How to limit processor speed to reduce its temperature?

[WellEatenPanda]

I have Intel i3-370M processor in my laptop and it's constantly overheating even when watching a movie or surfing the net. I have to put something underneath it or use additional coolers and even then, they only prolong the time until it shuts down.

Is there a way to limit the speed of the processor, so it wouldn't overheat. I've tried using CPU Idle and other software but the drivers they use don't load. Is there one for Intel processors?

I really don't need the speed it provides and cleaning of the cooler won't help as the laptop overheated from the time my dad bought it. The cooler blows air from the side so in theory the laptop should work flat on the desk, shouldn't it?

I'm monitoring the temperature and it's always above 60C, with addtional cooler and with about 2cm above the table, is this normal? The maximum temperature for the processor is 90C.

P.S. I don't want to deal with BIOS as it requires very good knowledge of how the CPU works and the voltages involved. I'm not that advanced as of yet, or is it the only way?

Thank you for any help.

A noob in a sauna with extra-super-speed processor.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

Time to remove the underside cover and blow out the dust, dog hair and other debris.

 

[sarwar_r87]

you can reduce the clock speed from windows power management. but this is not a fix.

i believe this is a fairly old laptop. most common cause of temp increase in laptop is that there is dirt inside the CPU. i suggest sending it for servicing to clean. it should be covered by warranty. you can also do it your self at home. Just open the back plate and the heatsink and clean it. reapply thermal paste and close up. you can find good tutorials in utube.


PS> i hope u are not using your extra-super-speedy laptop in sauna

 

[getochkn]

you can reduce the clock speed from windows power management. but this is not a fix.

i believe this is a fairly old laptop. most common cause of temp increase in laptop is that there is dirt inside the CPU. i suggest sending it for servicing to clean. it should be covered by warranty. you can also do it your self at home. Just open the back plate and the heatsink and clean it. reapply thermal paste and close up. you can find good tutorials in utube.


PS> i hope u are not using your extra-super-speedy laptop in sauna

First you say it's an old laptop, then it say it should be covered under warranty? Which is it? Old laptops aren't covered under warranty, and even new ones, they usually won't do anything but send it back to you if it's clogged with dog hair, that's not their problem. The chip he mention wasn't released until almost the end of 2010, so the laptop can't even be 3 years old at the most if they got it the day the chip launched.


It does sound like it needs cleaning of the fan, heat pipes, and possibly some new thermal paste.

As for the comments, just take off the back plate and do it, good luck. Have you people ever taken apart a laptop? I have cleaned hundreds and have seen maybe a handful that actually give you access to the heatsink/fans without taking 95% of the laptop apart. I usually charge $80 for such a service in my shop because of the time involved, because 99% of the time, you have to take apart the laptop pretty much to the motherboard to get access to the fans, heatpipe and heatsink to change thermal paste. It takes time to remove every single screw, keep track of them as they are all different hieghts and sizes, all the tiny ribbon cables and not break them, all the connectors, to finally get to the guts. An average laptop takes 1-2 hours from start to finish to do and that's after doing hundreds.

I'm not saying the average person can't do it, but on most laptops it's a daunting task for the beginner, and I've had dozens of laptops come in with broken ribbon cables or wires because someone watched a youtube video trying to clean it and trashed it.

 

[sarwar_r87]

is everything ok mate? you seem excited!

First you say it's an old laptop, then it say it should be covered under warranty? Which is it? Old laptops aren't covered under warranty, and even new ones, they usually won't do anything but send it back to you if it's clogged with dog hair, that's not their problem. The chip he mention wasn't released until almost the end of 2010, so the laptop can't even be 3 years old at the most if they got it the day the chip launched.


It does sound like it needs cleaning of the fan, heat pipes, and possibly some new thermal paste.

As for the comments, just take off the back plate and do it, good luck. Have you people ever taken apart a laptop? I have cleaned hundreds and have seen maybe a handful that actually give you access to the heatsink/fans without taking 95% of the laptop apart. I usually charge $80 for such a service in my shop because of the time involved, because 99% of the time, you have to take apart the laptop pretty much to the motherboard to get access to the fans, heatpipe and heatsink to change thermal paste. It takes time to remove every single screw, keep track of them as they are all different hieghts and sizes, all the tiny ribbon cables and not break them, all the connectors, to finally get to the guts. An average laptop takes 1-2 hours from start to finish to do and that's after doing hundreds.

