Laptop Coolers

[bob]

I bought a really cheap 3 fan cooler and it didn't work well for me at first. Because my cooler was not quite as wide as my laptop, I got the idea of stacking large books on either side of the cooler, and propping up the laptop on the books, to allow for a few inches of space between the laptop and the cooler. I found that allowing the air to circulate in this gap actually worked quite well, cooling my laptop enough to avoid the overheating problems I was getting when I ran overnight tournaments or analysis.

What kind of overheating issues? I have had several laptops from Dell, Gateway, Sony, HP and IBM. I have run them all for days at a time non-stop and never had a problem of any kind with temps getting too high. I think this is more urban myth than reality. The only benefit I have found, and still find, is a thin cooler between me and my laptop prevents my legs getting over-cooked when I run some cpu-bound tests sitting in my recliner at home.

[tmokonen]

After a few hours of 100% CPU utilization, my laptop would freeze, and the display would show these odd looking vertical lines. I had a program that showed the temperature of my laptop, and 75 degrees C was around the breaking point where these freezes would happen. The cooler cooled it down so that the temperature was in the mid to high 60s, just enough so that the freezes stopped happening.

I never had problems with ordinary everyday use of a laptop, only when I used chess engines for hours on end.

[Steve B]

They do work Ted....I have one that lies under my Dell Core2Duo laptop with two big fans and it cools the device anything between 6-8 degrees lower during summer....
Dr.D

Just Curious Dr.D.
why the need to cool your laptop at all?
my home computers have all been laptops for about 20 years now( never owned a home desktop computer) and i never had the need to cool them and never had an overheating problem
my current laptop is a dual core Dell I5 running windows 7
is that because your laptop is "always on" or because you use them for overnight analysis of chess positions or something similar?
i usually turn my laptop off when not in use
(which is basically all night long)

Air-Conditioned Regards
Steve

Question:

(1) does cooling make it run faster? Not at all.

(2) will it prolong the life of the laptop? Most likely, no. The things make the laptop run a little cooler, and make it more comfortable to use when on your lap.

That is _all_ the benefit you will see. These things are designed to keep the CPU operating temp below whatever limit Intel/AMD suggests. And they will do that flawlessly. If the bottom of the laptop gets too hot, it is because that is part of the heat sink and heat removal path. Your leg makes a good heat sink because your blood circulation removes the heat pretty quickly...

I can see that
the funny thing is
i never actually used a lap top ..on my lap..so i dont really know how hot it can get
i have it set up on my desk at home
or when i am at a clients office..on the clients desk
i imagine if i ever felt the bottom of it i would get alarmed at how hot it got
same thing with the old chess computers
every so often i feel the power supply and some of them can get very hot
i get concerned for a minute and then force myself to worry about something else
never had a dedicated computer overheat on me either

Cold As Ice Regards
Steve

[bob]

They do work Ted....I have one that lies under my Dell Core2Duo laptop with two big fans and it cools the device anything between 6-8 degrees lower during summer....
Dr.D

Just Curious Dr.D.
why the need to cool your laptop at all?
my home computers have all been laptops for about 20 years now( never owned a home desktop computer) and i never had the need to cool them and never had an overheating problem
my current laptop is a dual core Dell I5 running windows 7
is that because your laptop is "always on" or because you use them for overnight analysis of chess positions or something similar?
i usually turn my laptop off when not in use
(which is basically all night long)

Air-Conditioned Regards
Steve

Question:

(1) does cooling make it run faster? Not at all.

(2) will it prolong the life of the laptop? Most likely, no. The things make the laptop run a little cooler, and make it more comfortable to use when on your lap.

That is _all_ the benefit you will see. These things are designed to keep the CPU operating temp below whatever limit Intel/AMD suggests. And they will do that flawlessly. If the bottom of the laptop gets too hot, it is because that is part of the heat sink and heat removal path. Your leg makes a good heat sink because your blood circulation removes the heat pretty quickly...

I can see that
the funny thing is
i never actually used a lap top ..on my lap..so i dont really know how hot it can get
i have it set up on my desk at home
or when i am at a clients office..on the clients desk
i imagine if i ever felt the bottom of it i would get alarmed at how hot it got
same thing with the old chess computers
every so often i feel the power supply and some of them can get very hot
i get concerned for a minute and then force myself to worry about something else
never had a dedicated computer overheat on me either

Cold As Ice Regards
Steve

I have been using laptops since the original Data General One. Never had a temp problem with one, except for the bottom when in contact with my leg. I have used a laptop to run Scrappy/Crafty online for days at a time, playing non-stop on ICC back when that was common, with nary a problem. Yep, some of the "cheapo" laptops might not like that kind of usage... But from reputable vendors, I have not seen a single problem myself.

