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Old 12-07-09, 08:00 AM   #1
Piwoslaw
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Default Laptop fan rarely turns off

My laptop is 4.5 years old, so I know things can be going wrong. It seems that the fan is almost always on. Not only when doing something, but sometimes I forget to put it into standby, just close the lid, and even sitting in idle for 20-30 minutes hardly ever shuts the fan off. But it's not like it's never off: sometimes when I turn it on the fan starts after a few minutes, sometimes it will turn off when idling, but rarely. I've opened it a few times and tried to get some dust out, but that doesn't help much. Maybe there is dust somewhere where I can't get at it? I got a new battery 1.5 years ago, now it sits much higher so the ventilation under the laptop is actually better than before, but it seems that the fan wasn't on for so long soon after I bought it, compared to now. Maybe the OS's are old (WinXP since I got it, Fedora 6 for the last 3 years) and a clean install would allow it work more efficiently?

It's not the power consumption I'm worried about as much as the noise. The fan is only in 1st speed, so it's not too loud, but the low level noise after many hours a day really gets on my nerves.

Any ideas?

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Old 12-07-09, 08:48 AM   #2
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Could it be a bad fan bearing? It could have been running constantly but was very quiet until the bearing started to wear.
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Old 12-07-09, 10:02 AM   #3
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I deal with laptops all the time at work. It sounds like you just need a new fan like Mike said. That and like you said, there could be some dust in there that you need to clear out. It just sounds like the machine can't get rid of that heat. Either that or your machine is breaking down and the fan just doesn't know to shut off anymore.
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Old 12-07-09, 11:15 AM   #4
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The fan definately is louder, but it also has more on time. I'm thinking that the dust may be insulating some of the heat. Could it be that since the OS's are old, that there are some long forgotten programs running in the background? Under Linux I can see what is on and what's not, and turn whatever I want off, and even when nothing is running the fan rarely turns off. On the hand, when it does, it's more likely to do so under WinXP, which always has some processes in the background copying my data, sending it to MicroSoft and formatting my disc when done And not everything can be turned off under WniXP. Weird. In a few months I'm planning on a new install of Fedora, so maybe then I'll see how works. Before then I'll see how hard it would be to replace the fan.

Thanks, guys

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Old 12-07-09, 02:59 PM   #5
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Yeah, microsoft is notorious for saying that they're operating system should be formatted and reinstalled every 6 months for optimum performance. As if people are going to go around formatting their machines every 6 months.
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Old 12-08-09, 08:24 AM   #6
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dust is a good insulator, cleaning everything out would be a good idea, but it does sound like you need to start fresh too with your OS.
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Old 12-08-09, 02:59 PM   #7
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I had a similar problem with my older laptop (6 years). It would run the fans constantly. I dusted and cleaned to the best extent I could, but it still happened. It turned out that the wireless card was overheating (it still worked) and causing the fans to run hard all the time. I turned off the wireless card, and everything is back to normal. Try feeling around your laptop for "hotspots", and figure out what is located where it is hottest... that's how I found that the wireless card was overheating.
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Old 12-09-09, 07:50 AM   #8
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I usually park mine on a chiled gel pack, and swap it every hour or so. I'm thinking of making a stand with an easy way to add ice and drain off water as needed. However, I might just fix an old, low-powered one that still does all I need most of the time, and seldom runs a fan.
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Old 11-17-11, 08:41 AM   #9
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Small update: For the last year or so I've been working mostly on Windows and the fan has never shut off. Today I spent some time on Linux and the silence just struck me. The fan was actually off!! So I whipped out the kill-a-watt and I checked that Linux in idle (all programs closed) consumes 18.1-18.3 watts, closing the lid reduces that by 4-4.5W. Next I rebooted into WinXP and it just won't get below 23W with the lid open.

So Windows is actually producing about 5 watts of heat more than Linux, just in idle And that's why I keep hearing the fan. I even took the laptop down to the basement and left it there for a while to see if the 5°C lower ambient temperature is enough to turn the fan off. Nope.

It looks like getting a new computer is more likely at the moment than reinstalling both OS's, so until then I'll just have to deal with the noise.
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Old 11-17-11, 08:45 AM   #10
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Win7 would probably cut that power usage down a bit too. It also uses sleep mode better then XP did.

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