Same using a hair dryer without heat for more than a year to clean PC.
PC Peripherals Vacuum cleaners for PC cleaning ?
- Thread starter rawfiul
- Start date
truegenius
Disciple
for the question to vacuum or not to
here is your answer
here is your answer
yup even linus ( the one who brakes pc stuff ) doesn't vacuum, cause it sucks, and guys don't suck, got ya, LinusS**Tips 
bad pj
bad pj
nitin_g3
Adept
Hey, looks like you've had experience of getting some component damaged due to fan spinning while using blower. I myself use blower to remove dust from pc. Including GPU.
Should I tape GPU fans before using blower?
I've cleaned the pc 3 times till now but no fans have failed. Any other advice is also most welcome. Have some specific questions below:
- Should I remove the fan pins since it might generate some electricity and damage mobo?
- Should I just tape all the fans including GPU fans and then use the blower?
- Also heard about blower hose generating static. My blower hose is entirely made of rubber. Is there still a chance it might cause issue due to static?
Lespiritdecorpse
Disciple
I have an older model of this cleaner. I have been using it for years to get rid of dust from inside my pc case. It works like a charm and manages to get rid of dust from even the smallest crevices. Just a general warning though, if you end up using a blower please ensure the nozzle is atleast a foot and a half away from your device. The blower end of this is quite powerful and might damage the circuits on the board or mess up your fans if its held too close to the board/ card.
That and use an antistatic computer brush. to lightly dust the interiors.
nRiTeCh
Skilled
The first time I cleaned my pc using vacuum cleaner I cleaned individual component very closely without worrying about any static etc. as I was unaware about it.
Luckily nothing got affected but after reading this thread I started cleaning without actually touching any of the components directly.
Silent47Assassin
Disciple
Just locking the blades should do it. You can use tape, a plastic wedge, small screwdriver or anything similar as long as it is not putting any angular pressure on the fan assembly. No need to remove the connectors. Also as nRiTeCh said, do it from a distance, say 15 cm or so. If you are using a leaf blower, it will be powerful enough to clean all the dust out even at that distance. Also, don't use the pin like nozzle attachment if you have it; just the standard nozzle which is approximately 1" in diameter.
Kratos47
Disciple
@nitin_g3
@nRiTeCh
For extra protection from ESD, what I do is, while using a blower I insert a copper wire mesh inside the blower hose & 1 aluminium bracket ring outside and then ground both of them, which absorbs all the ESD build up while pushing air out. Never had a problem with my PC.
I've toasted a motherboard before but main cause for that I didn't unplug the power cord, so capacitors were holding a charge.
@nRiTeCh
For extra protection from ESD, what I do is, while using a blower I insert a copper wire mesh inside the blower hose & 1 aluminium bracket ring outside and then ground both of them, which absorbs all the ESD build up while pushing air out. Never had a problem with my PC.
I've toasted a motherboard before but main cause for that I didn't unplug the power cord, so capacitors were holding a charge.
truegenius
Disciple
In my opinion you should remove pins of fans connected to board as its easy and saves any potential risk (if any).
Though as soon as a pc is turned off then the fans still keeps spinning for few seconds and for those few seconds they do act like a generator everytime a pc is turned off, so i don't think it will do any harm to pc if fans spins at low speed due to blower's wind.
For fun, if you have bunch of fans in same fan hub then by blowing air in 1 fan the other fans spins with that electricity generated by 1 fan (i did this few months ago with my 5 red led jonsbo fans connected to 1 hub) make sure to disconnect fan hub from motherboard.
About static, if you don't have carpet and don't wear any slippers during cleaning then its as if you are using antistatic band. Though you should still keep hose of blower 1~2 feet away from pc for extra precaution (distance also helps to keep fans from spinning too fast)