White stuff on VGA's heatsink - Is it normal?

[Quang Bui]

Hi guys,

As title, is it usual for a VGA to have white stuff on its heatsink? Should I clean them off, or leave it this way? I'm worry that if I clean it I might damage the chips on the card.

Picture below:

 

[R_1]

canned air is your friend. The dust bunnies are attacking your heatsink.
that is just buildup from the airflow across the fins. with the PC off and the GPU blades held still blow off the bunnies. do not let the air spin the fan, hold the blades and blow off the leading edges of each blade.

canned air is filtered and pressurized so not to damage electronics, an air compressor is not and should not be used for electronics.
canned air - good
compressed air - bad