Fan won't stop running but CPU is normal

[Bobolous]

My PCS laptop - not yet a year old - has today started noisily running the fan all the time. It's really quite distracting and worrying.

It's just the right hand vent that is venting.

The CPU is not running abnormally according to Task Manager.

The fan runs even from a cold start-up, and the air coming out does NOT feel warm, so I doubt it's an internal issue to do with actual temperature/dust/etc.

There were some Windows updates the other day but other than that no new software recently.

Various places online suggest under System > Notifications > turning off tips about Windows, but this seemed unlikely to me and has made no change.

There are also various suggestions of specific process to disable and I've tried all I could, but none of them were showing high CPU use, and it hasn't worked.

Any suggestions?

 

[SpyderTracks]

The very first thing to do is check your temps of both CPU and graphics. Download speccy or hwmonitor and check temps when idle and under load.

Don't assume it's not overheating just because the air doesn't feel warm.

 

[ubuysa]

Solving this will be a process of elimination, start with the most critical and work downwards. So, as SpyderTracks says, check the CPU and GPU (and all other) temperatures first. Then I would look at whatever fan control software you have, this may be in the BIOS setup, and check that the profile for that fan is no different to the others. Finally, if you have more than one case fan, I would swap the suspect fan with one of the others to see whether the problem follows the fan.

 

[Artiom]

I encountered 2 cases with similar symptoms:
1. Optimus V had some chip under the second HDD which was overheating - and it was way too far from any vents. The problem was solved by flashing a custom BIOS which simply ignored the temperature sensor on this chip. The laptop works perfectly since (3+ years)
2. Cosmos VI (my current work laptop) - fan won't stop spinning regardless of CPU/GPU temperature. It turns out the M.2 SSD is (very) hot under load - and again it is slightly off the main airflow, however it has a vent - so adding a laptop cooling pad solved the issue.

 

[Tony1044]

I encountered 2 cases with similar symptoms:
1. Optimus V had some chip under the second HDD which was overheating - and it was way too far from any vents. The problem was solved by flashing a custom BIOS which simply ignored the temperature sensor on this chip. The laptop works perfectly since (3+ years)
2. Cosmos VI (my current work laptop) - fan won't stop spinning regardless of CPU/GPU temperature. It turns out the M.2 SSD is (very) hot under load - and again it is slightly off the main airflow, however it has a vent - so adding a laptop cooling pad solved the issue.

Just be aware that a custom BIOS will, in all likelihood, invalidate your warranty.

 

[Tony1044]

You may also find that having followed Spydertracks' advice that your machine is running hotter than you expect.

It may benefit from a clean of the fans and a repaste.

 

[ubuysa]

I encountered 2 cases with similar symptoms:
1. Optimus V had some chip under the second HDD which was overheating - and it was way too far from any vents. The problem was solved by flashing a custom BIOS which simply ignored the temperature sensor on this chip. The laptop works perfectly since (3+ years)
2. Cosmos VI (my current work laptop) - fan won't stop spinning regardless of CPU/GPU temperature. It turns out the M.2 SSD is (very) hot under load - and again it is slightly off the main airflow, however it has a vent - so adding a laptop cooling pad solved the issue.

I would not recommend that anyone 'solve' a problem by ignoring a senor. that's just not wise.

 

[Tony1044]

I would not recommend that anyone 'solve' a problem by ignoring a senor. that's just not wise.

I was on a RIB (Rigid Inflatable Boat) having done a dive. Nothing too complex - recreational depths at about 25/26m

A guy popped up and handed his gear to the boat driver and then climbed in.

Whilst waving his arm round asking if anyone knew how to shut his dive computer up which was busy beeping and flashing a fast ascent/missed deco stop warning.

 

[Artiom]

I would not recommend that anyone 'solve' a problem by ignoring a senor. that's just not wise.

It is not wise to engineer a laptop in such way that hot components do not get cooled properly. And yes, a custom bios invalidates the warranty.
So, without understanding the circumstances, calling something "not wise" is not wise.
My current Cosmos VI has same issue for the M.2 drive, but at least it has a few holes near and a cooling pad helps.

