Laptop overheating

Noctu

Hi guys,
I've got a Toshiba Satellite Pro A40 - Mobile P4 3ghz, 1gig ram (upgraded myself from 512mb), on XP SP2.

It's my first laptop after working with and building desktop PCs for years, so I suppose I'm not used to laptop based gripes!

The problem is, it's started to overheat when I set it on a CPU hogging task - in this case, converting an AVI to VCD. The fan starts going crazy, on full whack, then after a minute or two it'll just shut itself off.

I've tried throttling the CPU power using the Toshiba power utility but it didn't seem to make a difference, and tbh I don't want to have to throttle it really. I've had it for a year or so and it never had this problem before.

I've had a bit of a google and a few people have mentioned a dirty fan - could this be the cause? It wouldn't be surprising really, as it's carted around everywhere. But how could I dismantle it to clean it? It was nerve wracking enough to stick some more RAM in it - ridiculous but you know what I mean!

Or are there any other solutions? I've heard that P4s are notorious for doing this, and I'm afraid that it might cause lasting damage to the motherboard or something else.

Thanks in advance!
Rachel.

GreenNotM

Hi Rachel

It is most liking to be dust - pulled in when the laptop is being use.

The quick and dirty solution is to use a vacumn cleaner to pull the dust back out of the in-vents on the base(?), the pro solution is to take it to a Toshiba Dealer and have it cleaned.

I did find this but for an A35 - it show the process involve http://www.irisvista.com/tech/laptops/ToshibaA35/Satellite-A35-fixing-overheating.htm

You may be able to find out more on the Toshiba Forums http://forums.computers.toshiba-europe.com/jive3/thread.jspa?threadID=16173&messageID=65625

HTH

BillScarab

You can buy laptop coolers which sit underneath the laptop such as this.

http://www.ebuyer.com/UK/product/61069

That may help, the reviews seem pretty positive, I've not used one myself though.

It would still be worth cleaning it first though. Most people recommend using cans of compressed air to shift the dust as apparently vacuum cleaners can generate static, I've not had a problem using my dustbuster though!

startrekker

You can now buy a can of compressed air from Tesxo, I bought some last week to clean out my sons Ps2 and my pc, it was about £3.95 per can

Little_John

It does sound like it is shutting down to over heating I am waiting for a new fan to arrive to replace the one that died in mine last week. I contacted the makers of the fan with all the details wire length etc and they are sending me a free sample to replace it. I did contact the laptop company and many others that sell the fan and they are all requesting £90 ish for a replacement.

But get a can of air and use the straw and blow all the dust out of it and you will sort it out. if you have upgraded the memory yourself then take the back off and do a proper job just keep the can vertical so you don't get the propellant coming out, it evaporates but it is a liquid.