This reminded me of experiments with a case-less-fan-full setup. Not a cpu fan but a full-fledged table fan. As a cash-strapped recently exed-student of that t

This reminded me of experiments with a case-less-fan-full setup. Not a cpu fan but a full-fledged table fan. As a cash-strapped recently exed-student of that time I had assembled a desktop based on AMD K6 CPU one summer. They were significantly cheaper than the Intel peers of that time. I had two favorite tests to check a running system (i) compile the kernel and (ii) run GNU Chess against each other. To my sinking disappointed both crashed repeatedly on this assembly, I had sunk quite a bit of my savings into this. Those days you had to take a lot of care choosing your hardware if you wanted to run Linux. Linux was largely an unknown entity in India at that time. We used to get Linux distributions (usually Redhat, Debian or Mandrake) on CDs that came with a magazine called PCQuest. Many thanks to Atul Chitnis (RIP) for popularizing an alternative path to a computer experience. Anything other than Windows was unimaginable in India at that time. Guessing it could be an overheating problem, I removed the case and directed a table fan at it - Problem solved! I had it run kernel compilation on a loop all through the day, no failures. Later I reapplied the thermal paste on the cpu/heatsink fixture (it had come as an assembly when I had purchased it). After that I could compile the kernel -- case closed. Came away with the realization that AMD chips though cheaper, they tend to run hotter. This turned out to be good learning too. Running 2 Athlon based desktops with their fans directed at me gave me enough heating in the winter as a grad student. Fun days.