Is it good idea to remove laptop keyboard?

Hi,

I'm using a HP Pavilion Dv6t-7000 and this laptop has a heating issue, especially with the Nvidia GT 650m. I use it with a cooling pad on the desk connected to a monitor and a Logitech wireless keyboard and mouse most of the time.

So I read somewhere that said if you remove the keyboard, it opens up the laptop and let it run cooler. The keyboard is easy enough to remove, 2 screws and you don't even need to open the laptop. Beneath the keyboard is another layer of plastic that is part of the face cover, with multiple hole entries, specifically above the fan.

Sure enough, according to my temp readings, the laptop is running cooler. However, I'm wondering if I am missing something? A friend of mine told me that the laptop needs to be a closed system because it is designed to filter the air through the laptop like a jetstream. The whole thing should be designed to work with the heatsink. If the system is open, heat is escaping through the top of the laptop and not through the heatsink, so the heatsink is less effective.

After a couple of years, I noticed the plastic piece of the top cover began to crack, sure enough from the heat coming up. The other thing I notice is, since the whole system is cooler, the fan rarely reaches max speed. So it runs at middle speed, which then the CPU is actually running "hotter" in some heavy load applications.

For example, the fan will trigger to max speed when the GPU reaches 74*C and return to mid speed when it cools down to 68*C or when the CPU reaches 90*C and return to mid speed when it returns to 75*C.

Mid speed:
GPU: 68-74*C
CPU: 75-90*C

So in one heavy loaded application, the GPU remains steady at around 70-71*C and the CPU runs around 80-85*C, it is mostly 80*C but it spikes up to 87-89*C. However the fan never triggers to max. I'm concerned about the CPU spiking up to such high degree.

Now with the system closed, the GPU actually heats up to 74*C which triggers the max fan. With the fan on max, it cools the GPU back down to 70-71*C. So essentially the GPU remains the same except the fan is on high. But in max fan, the CPU runs cooler around 75-80*C, spiking occasionally to 82-84*C. I noticed it is much more stable, less random spikes.

So does this confirm what my friend said? I should run the laptop in a closed environment and not opening it up? My other concern is that the HP laptop design is stupid. It puts the cpu and heatsink on the bottom side! Heat rises, so essentially their design had the heaksink on the bottom of the CPU facing down. In this case, I would want more heat taken into the heatsink and transferred out instead of letting it rise into the PCB and other components on the other side of the CPU, right?

And then some people tell me the system is designed to protect itself so it really doesn't matter which way b/c if the fan doesn't run on max, it is because the system determines that it doesn't need to be. So either way is fine and I'm worrying over nothing. But then again, this laptop heating is already poorly designed, should I put so much trust in these engineers?

Please tell me what you think! Thank you!

 

An easier solution would be to clean out the fans and repaste the GPU and GPU with fresh thermal compound.

 

With an already overheating system, you'd think I do that periodically.

This laptop was overheating the 1st day I brought it in. It is such a bad design. The overheating actually caused the fan's bearing to wear out within a year. I had to buy liquid wrench light machine oil to resolve this issue. This is also one of the reason I was afraid to run the fan on max.

After 4 years, the paste dried and I actually didn't bother to replace it and it was easily running the CPU past 105*C TDP, which it throttles. Eventually it burnt out the motherboard and I had to replace it. Being more careful now, I replace the paste again in 3 years, this time also with Grizzly Kryonaut.

What caught my attention was this time, there were severe CPU spikes compare to 3 years ago when I repaste with Arctic Silver. After some more testing, I realized it is because Arctic Silver doesn't work that well in comparison to the original HP stock (weird huh?) so the GPU reached 74*C easily and the fan was always on max, thus stablizing the CPU temperature.

With Kyronaut, the GPU is running so cool, the fan doesn't reach max speed often, resulting with the CPU running hotter and spiking. But I'm wondering whether this is something to worried about as the spiking never triggers the fan to max either.

 

Kryonaut is not a good paste to use on laptops because it has a tendency to break down at temperatures at and above 80C.

