Overheating Notebook! Help!

Christian · 4th April 2007, 6:37 PM

I am the owner of a HP dv9000z notebook with a dual TL-56 AMD cores. The laptop generally runs fairly well and smooth. But when I try to run games such as SupremeCommander or NeverWinterNights 2 the laptop runs too hot. How do I know this? Well, after about 30 min of playing the laptop shutsdown - blackscreen - nothing. And I cant turn it back on. Nothing. I have to wait 5-10 minutes before I can switch it on, and I can see from my CPU RightMark Clock utility that I went over 90 degrees C.

I already tried RM CPU Clock to lower the voltage - but it doesnt seem to help too much (it lowers the idle temperature to around 55 degrees C). And anyway - when I play a graphics intensive game, the CPU uses full frequency/voltage anyway (it usually climbs to 80-85 degrees C)

I dont really want to go out and buy one of these cheap plastic fan cooling pads for the laptop. Mostly because this is a big 17" laptop and these pads dont usually fit the whole length, and the laptop ends up wobbling.

What can you suggest? Has anyone else had any problems with an overheating notebook? What have you done? Are there solutions for 17" laptops?

th3_hawk · 4th April 2007, 9:18 PM

Here is one I found through google:

http://www.laptoplifestyle.net/lapto...ad_review.html

http://www.google.com.au/search?q=17...ient=firefox-a

I'm sure I have seen a bunch of pads at the shops in Sydney's Capitol Square that would be that size, but I can't say that I have measured them to confirm, they just looked big :P

T1tan · 4th April 2007, 11:00 PM

can't seem to find the targus chillhub on staticice... the chill pad is available though for as low as $30. I really want the hub though, as it could act as a pseudo-docking station.

Manol · 5th April 2007, 11:23 AM

I really don't understand why you're all immediately suggesting 3rd party cooling solutions?

If his laptop is all stock and it's overheating wouldn't that be classed as a manufacturing defect/warranty issue?

A laptop that has been designed to have that CPU/GPU combination, shouldn't overheat.

By the sounds of it's a new laptop and would still have warranty, why don't you take advantage of your warranty and return it?

SLATYE · 5th April 2007, 12:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Manol

By the sounds of it's a new laptop and would still have warranty, why don't you take advantage of your warranty and return it?

That's exactly what I'd do. If the laptop is overheating and you haven't modified anything, then it's either faulty or badly designed. Either way, you shouldn't be the one paying to fix it - it's the manufacturer's problem.

tin · 5th April 2007, 1:25 PM

Yeah. RMA it...
If it's more than 6 months old though, check the vents/fans aren't clogged with dust. A friend of mine had a Toshiba doing the same shutdown thing recently. I got the compressor and blew the dust out and now it works fine.

Note: If you use a compressor or compressed air to blow dust out, make sure you hold the fans from spinning, and don't use extreme pressures. 30 or 40 psi max.

Sonicman · 5th April 2007, 2:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tin

Yeah. RMA it...
If it's more than 6 months old though, check the vents/fans aren't clogged with dust. A friend of mine had a Toshiba doing the same shutdown thing recently. I got the compressor and blew the dust out and now it works fine.

Note: If you use a compressor or compressed air to blow dust out, make sure you hold the fans from spinning, and don't use extreme pressures. 30 or 40 psi max.

I agree, you'll probably find that the area between the heatsink and the fan will be clogged with dust. Happens very often in laptops with powerful fans that suck air from the bottom.

Christian · 5th April 2007, 3:12 PM

Well, I know I should probably send it back to HP.

BUT I recently had some really bad experience with ASUS Germany (A6Va). It took me almost 3 months to get my other laptop back. And I had to call ServiceCentre every week or so - just to be told some other bull shit story (I didnt even get a memory upgrade, and they ignored my letter of complaint to management!)

