Hi,

 

I have an Inspiron 5150, 512 MB RAM, 64 MB video, 40 GB hard disk, P4-M 3 GHz.

During the last couple of days, I have noticed that the fan kicks in much more often than usually, even if the CPU utilization is less than 10%. This happens even when the room temperature is lower than the usual.

I downloaded a program that shows the CPU temperature, and I noticed that when I start my computer the CPU temp. is at 33 C. While the computer is on, it starts going up, and even with the PC idle, it can reach 45-50 C. When I do a really simple, not intensive task, such as opening Outlook Express or Internet Explorer it goes up to 55 - 65 C, causing the fan to kick in. The fan never kicked it in the past when I was doing these kinds of tasks, or even more intensive tasks - e.g. editing with DreamWeaver Ultradev.

I am confident things are not working the way they did, and I can't find any reason to justify this change.

I used the diagnostics program to check the fan and sensor, and it looks ok.

Do you have any suggestions? Is there any way I can detect what the problem is or to resolve it?

Thank you in advance