IMAGE: CHRIS BARYLICK Dust is even in the RAM slots. Since reassembling the Mac Pro, the computer has run better than ever, is no louder than it was in years past, and can go to sleep and be awakened as well as when it was brand-new.

From there, I sought out every nook and cranny inside the case with a full can of compressed air, gently vacuumed up the dust bunnies and then began to pick up and clean each component with the can of compressed air. What followed next was about 20 minutes of pulling out the Mac Pro’s hard drives, optical drives, daughterboards, RAM chips, graphics card, and everything else I could cleanly remove and put off to the side on a safe, static-free surface. Did my Mac Pro get to the point where the hardware and its sensors detected that it was dangerously overheating and decided to shut things down as a safety protocol? The idea began to make a bit more sense, even if it meant not tearing my Mac Pro down to its core components, installing the new power supply, and reassembling everything from there. This, combined with half a feline’s worth of hairballs scattered throughout, made me wonder about the air flowing through the machine and how the internal temperature was affected. Upon opening the case, the first thing I noticed was a coating of dust over everything, especially around the Mac Pro’s fans. One $270 eBay-purchased power supply later, I was ready to dissect my Mac Pro. IMAGE: CHRIS BARYLICK Dust and hairballs have invaded this seven-year-old Mac Pro.Īfter I performed a clean installation of OS X 10.7.5 and saw the same problem recur, I gritted my teeth and thought, “Look, I’ve been running this thing practically nonstop for seven years now-it may be time to retire and replace the power supply.” But if I put my Mac Pro in a situation where it could fall asleep or go into any kind of power-saving mode, I’d be unable to wake it up by typing on the keyboard or moving the mouse. If I turned the Mac on and keep it running with a steady task (such as importing and converting video), and it was fine.

While there are no guaranteed means of keeping your Mac cool, one of the best things you can do is ensure that it’s as dust-free as possible, thereby allowing for a better air flow within your computer.Ībout a month ago, my 2006 Mac Pro had gone from one of the most reliable Macs I’ve ever had the pleasure of owning to an unreliable nightmare. The prevailing logic is that the cooler it is inside your computer, the better it will run, and a cooler system also lessens the chance of overheating and damaging components.

Ram cleaner mac 10.7.5