And I read on the forums (including this one) that HP service is even worse... so I am sorta afraid that I am going to get the bullshit runaround by some service tech people that dont know what to do...

eg. Step 1. update BIOS
Step 2. reinstall Windows
Step 3. update drivers
Thank you for your inquirey. We are happy that we could help you!

And most likely they will tell me its the game fault... because the laptop runs(!) with every other program (including Counter-Strike, Battlefield and Oblivion)

BUT before you tell me... ahhh... so it IS the games... NO its NOT. Because, remember, I had to wait 5-10 minutes after the shutdown before I could turn it back on... so I had to wait for the laptop to cool down.

toby101 · 5th April 2007, 4:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Christian

I read on the forums (including this one) that HP service is even worse...

HP outsources all service (at least in Europe), I work for the company that has the contract in all the Nordic countries (incidentally in the HP division). From my experience, as long as whoever has the contract in Poland and/or Germany has similar standards, this would be diagnosed as a defective HSF module. Being a fairly common fault, they would almost certainly have the replacement in local storage which would mean a shorter wait-time.

I am however a bit concerned about the 5-10 minutes you say it takes before you can power up again. In my experience, overheated CPUs on these systems tend to dissipate that heat very fast and should power up again in less that a minute.

I would suggest running prime95 to remove GPU from the equation, not sure if you need two instances for dual core AMD like you do for Core 2 Duo. Either way, if you send it in for warranty rep the more info you provide the better.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Christian

And most likely they will tell me its the game fault

Can't vouch for the quality of the techs in whichever company HP outsources to in your area, but if we got the problem description you posted here we would generally run the games you have installed plus other benchmarking/stressing programs in order to replicate the failure. As far as blaming the game, it just isn't logical. A cooling solution should always be up to the task of 100% utilisation.

toby101 · 5th April 2007, 4:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by toby101

I would suggest running prime95 to remove GPU from the equation,

On second thoughts, it isn't that simple as the GPU and CPU share a single fan with a heatpipe/heatsink each. Can you confirm that the fan is running? (should hear it go at max rpm during POST) Also worth looking at the intake vent, if dust is your problem it'll most likely be accumulating just inside and on the vents.

Christian · 5th April 2007, 5:24 PM

This is a trans-script of my asking for help on the HP Wesbite Online Tech-Support.

Chat Transcript Begins Here
--------------------------------------------------------------
Hello Christian.

Welcome to HP Total Care for HP NoteBook Products. My name is Grace. How may I help you today?

Hi hi..

How are you doing today?

Ok... I have a DV9040ea...

version of the dv900z

and I have some heat problems.

Yesterday I installed Neverwinter Nights 2. And after about 30 min of gameplay, the computer just shut down. And then it wouldnt start back up. I press the button, and nothing. No response. After letting it cool down a little it worked again no problems. The same things happened about one week ago with the installation of Supreme Commander.

Both games are graphics heavy.

Oh I see

I have all current drivers installed and everything appears to be working normally.

Let me assist you in this regard

May I have the Serial , Product and Model number of the notebook?

Yes.

###########

and pn is ##########

Thank you for the information.

Please give me a minute

(I cant enter this into the HP website either... it tells me the information is not valid.????)

Let me know is that game specifications matchs your Notebook specifications?

of course

its a dual core notebook

with good graphics card

Thank you for confirming the same.

Could I have a few moments of your time while I search the information for you?

of course.

Thank you

Generally the computer runs around 50-60 degree C. With game use, it runs at 70-80 degrees. Only with these two gamesÂ… do I manage to get over 90 degrees.. .and the consequent shutdown.

I am wondering if this a isolated problem?

By the way, I installed the newest BIOS F.28 for this notebook.

Thank you for your patience and time.

Let me know the operating system running on your computer?

WinXP SP2

Thank you for confirming the same.

Here I am providing you with few solutions to resolve this issue.