 

[ubuysa]

It is not wise to engineer a laptop in such way that hot components do not get cooled properly. And yes, a custom bios invalidates the warranty.
So, without understanding the circumstances, calling something "not wise" is not wise.
My current Cosmos VI has same issue for the M.2 drive, but at least it has a few holes near and a cooling pad helps.

So now you're an expert on laptop cooling? Sensors are there for a reason and deliberately ignoring the output of one and calling it a 'solution' is far worse than 'not wise'. I was actually being polite.

 

[Artiom]

So now you're an expert on laptop cooling? Sensors are there for a reason and deliberately ignoring the output of one and calling it a 'solution' is far worse than 'not wise'. I was actually being polite.

Looks like I am more expert than you, as so far you have provided zero useful information to this thread. Everyone appreciates your efforts trying to help others, but please refrain form such childish behavior thinking that you are smarter than everyone else. It is fine to provide an alternative point of view - "custom bios voids warranty", but calling something stupid without providing a better solution is... well... stupid.

Just to add something useful to this post, that laptop (Optimus V) was on warranty repairs after that - its monitor cable broke - and it was repaired for free, PCS support just pointed that the motherboard may not be covered by the warranty if anything happens, but everything else - is. Once again they demonstrated an excellent support service. It's sometimes they can't do anything with an unfortunate combination of hardware - which was the case of a second HDD covering a hot chip with no airflow at all.

 

[mantadog]

Looks like I am more expert than you, as so far you have provided zero useful information to this thread. Everyone appreciates your efforts trying to help others, but please refrain form such childish behavior thinking that you are smarter than everyone else. It is fine to provide an alternative point of view - "custom bios voids warranty", but calling something stupid without providing a better solution is... well... stupid

Let's try and keep things civil, I think most of us here recognise ubuysa as someone who has more experience with computer hardware than most. Perhaps you don't know his past but I can assure you, while he may speak bluntly at times, any criticism is usually well warranted.

 

[Tony1044]

Looks like I am more expert than you, as so far you have provided zero useful information to this thread. Everyone appreciates your efforts trying to help others, but please refrain form such childish behavior thinking that you are smarter than everyone else. It is fine to provide an alternative point of view - "custom bios voids warranty", but calling something stupid without providing a better solution is... well... stupid.

Just to add something useful to this post, that laptop (Optimus V) was on warranty repairs after that - its monitor cable broke - and it was repaired for free, PCS support just pointed that the motherboard may not be covered by the warranty if anything happens, but everything else - is. Once again they demonstrated an excellent support service. It's sometimes they can't do anything with an unfortunate combination of hardware - which was the case of a second HDD covering a hot chip with no airflow at all.

Ok so first off let's calm down, eh?

Ubuyusa makes a valid point. Now before you go asking, my background IS as a fully qualified (as in I did a degree in it) electrical and electronics engineer. Before I moved over to the projects / IT world, I worked in electronics engineering for the likes of Sharp Electronics.

Now I could go into airflow and why sensors are put into a specific spot even if they don't seem to do anything. It's something that designers spend a lot of time working on, like, for example why the tracks on the circuit board in your laptop/pc will suddenly kink - that's to ensure that every track is the same length and signals arrive as close to simultaneously as possible...

But look at this:



That is a three dimensional heat map of the server running my firewall. Well some of them.

Now looking inside the server you'd never guess it's hotspots or coolspots.

By bypassing a sensor you run the risk of causing irrepairable, warranty-voiding damage. Trust me when I tell you when silicon hits that golden 105 degrees Celsius the cascading failure you get will be explosive. Literally.

Ultimately it's your machine. If you want to do foolhardy things with it then really no one cares.

However. Disabling a sensor. Yeah that's stupid.

 

[Artiom]

So what should be the solution for Optimus V chassis?

 

[Oussebon]

The problem was solved by flashing a custom BIOS which simply ignored the temperature sensor on this chip.

I have encountered a situation where disabling a sensor/warning was a necessary solution - my Asus mobo gives warning about fan speed being too low on boot up, iirc where the CPU's fan goes below 600rpm. Changing that threshold or disabling the monitoring is needed there as the mobo doesn't take into account that some cooling solutions are fine at lower rpm, I guess. Any actual issues with cooling due to low fan speed would show up in the thermals.

