My notebook's cooling fan performance

I've been using my notebook for extended periods lately so I've been concerned about it's cpu cooling capability. The HD doesn't seem to be an issue at all.

So I installed SpeedFan to track things. This is what I've observed in the past day or so:

1. While in use it will eventually reach 70c (or 60c as I type this) and then the fan seems to kick in and within about 3-4 minutes bring it down to 51c, no lower. This applies to cpu 0 and cpu 1, which I suppose refers to my dual core Centrino Duo (Intel Core2 CPU T5600 @ 1.83GHz).

2. Then over about 30-60 minutes it will creep back up to 70c again, then the fan kicks on.

Is this typical?

Can Speed Fan be adjusted to better optimize things?

It seems to be a lot of work to get to the fan (mb removal) but is there a way to clean the fan without opening up things very much?

It's a Dell Latitude D620. The fan is very quiet. I use it on a tabletop, always raised up on risers of about 3/4 inch for better airflow along the bottom.

Thanks

 

I would be finding out what process is causing the spike, or get the machine cleaned, if that is the cause of the temp spikes.

 

For what it's worth, I did find this third party utility that seems to address fan issues with Dells.

http://www.diefer.de/i8kfan/index.html


"General info

I8kfanGUI is a graphical Windows application to show the internal temperatures and to control the fan operation on the Dell Inspiron/Latitude/Precision notebook series. It's running under Windows 2000 and above operating system versions (Windows 2000/XP/Server2003/Vista)."

I'll read through the manual and see if it helps.