Step 1: Reinstalling Power Management:

To reinstall Power Management in Windows XP, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, select Control Panel, and then choose Performance and Maintenance.
2. Click the System icon to open the System properties window.
3. Select the Hardware tab and click Device Manager.
4. Click the plus (+) sign next to System Devices.
5. Right-click the ACPI Fixed Features button and select Uninstall.
6. Restart the system.

On restarting the system, Windows will automatically detect and install Power Management on the computer.

Step 2: Reset BIOS settings:

To reset the BIOS defaults, follow these steps:

1. Restart the computer and press F2 (F10 in some notebooks) as soon as the HP logo appears.
2. Go to Exit menu and select Load BIOS defaults or press F9.
3. Go to Exit menu and select Save changes and Exit or press F10.

This will reset the BIOS defaults.

Step 3: Update system BIOS from the following link

ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp35001-35500/sp35202.exe

Please copy the entire URL and paste it in a new window of Internet Explorer. Then open the link from there.

Step 4:
Sometimes, Windows XP might suddenly poweroff the computer without any warning. To resolve this issue, disable the automatically restart on system failure feature.

To disable the automatically restart on system failure feature, follow the steps given below:

1. Click Start, right-click My Computer icon, and then Properties.
2. Click the Advanced tab, and then Settings in the Startup & Recovery
section.
3. Remove the checkmark next to Automatically Restart under System
Failure.
4. Click OK to close the Startup and Recovery window, and then OK to
close the System Properties window.
5. Restart the computer.

So you dont think that it is an overheating issue?

And here I am rpoviding you a link with the steps in Resolving General Game Issues

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/g...reg_R1002_USEN

Please copy the entire URL and paste it in a new window of Internet Explorer. Then open the link from there.

Ok. Thank you.

Performing the above steps will resolve the issue

Please do not copy the steps from the chat

And for your convenience I will send this chat transcript to your e mail address

Thank you again.

Please perform the steps and get back to us with the result

Please get back to us any time if you need any further assistance with this chat session ID for reference

Its my pleasure assisting you.

Have a Great Day ahead!

Thank you for using HP Total Care and giving us an opportunity to serve you through Real-Time Chat. A copy of our chat session will be emailed to you shortly.

bennyg · 5th April 2007, 6:16 PM

the prime95 thing is a good idea to check CPU

to check GPU, I used to fire up Quake 4, set res and all quality settings to max (16xAA, max AF, Ultra quality; of course make sure in desktop settings you've got "Max Quality" selected, the first time I tried it I set 16xAA and got 60+fps, thought OMG HUGE but found the slider was on "performance" which of course ignores all AA) and sit in a spot after waxing all the bad dudes in a level - the spot at the end of the 1st level looking at the fire and cortez was what I used to do. Found my PC would just totally black out (only thing that kept going were the fans) after GPU temp reached 80C (use the Rivatuner Stats server thingy) when I OCed it too much.
Dunno if this would stress fast GPUs these days - whatever yours is, HP site was most unhelpful - but it worked for my 6800.

The idea is for minimal CPU usage but max load on the GPU.

Re the transcript: It sounds to me like you were talking to a computer. "Let me assist you in this regard" "Thank you for confirming the same" ?!? Who says that?

Christian · 5th April 2007, 6:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bennyg

Re the transcript: It sounds to me like you were talking to a computer. "Let me assist you in this regard" "Thank you for confirming the same" ?!? Who says that?

A computer, or some person with macros... yes, I did notice that as well

I am runing FAH now, and the temperature has been steadily climbing from 80 (normal high load) to now 84 over the last three hours.

toby101 · 5th April 2007, 9:26 PM

Bah... no wonder customers are often pissed off by the time they get to us

had no idea HP were so crappy at handling complaints, (although I wouldnt really expect any better from any IM support service)

If you bought through a reseller, I'd just go drop it on their counter and say "it doesn't work" tell them about the crashing and leave it at that.

Christian · 10th April 2007, 3:42 PM

Well, I know you arent supposed to use the vacuum cleaner on the fans... but I cleaned the laptop this morning... with the vacuum cleaner. And surprisingly it did the job.