However, I'd have to agree that you can't call disabling a warning that something is too hot a solution. If X is actually running too hot then the warning is there for a reason.
If the sensor's faulty obviously that's also a problem.
If the sensor's fine but the threshold limits given in the BIOS/software etc are incorrect, disabling the warning would mean you'd get no indication about an actual thermal issue and its presence may not make itself as immediately obvious as a CPU throttling, leading to components being run at higher temps than they ought to for longer.

Disabling the warning doesn't sound like a solution. it just sounds like ignoring a problem that luckily hasn't killed any hardware yet.

Flashing a custom BIOS is also, as previously said, a great way to invalidate the warranty.

So what should be the solution for Optimus V chassis?

If I got a new laptop that ran too hot due to a fundamental design flaw I'd probably return it as being basically faulty.

I'd caution anyone coming across this thread against considering disabling a temperature sensor as a "solution". It's kind of like removing your smoke alarm because it started beeping.

 

[Tony1044]

So what should be the solution for Optimus V chassis?

Have you done a clean of the fans and a repaste of the heatsinks..they'd be first on my list.

Get a can of compressed air and some good quality thermal paste as well as an antistatic bracelet from Amazon - it's really not that hard to do. Plenty of youtube vids.

I had to my Defiance II after about a year as it'd always run hot. Worked a treat.

 

[Artiom]

This gets completely offtopic now, but the fans are clean and in good working order. CPU/GPU temps are fine. No one says ignoring a temperature sensor is a good idea overall - but this is the only alternative to returning an otherwise great chassis. Engineering design flaws happen from time to time as there are too many factors to consider and sometimes we have to take a compromise - in this particular case - I sacrificed the motherboard warranty for my ears' health - and the laptop is quiet and works perfectly for more than 3 years so far. When pointing issues in someone's reasoning - try first to understand the actual situation with the specific hardware combination as general recommendations are useful "most of the time" but not always.

 

[Oussebon]

try first to understand the actual situation with the specific hardware combination as general recommendations are useful "most of the time" but not always.

I do understand. You made the choice to invalidate the warranty and ignore something that's telling you there's a problem because you're otherwise quite happy with the purchase.

That's your money and your call.

My general advice, however, to anyone else reading your solution and thinking it's a remotely good idea would be that, well, it isn't. If they get a brand new a laptop and there's a problem, try to get PCS to fix it / troubleshoot it. If it doesn't fix it, send it back, get a refund, and buy something else.

Unless you have so much money and the laptop isn't important enough to you that it really doesn't matter if the thing fails.

There's no specific hardware where your "fix" is a good option to recommend. It's certainly possible to do it, and even get away with for a fair while, with luck anyway. But it would always be a bad idea to recommend what you did.

 

[Tony1044]

This gets completely offtopic now, but the fans are clean and in good working order. CPU/GPU temps are fine. No one says ignoring a temperature sensor is a good idea overall - but this is the only alternative to returning an otherwise great chassis. Engineering design flaws happen from time to time as there are too many factors to consider and sometimes we have to take a compromise - in this particular case - I sacrificed the motherboard warranty for my ears' health - and the laptop is quiet and works perfectly for more than 3 years so far. When pointing issues in someone's reasoning - try first to understand the actual situation with the specific hardware combination as general recommendations are useful "most of the time" but not always.

You really are rude, ignorant and arrogant, aren't you?

You come asking for help and advise and when people try to give it, all you can do is talk down at them somehow trying to prove you know better all round. So why ask for advice in the first place if you know best?

I'm done. I really couldn't care less if I tried.

 

[Sling23]

Hi Guys,

I would like to thank everyone for their input on this topic trying to help out Bobolous. I must stress that when we are helping each other out we need to try as best as possible to keep on topic and respect each other and the PCS Forum Rules in our replies. I am locking this thread before anything further gets out of hand, at this point nobody is getting the advice needed and I feel that the thread would be better dealt with between myself and Bobolous.

I must reiterate the Forums are not an official line for support and if Bobolous or Artiom are having issues with systems purchased through us that they contact us via our official lines of support shown in my signature below.

I once again would like to thank everyone for their input in this thread and the time and effort you guys put in assisting each other. It is something that is greatly appreciated by the PC Specialist Team. If anybody would like to discuss anything further feel free to send me a DM regarding this.

Many Thanks
Sling23