Well, I can tell you baking your GPU card won’t really fix your issue as the root problem is you’re pushing the system beyond what it was designed to run! Think of it this way you wouldn’t race a 1960 Ford mustang against the latest model would you? The newer one would win the race! And the older one will likely breakdown in mid race!
Computers are no different! Older systems where designed to run the apps that where either out already when they where introduced as well as what the market was aiming for (offer some head room in the design). So in 2009 did you run 3D modeling apps like this then? Sadly the best we had was stick drawings with ROM based toolbox fillers. Not the heavy compute realistic fractals fills we have today!
So What can I do to fix this system and what can I run?
To start with your system more than likely needs a good clean! Using a small soft paint brush and a can of can’ed air clean out the dust build up of the case, fan’s and heatsink fins as well as the logic board once you’ll pulled it.
In addition, the thermal paste on both the CPU & GPU chips has long since dried up and not offering the needed heat transference. So we need to clean and re-paste them both with good thermal paste.
That leaves us with the thermal pads on the VRAM chips on the GPU card are also likely a shriveled mess! They too need to be fully cleaned off and replaced. You’ll need to dry fit the heatsink on so you can measure the gap between the VRAM chips and the heatsink. Use a metric feeler gage or some card stock stacked up and then measure the thickness. Pick from here the same size or slightly thicker pad material. You want is just snug not compressed.
Once you’ve put things back together you might want to make sure your RAM is at least 8 GB , the max this system supports is 16 GB. You may want to consider replacing your optical drive with a SSD like maybe a 128/256 GB unit and then make this your boot drive. Installing iMac Intel 27" EMC 2309 and 2374 Dual Drive or if you really can do it replace the HDD with a SSD I would go with a 512/1 TB drive in that case iMac Intel 27" EMC 2309 and 2374 Hard Drive Replacement And you’ll need this inline sensor to replace the HD’s unit OWC In-line Digital Thermal Sensor for iMac Late 2009 - Mid 2010. Either way it will offer not only faster file access it will lower your systems temp!
Now the bugaboo! This is only a Core2Duo based system so the investment in this system maybe fool hardy if you real need the processing power of a newer system. If 3D rendering or game play is important to you you’ll need to get a much newer system!
This system just can’t sustain high workloads like this. To help you see things I would install this great app: TG Pro it offers the best view of your systems internal sensors and allows you to punch up the fans if needed. Just don’t push it as hard as you have been.
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