes up.

Oh, the other thing I forgot to mention is that last night I booted up using the Acronis Live CD to make an image of the harddrive - the fan was loud, and stayed loud as described above - but this time, about 5 minutes into the image making process, my monitor shut down and went into sleep mode. Presumably because the video card stopped sending a signal. I've used Acronis a bunch in the past and it doesn't ever shut the monitor off during an operation. A few minutes after the monitor went off the LED on the power button on the computer's case started turning from white (which it is normally) to orange, then back to white, then back to orange... etc...  The computer then started beeping. I've also just learned that the amount of beeps means something, which I didn't know at the time.

Anyways, just looking for any tips.

What I was going to do:

1) Run Dell's self diagnostic software - see what happens.

2) Swap the video card with a different one, see if the noise goes awat.

Thanks!