I run AutoCAD and it's a hog. 1 gb should work Ross. That Celeron processor is probably more responsible than your physical memory.

OK, I'll try to make this real simple, then.

My motherboard keep getting hot. Hence, the fan keep kicking on.

What can I do to make it stop?

I have 1 gig of ram and I know I need more. I've read people having as much as 4 gig's. How much is enough and what is to much? Is it a simple thing as just getting a better processor or do I need to go to extremes and get a new motherboard?

I think you're right about the processor.
I just needed a second opinion.

Thought someone might know something else that I may have over looked.

The heat could be caused by any number of things. Case fans, power supply, dirt and even room temperature. Make sure all the fans are running and leave the side of the case off and see if the CPU fan goes back to normal. If your machine is hot, it will slow it down. I don't agree about the CPU update versus the memory.....I'd go for the RAM. Very honestly though, your setup is fairly well balanced...I'd leave it be.

The fan doesn't stay on, but it does go on from time to time.

I typed the above before I read that. That's your 'heat' problem right there. It should be running all the time. Either take the fan off and clean it or use compressed air with it on.

Oh and more details:

SpeedFan allows you to have a deeper view of the status of your computer. Almost every computer includes support for hardware monitoring. Accessing digital temperature sensors is really useful. If you are trying to figure out why your pc hangs when under heavy load or after some hours of usage, SpeedFan might help you to find the real cause. Very often it is a poor power supply, or an improperly installed heatsink that lead to behaviours that we tend to associate with errors from the operating system, but that are not. SpeedFan automatically searches your computer for interesting chips: the hardware monitor chips. SpeedFan can expose voltages, fan speeds and temperatures. On rare occasions, the BIOS doesn't activate such features. SpeedFan tries to enable them as long as this is a safe thing to do. Not only the motherboard is searched, but also some video cards and almost every recent hard disk. SpeedFan can access status info from EIDE, SATA and even SCSI drives, showing, in a consistent way, internal data that can be used to diagnose current and future hard disk failures. This is known as S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology). At the lowest level, SpeedFan is an hardware monitor software that can access digital temperature sensors, but its main feature is that it can control fan speeds according to the temperatures inside your pc, thus reducing noise.

That speedfan program can't be right. says my HDD is running at a temp of 122F. That's not right at all.

I don't agree about the CPU update versus the memory.....I'd go for the RAM. Very honestly though, your setup is fairly well balanced...I'd leave it be.

I wasn't recommending a CPU update I just meant that for the Fan issue it was a more likely candidate than the amount of ram if DSL service is causing the fan to ramp up.

I think you are overthinking this, frankly. Most likely what is happening is your fan is either dirty inside or dying, and instead of kicking on and off, it is just spinning down because it isn't working properly. I've seen computers run with a fan like that for a long time, and with processors far hotter than should be survivable.

I wouldn't upgrade anything until I needed to. It would be a shame to waste money on upgrades only to find that you'd be better off just building/buying a new machine for Vista. Once you have your fan issue fixed, I'd assess whatever else might be wrong.

It should have nothing whatsoever to do with your connection speed, though.

ME? Well, that could be part of your problem right there.

I guess one thing I'd have to ask is what the real problem is. If your fan is supposed to be kicking on, and it kicks on, why worry about it? If your performance isn't degrading, then you don't have a problem.

If you computer is running hot, again, you don't know how many fans I've replaced from people over the years who had me there to "overhaul" a slow system. If your fan is clogged or wearing out, you'll have system slowdown as the computer gets hot. If you aren't having problems, and you think the fan thing is your computer purposely controlling it, I don't see really what there is to fix.

Need to get my computer compatible with ME.

I meant to say, need to get it compatible with (myself), not "WindowME".
Too funny.

Thank BakerStreet. I'll take it into concideration.

Kona, if you are ever in the position to say 'told you so', you relish it, mmkay?

Kona...Kona....Kona.....what are we goin' to do with you?   

Lantec: didn't mean for my 'disagreement' to sound so ...ah....disagreeable. Sorry 'bout that.  

Z71: Clean that fan and I'm sure all will be right with the world again. Baker's right; find the problem, then ponder grander things. Don't want the lack of a machine to put a damper on your well-honed skinning skills