[erremerre]

I use a core i7-920 from first generation that I recently changed with a Xeon compatible socket and another i7-3770 from third generation as daily drivers. And I do some gaming with non-intensive games. The computer works perfectly with no major drawbacks.

The third generation is noisy because it is in a small format case and with very deficient ventilation that I can't solve.

[LargoLasskhyfv]

Did you try to at least remove the dust/dirt which tends to clog those parts over these timespans? With forced air from a pressured can to blow it out, or the other way around with a vacuum cleaner? (But arrest the fan, or unplug it while doing so, if possible! Otherwise it can spin like crazy and working as a generator, even frying the controller!) Furthermore the cooling paste/glue/mat between the die, or the lid of the CPU and the underside of the cooler tends to degrade/dry out, also because of time. Exchanging that requires disassembly, removing the old stuff carefully with isopropanol, reapplying some thermal paste, nothing special, just Arctic MX4 is good enough, and then reattaching the cooler.

Would work wonders, I guess.

[erremerre]

I had changed the thermal paste last year, and I think it had still the original thermal paste (completely dry) and it was improved a lot. Like going from 90 degrees to like about 70 degrees.

But the machine is still noisy. I also got a nvidia 1050ti small format into it, and it completely breaks the small flow path that exist. The flowpath is provided with the cpu fan and a plastic piece to redirect the flow.

Lately is having some very nasty blue screen of death. That when I look online they say might be produced by the RAM failing. But running mem86+, one stick at a time and both stick together, always pass with 0% error. So I am getting out of ideas.