Overheating Fix for Dummies--Does It Exist?

What exactly is overheating? The CPU or the GPU?

In any event, making adjustments to your graphical settings won't do much. The easiest way to reduce heat is by opening the case and removing dust. I know you said you don't want to open the case, but it only takes a few minutes. Open the case, blow away some dust, don't touch anything.

Other good practices are making sure cable management is good and that you have plenty of fans, but that's a bit more advanced.

No idea. It crashes, and the first time it did, when I restarted the screen said something about "temperature error". I thiiiink CPU, since it's AMD and the screen was, I believe, also AMD. I'd heard something about messing with the affinities?

ETA: Appreciate the thought, but...yeah, I don't really know how to go about opening the case, and if it's that kind of thing, I'll just call the shop guys. If there's anything I can do without that, though, I'd rather try.

Awesome--thanks!

If it's a store-bought system, return it. A cpu should be able to run at 100% without overheating and shutting down, provided the ambient temperature of the room it's in isn't too high of course. That it does overheat indicates the cpufan isn't placed properly or perhaps the case as a whole doesn't offer adequate airflow. Any solution that will prevent it from happening again that doesn't involve solving this fundamental problem will just cost you performance.

Bought it from a dude on Craigslist, alas. It may well be an ambient temperature thing--I live in a studio and the heat's cranked up these days. I'll see if I can live with the decline in performance from the other stuff, and take it in if not. Thanks!

Normally, overheating issues are caused by hardware, I had one of these happening to me 2 months ago, I had to open the case, put new thermal paste to my CPU and adjust the CPU fan cooler, and the game was running smoothly. But I understand if you are afraid to open the case and do it yourself, so get anyone with technical knowledge to have your PC checked. Tell them directly to look for overheat issues.

I've had a heat issue on my old PC once. My CPU would get to 90°C (and not shut down, miraculously), and then I discovered there was a ball of dust the size of a small animal in the CPU fan. Before removing that, I had gone into energy mode to reduce heat, which worked, but was terrible for gaming.

An older PC I had was a cable management nightmare. It was a PC I bought before I had any hardware knowledge and had a case without any room for cable management. I upgraded the GPU and had to get a new power supply, which happened to have wires as thick as my thumbs. That PC was stuffed. The GPU got bent a little. Eventually the CPU fan fell off, and I managed to keep the PC on life support by reapplying thermal gel and laying the PC on its side, with the fan just resting on top of it.

Any PC can fall victim to dust, so once in a while you should open the case to remove dust, preferrably with a can of condensed gas. I've used a vacuum cleaner once, but that's at your own risk.