<p>Actually you want it to spin to clean off all of it. No prob on back voltage if system is off.</p>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Apr 4, 2012 4:20 PM, "Brian Mathis" <<a href="mailto:brian.mathis%2Bale@betteradmin.com">brian.mathis+ale@betteradmin.com</a>> wrote:<br type="attribution"><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex">
Be careful when using a vacuum or canned air. It will spin the fan<br>
which turns it into a small generator which could feedback voltage<br>
into the motherboard. If possible, use a small straw or something to<br>
prevent the fan from spinning when you clean it like this.<br>
<br>
<br>
❧ Brian Mathis<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
On Wed, Apr 4, 2012 at 3:19 PM, Jim Kinney <<a href="mailto:jim.kinney@gmail.com">jim.kinney@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<br>
> I have set a laptop intake on top of a shop vac hose with the vac running<br>
> and blasted canned air in the laptop exhaust vent. What came out was a cloud<br>
> of crud that was hung on the fan blades.<br>
><br>
> I have a passive cooling pad that is nothing more than a swivel pad with<br>
> adjustable "bumps". Good airflow and less than $15.<br>
><br>
><br>
> On Wed, Apr 4, 2012 at 3:12 PM, Ron Frazier (ALE)<br>
> <<a href="mailto:atllinuxenthinfo@techstarship.com">atllinuxenthinfo@techstarship.com</a>> wrote:<br>
>><br>
>> Hi Jim,<br>
>><br>
>> Your computer SHOULD be able to run at 100 percent capacity for an<br>
>> extended period of time without overheating. I'll second the advice<br>
>> that Brian Mathis gave to clean the unit. Here are some details you<br>
>> want to check.<br>
>><br>
>> a) Make sure the fan is working at all. It may not be on when the<br>
>> computer is cool, but should definitely come on when the computer gets<br>
>> hot.<br>
>> b) Make sure the fan intake, which is often on the bottom, is not<br>
>> blocked and that the machine is not sitting on a soft surface, or even a<br>
>> hard surface with no air gap.<br>
>> c) Clean any dust out of the fan intake. I've had these intakes to get<br>
>> clogged before. You can put a piece of wedding ribbon or other fine<br>
>> mesh over the intake to help prevent dust accumulation inside the<br>
>> machine. Not too fine though or you'll reduce airflow too much. Window<br>
>> screen, however is too course. You'll have to check this intake<br>
>> periodically and clean it.<br>
>> d) Get into the bios and make sure all cooling settings are maxed out,<br>
>> set the fans to run at 100 % all the time (at least until you solve this<br>
>> problem).<br>
>> e) You may wish to get a laptop cooler pad, which has a fan, which blows<br>
>> air up toward the laptop from the base. I have a nice unit made by<br>
>> Cooler Master, for two of my laptops that sit on a desk, that I bought<br>
>> from Frys. It has a very large and quiet fan that blows air upward.<br>
>> Don't get a dirt cheap unit. They have fans that are rated for less<br>
>> than a year. Get a nice unit, like the one I mentioned, with a fan with<br>
>> BALL BEARINGS and not sleeve bearings. Note that these don't provide<br>
>> cooling in reality, just air flow, but that might be what you need.<br>
>> f) If you open the computer up, look for the heat exchanger, which the<br>
>> fan blows through, which may be attached to a heat pipe. Very<br>
>> carefully, clean dust out of the heat exchanger. Note, on one of my<br>
>> machines, it had a little bitty 1" heat exchanger, with all the air<br>
>> flowing through that. I found a glob of dust covering 3/4 of it from<br>
>> the INSIDE. Once I cleaned that, I found that the PC would stay within<br>
>> it's thermal limits even under full load.<br>
>> g) If you remove any heat exchangers or heat pipes, make absolutely sure<br>
>> that all surfaces have a good thermal contact and seal when you put it<br>
>> back together. You may need to add / replace thermal paste as Brian<br>
>> mentioned. It only takes a tiny drop.<br>
>> h) Once you get the OS running, install a temperature monitoring<br>