I have no idea why or how. But the laptop is now going up/down the temperature ramp very quckly and smoothly - from 60 to 52 in a few seconds. Unbelievable.

Toby - do you have any explanation? How do you clean the HSF in the HP workshop?

I had a similar problem with a MEDION laptop a few years ago. It was out of warranty - so I went and found the workshop disassembly manual and pulled the HSF of the CPU. They used an thermal heat sticker thing... and it was totally blistered with almost no contact between CPU and HSF. I replaced it with ArticSilver3 and it also did the job.

Does HP have these nasty thermal sticker things on their CPUs? Does blistering happen often?

4th April 2007, 6:37 PM	#1
Christian Member Join Date: Jun 2001 Location: Gdansk Posts: 9	Overheating Notebook! Help! I am the owner of a HP dv9000z notebook with a dual TL-56 AMD cores. The laptop generally runs fairly well and smooth. But when I try to run games such as SupremeCommander or NeverWinterNights 2 the laptop runs too hot. How do I know this? Well, after about 30 min of playing the laptop shutsdown - blackscreen - nothing. And I cant turn it back on. Nothing. I have to wait 5-10 minutes before I can switch it on, and I can see from my CPU RightMark Clock utility that I went over 90 degrees C. I already tried RM CPU Clock to lower the voltage - but it doesnt seem to help too much (it lowers the idle temperature to around 55 degrees C). And anyway - when I play a graphics intensive game, the CPU uses full frequency/voltage anyway (it usually climbs to 80-85 degrees C) I dont really want to go out and buy one of these cheap plastic fan cooling pads for the laptop. Mostly because this is a big 17" laptop and these pads dont usually fit the whole length, and the laptop ends up wobbling. What can you suggest? Has anyone else had any problems with an overheating notebook? What have you done? Are there solutions for 17" laptops?

4th April 2007, 9:18 PM	#2
th3_hawk Member Join Date: Jun 2005 Location: [SYD] Campbelltown Posts: 561	Here is one I found through google: http://www.laptoplifestyle.net/lapto...ad_review.html http://www.google.com.au/search?q=17...ient=firefox-a I'm sure I have seen a bunch of pads at the shops in Sydney's Capitol Square that would be that size, but I can't say that I have measured them to confirm, they just looked big :P __________________ "Victory goes to the player who makes the next-to-last mistake." Windows 2008 Server machine ticking away in the background providing mass storage for a couple of MacBook Pro's My Wifes Shop Currently for Sale: Nothin in Particular

4th April 2007, 11:00 PM	#3
T1tan Member Join Date: May 2002 Location: Sydney. Posts: 3,852	can't seem to find the targus chillhub on staticice... the chill pad is available though for as low as $30. I really want the hub though, as it could act as a pseudo-docking station. __________________ --Nik

5th April 2007, 1:25 PM	#6
tin Member Join Date: Jul 2001 Location: Narrabri NSW Posts: 4,909	Yeah. RMA it... If it's more than 6 months old though, check the vents/fans aren't clogged with dust. A friend of mine had a Toshiba doing the same shutdown thing recently. I got the compressor and blew the dust out and now it works fine. Note: If you use a compressor or compressed air to blow dust out, make sure you hold the fans from spinning, and don't use extreme pressures. 30 or 40 psi max. __________________ ©®£¤¥±²³¶µ»«¼½¾¿§ The software required Win95 or better, so I installed Linux. Question marks are the new full stop?

