Help with cooling side of things!!!

[Curtis]

i recently upgraded my pc with a few new things , bigger hdd etc ,, and i keep checkin my cpu temperature ,, but it is extreamly high ,, i was told mine should be running at about 40-45 c but its currently runnin at about 70-80c . which seems to be the reason why my computer crashes every two seconds .. but the thing is it never seemed to over heat and stuff like that but i havnt achualy changed no settings for the fans etc so i cnt see the problem!

Can sumone please help me try and get my CPU temp down to were it should be so i can play games again and be happy .

PC Specs

ASUS A7N8X-X
AMD Athlon 2800+
160gb HDD
1024 DDR
ATI Radion 9200 256mb
550w PSU

My OS is Win XP PRO

I hav the heatsink and fan thing runnin at 7000rpm (im sure it used to be more)

Thnx

 

[Curtis]

also the heatsink has thermal compound but i recently changed it because i was told i put to much on :S its now just got a little bit in the middle.

P.S its not over the heat sensors!! im not that stupid

 

[kof2000]

wow is running higher than my prescott.

 

[Pyotr]

Maybe you didn't put enough compound on? Did it work fine until you changed that?

 

[Curtis]

no it aint really ever wrked fine ,, its always overheated now and then so i would usually turn gfx down to normal or even low and also place a normal house fan facing the mobo. which would usually wrk ,, but now even with gfx on low (while playing game) and fan facing the mobo ,, it over heats every 2 minuits even while just browsing the inet or listenin to music .. i got plenty of thrmal compound on there now but seems to made it worse ,, its now currently runnin 82c (while doin nothin) .. i ordered sum thermal pads which wi was told are better than compound ,, i will wait for them to turn up and give them a bash ,, if they dont work ,, do u think it could be my heatsink and fan need replacing. or even summin totally diffrent to the temp thats coursing the comp to crash ,,??

Damn !! that was the longest thread ive eva wrote

 

[Praetor]

P.S its not over the heat sensors!!

Good beause the heatsensors are underneath.

i got plenty of thrmal compound on there now but seems to made it worse

Thats a bad thing. Too much = bad. Arguably worse than too little.

i ordered sum thermal pads which wi was told are better than compound

Pads are worse and negate the usefulness of the compound ot start with (thats why oems ship with a pad)


Now the all important question ..... whats the hsf on there?