I'm not saying the average person can't do it, but on most laptops it's a daunting task for the beginner, and I've had dozens of laptops come in with broken ribbon cables or wires because someone watched a youtube video trying to clean it and trashed it.

1. i have a old 22 month laptop. its still covered by warranty. what is the point? obviously i donot knw if he still has warrently.
2. well if you let your dog play WoW than off course they will not cover it under warranty. but i have a friend who got his fixed? maybe he had a silver tongue?
3. i did clean my laptop last month. its sony. its actually take the backplate and the heatsink with a screw driver. you ought to know that since you clearly make a living out of cleaning dog hair form laptops!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCAP9DpCYvQ

i said he can take a look at utube and if he is brave enough can try it. else pay someone to do it. if he breaks a ribbon you get paid for fixing it and make money. y complain!

 

[WellEatenPanda]

you can reduce the clock speed from windows power management. but this is not a fix.

i believe this is a fairly old laptop. most common cause of temp increase in laptop is that there is dirt inside the CPU. i suggest sending it for servicing to clean. it should be covered by warranty. you can also do it your self at home. Just open the back plate and the heatsink and clean it. reapply thermal paste and close up. you can find good tutorials in utube.


PS> i hope u are not using your extra-super-speedy laptop in sauna

Thanks for pointing out the windows power management settings, that's really useful!

The laptop is just more than a year old, is there a chance that it already caught enough dust to make it overheat or is it just bad laptop design? It's generating more heat that it could possibly carry away as the fan doesn't seem to be working really hard compared to the fan in my older laptop, which is almost 5 years old.

EDIT: I could easily clean it if not the ribbons holding the keyboard that I was unable to remove the last time I tried to clean my friend's laptop, they seem to be glued there. My laptop screws from the bottom, but first, the keyboard must be taken out.

Let me know what you think. Thanks a lot.

 

[getochkn]

Could be bad design or could be full of dust already due to bad design, always hard to tell. Nothing is ever glued in there, it may seem like it, but you need to look more closely to figure out how to get the keyboard out then.

 

[sarwar_r87]

Thanks for pointing out the windows power management settings, that's really useful!

The laptop is just more than a year old, is there a chance that it already caught enough dust to make it overheat or is it just bad laptop design? It's generating more heat that it could possibly carry away as the fan doesn't seem to be working really hard compared to the fan in my older laptop, which is almost 5 years old.

EDIT: I could easily clean it if not the ribbons holding the keyboard that I was unable to remove the last time I tried to clean my friend's laptop, they seem to be glued there. My laptop screws from the bottom, but first, the keyboard must be taken out.

Let me know what you think. Thanks a lot.

if it was a design flaw, you would see the overheating from the first month. if it is a design problem, or a heatsink came lose, it will definitely be covered by warranty. so send it in if it you have a warranty. if they open it, they will probably open the back and remove the heat sink to check for problems, inturn cleaning it and reappllying the paste and stuff (unless they are an arrogant bunch and puts back the dirty laptop together without using a blower).

one year is enough to collect dust if you use laptop outdoors and/or you live in a dry area.

if you donot mind me asking, what is the model and the make of the laptop

 

[WellEatenPanda]

Could be bad design or could be full of dust already due to bad design, always hard to tell. Nothing is ever glued in there, it may seem like it, but you need to look more closely to figure out how to get the keyboard out then.

Thanks for pointing out the windows power management settings, that's really useful!

The laptop is just more than a year old, is there a chance that it already caught enough dust to make it overheat or is it just bad laptop design? It's generating more heat that it could possibly carry away as the fan doesn't seem to be working really hard compared to the fan in my older laptop, which is almost 5 years old.

EDIT: I could easily clean it if not the ribbons holding the keyboard that I was unable to remove the last time I tried to clean my friend's laptop, they seem to be glued there. My laptop screws from the bottom, but first, the keyboard must be taken out.