5th April 2007, 6:16 PM	#12
bennyg Member Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Melbourne, Oztraya Posts: 684	the prime95 thing is a good idea to check CPU to check GPU, I used to fire up Quake 4, set res and all quality settings to max (16xAA, max AF, Ultra quality; of course make sure in desktop settings you've got "Max Quality" selected, the first time I tried it I set 16xAA and got 60+fps, thought OMG HUGE but found the slider was on "performance" which of course ignores all AA) and sit in a spot after waxing all the bad dudes in a level - the spot at the end of the 1st level looking at the fire and cortez was what I used to do. Found my PC would just totally black out (only thing that kept going were the fans) after GPU temp reached 80C (use the Rivatuner Stats server thingy) when I OCed it too much. Dunno if this would stress fast GPUs these days - whatever yours is, HP site was most unhelpful - but it worked for my 6800. The idea is for minimal CPU usage but max load on the GPU. Re the transcript: It sounds to me like you were talking to a computer. "Let me assist you in this regard" "Thank you for confirming the same" ?!? Who says that? __________________ Successful traders: 3/3: Brax, Zubrick, nvidiaXP Value: $125 Pending:- Coming soon: Asus G51J-A1, i7 720qm, 4Gb DDR3-1066, GTX260M@500/1250/800, 15.6" 1080p, 80Gb SSD, 320Gb HDD Soon-to-be-old lappy: Dell Vostro 1500, T9300/3Gb DDR667/8600GT@550/1200/475/320Gb/15.4" UWXGA \| Older lappy, Dell Latitude D620, T7200/2GbDDR2-667/GMA950/60Gb/14.1"

5th April 2007, 11:23 AM	#4
Manol (Banned or Deleted) Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Mentone, Victoria Posts: 1,214	I really don't understand why you're all immediately suggesting 3rd party cooling solutions? If his laptop is all stock and it's overheating wouldn't that be classed as a manufacturing defect/warranty issue? A laptop that has been designed to have that CPU/GPU combination, shouldn't overheat. By the sounds of it's a new laptop and would still have warranty, why don't you take advantage of your warranty and return it?

5th April 2007, 3:12 PM	#8
Christian Member Join Date: Jun 2001 Location: Gdansk Posts: 9	Well, I know I should probably send it back to HP. BUT I recently had some really bad experience with ASUS Germany (A6Va). It took me almost 3 months to get my other laptop back. And I had to call ServiceCentre every week or so - just to be told some other bull shit story (I didnt even get a memory upgrade, and they ignored my letter of complaint to management!) And I read on the forums (including this one) that HP service is even worse... so I am sorta afraid that I am going to get the bullshit runaround by some service tech people that dont know what to do... eg. Step 1. update BIOS Step 2. reinstall Windows Step 3. update drivers Thank you for your inquirey. We are happy that we could help you! And most likely they will tell me its the game fault... because the laptop runs(!) with every other program (including Counter-Strike, Battlefield and Oblivion) BUT before you tell me... ahhh... so it IS the games... NO its NOT. Because, remember, I had to wait 5-10 minutes after the shutdown before I could turn it back on... so I had to wait for the laptop to cool down.