 

if there is a plastic film (not actual PCB/circuit) behind the keyboard you could cut it so the air would but suck throught the keyboard, that's what I did on my Dell E5430 with non backlit keyboard but with a plastic film behind to prevent water going to the motherboard.

 

You might want to look into ThrottleStop to keep your CPU throttling under control. Especially look at tuning the turbo power limits and doing an undervolt. Either will help the CPU run a lot cooler.

Charles

 

Older HP Laptops are known to have bad cooling designs. Tbh your temps are pretty normal, my old HP ENVY 17 runs in the mid 80s when gaming and doing other intensive tasks even after cleaning the fan+heatsink, repasting the CPU and GPU, and undervolting the CPU.

You could disable turboboost which keeps your CPU running at stock speeds which lowers temps somewhat and/or do what Charles suggested by using Throttlestop to undervolt your CPU.

 

Thanks, I'm always up for recommendation for better pastes. The only one I don't think I can use are the metal based b/c the GPU has all these little capacitors and resistors on the GPU board next to the die.

So far I've tried Arctic Silver and MX. Silver is decent, but I'm surprised it is not as good as HP stock thermal paste, the temperature of the GPU was running a good 5 degree hotter. The MX is the worst one of them all and does nothing for the GPU. I was beginning to wonder if I bought a fake one, but it came with that scan code which verified through their website.

So far the Kryonaut is working great for the GPU, even better than the stock paste, with cooler temperature coming around, it was running on load at around 66-68*C, in comparison to HP stock at 70*C, and Arctic silver at 74*C.

Well with my keyboard removed, there is plenty of open space. But I'm wondering if that is a good idea b/c the fan is suppose to create a jetstream cooling the heatsink. With the system open, the heatsink would not be as effective, though the whole system is cooler. But my concern is the design of this laptop putting the CPU/GPU upside down, so the heat is actually going through the PCB upwards rather than disappating from the heatsink/fan jetstream.

Thank you, I actually have ThrottleStop but didn't think of this. I used it during the past month when it got really hot and it seems to be a great idea. I actually found out something wrong with my laptop, which I'll explain below in reply to the another post.

Thanks, after running it a bit and actually opening it up one more time, I have to agree with you that I might just be overreacting.

So this is a little unexpected, but a friend of mine suggested I take out the CPU from the socket to check for bent pins. I was reluctant because I have already opened it 6-7 times now, reseating the heatsink. So when I removed the CPU, there were no bent pins. However, I found a hair stuck in there in the socket (apparently a beard hair) and also a dried up arctic silver gunk from when I cleaned it mixed with a little copper dust from the heatsink.

I have absolutely no idea how this would affect the system, but I suspect both the hair and the arctic silver gunk would at least acted as heat insulators between the socket and the CPU. And indeed, after I cleared it and repaste it, the system seems to be running a lot more stable and maintains cooler at high fan.

I have no idea how those things got in there b/c it was pretty tight and was definitely not in there previously. But it seems to have resolved my problem. Other issues are more of a misunderstanding of the numbers.

1) Kryonaut is running the system so cool, so it is only on medium fan. This causes some spikes, but most of the crazy spikes were resolved after removing the hair and the gunk. However, once the fan is on high, the CPU cores are running very stable. I suppose I was just not use to having it run on med fan while on load.

2) So a previous problem which was even in high fan, there would be spikes, this is now resolved. Though core 0 seems to still be hotter than others and would spike. This is both due to more load on core 0 than other cores, but still there might still be some issue with seating the heatsink. When I first removed it, it was screwed on really tight. However, since then I repasted it, I didn't put it on that tight. The last time I just did it, I screwed it a little tighter than before and it seems to have helped with stability as well. So I guess it really depends on how one defines "snug" when screwing in the heatsink.

But overall, I think you are right, the numbers are fine, they're not overheating and I shouldn't worry too much about it especially when the spiking has been reduced dramatically.

Thanks everyone!