?It's interesting that you mention the fan, because several times in the
last 6 months or so it's become noisy. A high pitched, almost 'whistling'
sound. Plainly sounded like it needed lubrication.

This can be from builtup dust unbalancing the fan, but in the past I
have carefully sprayed lubricant inside an early fan (I think on a voodoo3
or something). The spraylube to look for is called Inox; it's
non-conductive, safe for plastics, etc etc.

You're probably beyond this now, but if it was clear the problem was
overheating, aftermarket videocard coolers are quite cheap.

rms