>> software package. This may be hard to get working depending on which<br>
>> sensors are in the PC and which drivers are in the kernel. On Windows,<br>
>> you could use something like SpeedFan.<br>
>> i) Set the cooling settings in the OS to maximum or active cooling. I'm<br>
>> not sure where this is in Ubuntu. In Windows, it's in the power<br>
>> settings. These settings won't necessarily run the fan all the time.<br>
>> However, if the system starts getting too hot, it will ramp up the fan<br>
>> prior to throttling the CPU frequency.<br>
>> j) Find out your CPU's maximum operating temperature. This can be a<br>
>> challenge. Let me know if you need help and I'll dig through some old<br>
>> bookmarks on the subject Every CPU is different. You have to find the<br>
>> data sheet for your particular model. All my laptops have Intel chips<br>
>> and they can take around 100 degrees C. More modern chips will<br>
>> generally throttle their speed before shutting down, but only to a<br>
>> point. My 4 core AMD chip in my desktop can only take 62 degrees C. I<br>
>> had to go to liquid cooling to keep it from overheating under full CPU<br>
>> load. GPU temperature is a whole other matter. Your laptop's cooling<br>
>> system probably is attached to both the CPU and the GPU.<br>
>> k) After you get the problem fixed and get your monitoring working, you<br>
>> may (or may not) want to stress test the system. If you want to, get<br>
>> the Prime95 software from here:<br>
>> <a href="http://www.mersenne.org/" target="_blank">http://www.mersenne.org/</a> This software is designed to<br>
>> calculate world record prime numbers that are important to<br>
>> mathematicians. However, it is also a great way to stress test the<br>
>> system since it runs the CPU and memory to the max. It doesn't do much<br>
>> with the GPU. You should be able to run the cpu flat out at 100 percent<br>
>> without a problem overheating. However, I wouldn't do this all the time<br>
>> because it probably shortens the life of the system. 30 minutes to 1<br>
>> hour for testing should not be a problem.<br>
>><br>
>> Hope this helps. If you need any assistance and I can help, I'd be glad<br>
>> to try.<br>
>><br>
>> Sincerely,<br>
>><br>
>> Ron<br>
>><br>
>><br>
>> On 4/4/2012 1:22 PM, Jim Philips wrote:<br>
>> > Just trolling for possible solutions: My laptop has an ATI Radeon<br>
>> > video card. Unless the Catalyst driver is installed, it quickly starts<br>
>> > to overheat. I messed up my Ubuntu install, so now I want to<br>
>> > reinstall. But when I try, about 50% of the files get copied to disk<br>
>> > and then it slows down and finally shuts off due to overheating. This<br>
>> > wasn't a problem earlier, but I think with each thermal shutdown, the<br>
>> > laptop gets a little more susceptible to overheating. Once Catalyst is<br>
>> > installed, everything works fine. But I can only install Catalyst if I<br>
>> > complete the install of Ubuntu. Any workarounds anybody can think of?<br>
>> ><br>
>> ><br>
>><br>
>> --<br>
>><br>
>> (PS - If you email me and don't get a quick response, you might want to<br>
>> call on the phone. I get about 300 emails per day from alternate energy<br>
>> mailing lists and such. I don't always see new messages very quickly.)<br>
>><br>
>> Ron Frazier<br>
>><br>
>> <a href="tel:770-205-9422" value="+17702059422">770-205-9422</a> (O) Leave a message.<br>
>> linuxdude AT <a href="http://techstarship.com" target="_blank">techstarship.com</a><br>
>><br>
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><br>
><br>
> --<br>
> --<br>
> James P. Kinney III<br>
><br>
> As long as the general population is passive, apathetic, diverted to<br>
> consumerism or hatred of the vulnerable, then the powerful can do as they<br>
> please, and those who survive will be left to contemplate the outcome.<br>
> - 2011 Noam Chomsky<br>
><br>
> <a href="http://heretothereideas.blogspot.com/" target="_blank">http://heretothereideas.blogspot.com/</a><br>
><br>
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