Let me know what you think. Thanks a lot.

if it was a design flaw, you would see the overheating from the first month. if it is a design problem, or a heatsink came lose, it will definitely be covered by warranty. so send it in if it you have a warranty. if they open it, they will probably open the back and remove the heat sink to check for problems, inturn cleaning it and reappllying the paste and stuff (unless they are an arrogant bunch and puts back the dirty laptop together without using a blower).

one year is enough to collect dust if you use laptop outdoors and/or you live in a dry area.

if you donot mind me asking, what is the model and the make of the laptop

It's not covered by warranty anymore, only the first year was covered. The laptop is Acer Aspire 5733. It was mostly used on a bed, but not extensively, just to check email/watch a movie.

Can it be because the laptop has no graphics card, which makes the processor work harder?

I've tried limiting the processor usage with power management settings and set the power saving settings. Task manager still shows 60% CPU usage, even when I set the processor usage limit at 25%. The temperature now seems 60-80 when playing games and no overheating occuring so far, with 80% limit.

EDIT: Idle temperature is 57-60C with only essential processes running, not even skype or anything. Is that even close to normal temperature? It's kind of hot outside though.

 

[kratosbellic]

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RnKXiQzgbm0"></a> excellent

 

[sarwar_r87]

mostly used on bed? if the exhaust outlets are blocked, i am not surprised by those reading.

maybe test the setup on a table to see if things improve.
i am sure you did, but i am just double checking with you.

Acer is difficult to disassemble, its your call if you wish to do it yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghSf6ALBUV4

 

[WellEatenPanda]

mostly used on bed? if the exhaust outlets are blocked, i am not surprised by those reading.

maybe test the setup on a table to see if things improve.
i am sure you did, but i am just double checking with you.

Acer is difficult to disassemble, its your call if you wish to do it yourself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghSf6ALBUV4

No, nothing is blocked, I mentioned that just in case more dust comes in while a laptop is used not only on a table. I've tried it on the table, using special table that raises the laptop from the desk and additional coolers beneath it, nothing helps, just prolongs the overheat. I even used a desk fan...

I've tried using software to see how many RPM the fan spins at, but none of the software detects the fan and the BIOS only contains the details of the CPU and the time and date of the system To me, the fan seems to be extremely strange as it makes no sound at 60C and just starts making it at +75C after which it's almost done.

If the fan is full of dust, shouldn't it spin way faster than it normally does?

 

[sarwar_r87]

higher rpm doesn always mean higher sound if it is a quality fat and not made into HP or Sony laptops. 😛
sometimes the fan may not run faster due to resistance from the dirt.

does the exhaust air feel hot to you? false CPU temp reading is however very uncommon.

it can be dirt, lose heatsink, dead fan. either way you have to open it up or send it to professionals.

 

[WellEatenPanda]

higher rpm doesn always mean higher sound if it is a quality fat and not made into HP or Sony laptops. 😛
sometimes the fan may not run faster due to resistance from the dirt.

does the exhaust air feel hot to you? false CPU temp reading is however very uncommon.

it can be dirt, lose heatsink, dead fan. either way you have to open it up or send it to professionals.

There is barely any air coming out even when the temperature is 80C (10 below Tj. Max). I will try to open it and clean the fan/reapply thermal paste and let you know if that's the problem.

Is there any particular paste I should use or is it not much of a difference? Does the paste harden when the cpu cools off?

 

[jaguarskx]

Arctic Silver 5 is a very good thermal paste. It has been around for a while so there are better ones around, but I would say it still ranks among the top 20 thermal pastes in my opinion. I think RadioShack and BestBuy sells it. Or you can order it online from places like Newegg or Amazon. It's a small tube so it will likely be mailed to you in a small envelop; no package to pickup.

Other brands are Arctic Cooling MX-4, Prolimatech PK-1, and IC Diamond.

 

[WellEatenPanda]

I completely removed every single part from the laptop to access the fan and removed half a centimetre of dust between the fan and the exhaust 😀 (and several cat hairballs of course ). Now it's 40C when idle and 75C max when several games are running, which is amazing!

Thank you very much.

 

[djtk]

My laptop CPU fan failed and requires a complete disassembly to replace it. An auxiliary fan plate helps, but I found a simpler and cheaper solution for my Win7 machine. Enter "msconfig" on the command line. Select the Boot tab and press "Advanced Options" If you have a multi-core CPU select "Number of Processors" and then select a number less then the total. I am running one Core out of four total and everything works fine, better than with 4, With 4 cores the outer case was too hot to touch. With 1, heat is hardly noticeable.