[AdminX]

Thanks to everyone for the info. The reason I asked is because the CPU/ Heatsink fan in my HP DV7-2180us started to die and became very noisy. I had to order a new one (part# 516876-001) from http://partsurfer.hp.com , take the laptop apart and replace the part since it was out of warranty. All is well now with the unit and the part only cost me $80 USD. It may have been a bad part or something I did that caused it, I really don't know but maybe getting a cooler might help take some of the load off the CPU/ Heatsink fan.



PS: Yeah I know I could have let HP do it and pay the toll, but I don't pay people to do for me what I can do myself.

[Dr.Wael Deeb]

Thanks to everyone for the info. The reason I asked is because the CPU/ Heatsink fan in my HP DV7-2180us started to die and became very noisy. I had to order a new one (part# 516876-001) from http://partsurfer.hp.com , take the laptop apart and replace the part since it was out of warranty. All is well now with the unit and the part only cost me $80 USD. It may have been a bad part or something I did that caused it, I really don't know but maybe getting a cooler might help take some of the load off the CPU/ Heatsink fan.

Life is interesting Ted....back in 2007 I had the same problem with a HP dual core brand new laptop....after bearly 6 months of intensive using,the fan became very noisy and it broke down....I ordered a new one which cost me then around 200 bucks ....
So it looks like HP fan units are in general a real piece of junk....
When i saw the picture of your new ordered fan,I again lived the moments of replacing the fan of my previous HP piece of junk....
Dell is the way to go since then with 3 laptops at home and zero problems....
HP fan devision sends their regards,
Dr.D

[Nimzovik]

All of the above really angers me. Blast! Make the things run cooler! I do not care how. That is their problem. I suppose I could order a 15 year warranty on a laptop. Then when the thing blows I get new parts. A tech at comp USA once told me that the company often had to honor the warranty with much better parts as the old tech. was no longer available.

I mean really.... Quality fans in a laptop is not the way to cut cost on production. Customer satisfaction and repeat business must hurt.

Just as an aside-- What do y'all think is the better quality company for laptops...? DELL? HP? Acer? Toshiba? I suppose I should start an official poll but I am too lazy.
Believe it or not I still have an old *cough cough* Packard Bell ( my goodness ... did I just say that out loud?) flat computer with upgrade to 66 MGhrz chip with upgraded RAM to 20 Megs that still works. If I can find it in my garage. Hmmmm... Maybe I call the guys on the American 'Pickers' TV show......

[Robert Weck]

If your notebook has a noisy built-in fan, you can reduce the "noise pollution" with a low-noise cooler (i wish, i had tried that, when i was using my Dell Latitude C810 and 840! They had really LOUD fans )

But more than CPU temp, i care for the temp of my harddisks! I have an EeePC 1000H; its HDD can easily heat up to >55 degrees Celsius (especially, if you operate it on a soft surface, that blocks the vents on the bottom), which is not a good temp for longer use. A cooler helps to keep the temp at a more healthy low to mid 40...



Robert

[AdminX]

If your notebook has a noisy built-in fan, you can reduce the "noise pollution" with a low-noise cooler (i wish, i had tried that, when i was using my Dell Latitude C810 and 840! They had really LOUD fans )

But more than CPU temp, i care for the temp of my harddisks! I have an EeePC 1000H; its HDD can easily heat up to >55 degrees Celsius (especially, if you operate it on a soft surface, that blocks the vents on the bottom), which is not a good temp for longer use. A cooler helps to keep the temp at a more healthy low to mid 40...



Robert

Hi Robert,

Trust me, This fan had to go it was really on it's way to the grave. It was more than just the increased noise. Now everything is back to normal, the new one is silent, working well and my temps are back to normal. My laptop is a quad core, so I was thinking a laptop cooler might take some of the load off the CPU fan.

[tmokonen]

I have been using laptops since the original Data General One. Never had a temp problem with one, except for the bottom when in contact with my leg. I have used a laptop to run Scrappy/Crafty online for days at a time, playing non-stop on ICC back when that was common, with nary a problem. Yep, some of the "cheapo" laptops might not like that kind of usage... But from reputable vendors, I have not seen a single problem myself.

Hmm, my laptop wasn't really a cheapo laptop, and it gave me overheating headaches. At the time that I bought it, it was one of the very few laptops with a dual core processor. I'm not sure why it gave me problems (the problems didn't show up until about three years after I bought it).