Fan cleaning season

It's that time of year again. My laptop's fan needs cleaning.

As many of you know, this is a newer laptop. A free, powerful replacement from my older one. But it appears that even this one can be infected with "the bug". A while ago, I wrote about "lag waves" that showed up in my video games. I don't experience those lag waves very often on this computer, but I do during Runescape sometimes. Which is strange, because I DON'T experience lag waves during my games with better graphics like Hitman: Blood Money or Oblivion. Funny, huh?

Anyway. For some reason I'm experiencing lag waves in Runescape, and also occasionally in CS Source. Now once you get done laughing at the games I play, could you please find it in your heart to help me out?

I'm pretty certain that these lag waves are the result of a malfunctioning fan. The overheating might be what's causing the lag waves. Sound plausible? Is there any other cause of lag waves I might have overlooked?

And last but not least, how do I go about cleaning the fans in my laptop?

Also, is there some alternate form of cooling? Some kind of fancy device I can strap to my laptop that makes it cool better?

CS:S and RS are both online games.
the lag could be caused by the servers, not your computer.

it seems more likely that it's the servers, considering that the games that seem to be fine are singleplayer games.

as far as cooling goes, I put my laptop on a special little stand with a built in external fan :3

CS:S and RS are both online games.
the lag could be caused by the servers, not your computer.

it seems more likely that it's the servers, considering that the games that seem to be fine are singleplayer games.

as far as cooling goes, I put my laptop on a special little stand with a built in external fan :3

Please, oh please tell me more!

Lag? Runescape? and Steam? WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!
BOY ARE YOU CRAZY?!

See, why would it be a cooling problem?

If it was that then the games that cause it to use more of the PC's hardware, which in turn making it hotter so the fans speed up more

But the games using less, which means the PC can run it without an increase of temp or fan speed be caused BY a fan problem?

Internet games Lag or 'Scan lines' whatever those are, if not update drivers OR stop using Vista and use a better Browser for rune scape or make sure you have the right and up to date plug ins.

If it was that then the games that cause it to use more of the PC's hardware, which in turn making it hotter so the fans speed up more

The thing is... I theorize that the fans might be unable to speed up more, because it could be clogged up by dust, or broken.

When I had my old laptop, for example, it used to run San Andreas and Fable just fine... but then one day, those games started getting massive lag waves. They would be fine for a few seconds, then MASSIVE LAG, then fine, then MASSIVE LAG.

With the old laptop, I tried reinstalling the OS, but it just shut down in the middle of installation. So I had no choice but to send it in for repairs. Under warranty, they fixed whatever was wrong with it, and when I read the repair logs, it read that they had "Fixed/Replaced the Fan".

Which leads me to believe that the fan was the cause of the problem. It must have overheated during video games, and overheated so intensely during OS reinstall, that the computer was forced to shut down. Seems pretty logical, right?

Well now I'm experiencing a similar problem with my new computer.

Actually, I've been withholding information. You see, I don't play "Source" online... I pilfered it with PacSteam, so I just play it single-player with AI bots. The game used to run just fine, but now it sometimes falls victim to lag waves. It doesn't occur often, but it does occur, and I suspect it's because the fan isn't as powerful as it used to be.

Not only that, but the bottom of my laptop feels really hot after a while.

yes, ALL laptops get hot and especially at the bottom and back.

get a laptop cooling pad/station.

lag and cooling... makes no sense to me. your computer is probably full of junk run http://www.ccleaner.com/ and delete your ie temporary internet files. then end extranouse procesess and try again.

lag waves in Runescape

this is normal.

however its good that your cleaning it more then i ever did. JUST DONT USE A HOOVER

Would you recommend a specific brand?

don't use a vacuum you idiot, get a can of compressed cleaning air.

Download speedfan and after running your laptop on full load for an hour or so, post a screenshot so we can see the temperatures.

As a heads up mobile core2s are fine into the 70s (C).