5th April 2007, 5:24 PM	#11
Christian Member Join Date: Jun 2001 Location: Gdansk Posts: 9	This is a trans-script of my asking for help on the HP Wesbite Online Tech-Support. Chat Transcript Begins Here -------------------------------------------------------------- Hello Christian. Welcome to HP Total Care for HP NoteBook Products. My name is Grace. How may I help you today? Hi hi.. How are you doing today? Ok... I have a DV9040ea... version of the dv900z and I have some heat problems. Yesterday I installed Neverwinter Nights 2. And after about 30 min of gameplay, the computer just shut down. And then it wouldnt start back up. I press the button, and nothing. No response. After letting it cool down a little it worked again no problems. The same things happened about one week ago with the installation of Supreme Commander. Both games are graphics heavy. Oh I see I have all current drivers installed and everything appears to be working normally. Let me assist you in this regard May I have the Serial , Product and Model number of the notebook? Yes. ########### and pn is ########## Thank you for the information. Please give me a minute (I cant enter this into the HP website either... it tells me the information is not valid.????) Let me know is that game specifications matchs your Notebook specifications? of course its a dual core notebook with good graphics card Thank you for confirming the same. Could I have a few moments of your time while I search the information for you? of course. Thank you Generally the computer runs around 50-60 degree C. With game use, it runs at 70-80 degrees. Only with these two gamesÂ… do I manage to get over 90 degrees.. .and the consequent shutdown. I am wondering if this a isolated problem? By the way, I installed the newest BIOS F.28 for this notebook. Thank you for your patience and time. Let me know the operating system running on your computer? WinXP SP2 Thank you for confirming the same. Here I am providing you with few solutions to resolve this issue. Step 1: Reinstalling Power Management: To reinstall Power Management in Windows XP, follow these steps: 1. Click Start, select Control Panel, and then choose Performance and Maintenance. 2. Click the System icon to open the System properties window. 3. Select the Hardware tab and click Device Manager. 4. Click the plus (+) sign next to System Devices. 5. Right-click the ACPI Fixed Features button and select Uninstall. 6. Restart the system. On restarting the system, Windows will automatically detect and install Power Management on the computer. Step 2: Reset BIOS settings: To reset the BIOS defaults, follow these steps: 1. Restart the computer and press F2 (F10 in some notebooks) as soon as the HP logo appears. 2. Go to Exit menu and select Load BIOS defaults or press F9. 3. Go to Exit menu and select Save changes and Exit or press F10. This will reset the BIOS defaults. Step 3: Update system BIOS from the following link ftp://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp35001-35500/sp35202.exe Please copy the entire URL and paste it in a new window of Internet Explorer. Then open the link from there. Step 4: Sometimes, Windows XP might suddenly poweroff the computer without any warning. To resolve this issue, disable the automatically restart on system failure feature. To disable the automatically restart on system failure feature, follow the steps given below: 1. Click Start, right-click My Computer icon, and then Properties. 2. Click the Advanced tab, and then Settings in the Startup & Recovery section. 3. Remove the checkmark next to Automatically Restart under System Failure. 4. Click OK to close the Startup and Recovery window, and then OK to close the System Properties window. 5. Restart the computer. So you dont think that it is an overheating issue? And here I am rpoviding you a link with the steps in Resolving General Game Issues http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/g...reg_R1002_USEN Please copy the entire URL and paste it in a new window of Internet Explorer. Then open the link from there. Ok. Thank you. Performing the above steps will resolve the issue Please do not copy the steps from the chat And for your convenience I will send this chat transcript to your e mail address Thank you again. Please perform the steps and get back to us with the result Please get back to us any time if you need any further assistance with this chat session ID for reference Its my pleasure assisting you. Have a Great Day ahead! Thank you for using HP Total Care and giving us an opportunity to serve you through Real-Time Chat. A copy of our chat session will be emailed to you shortly.

5th April 2007, 9:26 PM	#14
toby101 Member Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: Oslo, Norway Posts: 148	Bah... no wonder customers are often pissed off by the time they get to us had no idea HP were so crappy at handling complaints, (although I wouldnt really expect any better from any IM support service) If you bought through a reseller, I'd just go drop it on their counter and say "it doesn't work" tell them about the crashing and leave it at that. __________________ Testing

10th April 2007, 3:42 PM	#15
Christian Member Join Date: Jun 2001 Location: Gdansk Posts: 9	Well, I know you arent supposed to use the vacuum cleaner on the fans... but I cleaned the laptop this morning... with the vacuum cleaner. And surprisingly it did the job. I have no idea why or how. But the laptop is now going up/down the temperature ramp very quckly and smoothly - from 60 to 52 in a few seconds. Unbelievable. Toby - do you have any explanation? How do you clean the HSF in the HP workshop? I had a similar problem with a MEDION laptop a few years ago. It was out of warranty - so I went and found the workshop disassembly manual and pulled the HSF of the CPU. They used an thermal heat sticker thing... and it was totally blistered with almost no contact between CPU and HSF. I replaced it with ArticSilver3 and it also did the job. Does HP have these nasty thermal sticker things on their CPUs? Does blistering happen often?