Acer 5738G bottom vent built closed?

I bought this laptop (aspire 5536) off my bro, part exchange, before I moved to Thailand. It's awful and the worst part is I sold my desktop and moved all my stuff to lappy because its 500gb.

Over heats, runs like crap, I can't install XP now because it just shutsdown randomly during the install or bios screen (anything outside windows) due to overheating i'm thinking. I will buy a cooler but won't be much use because the vents are blocked. i'm a master with a desktop but never tinkered with a laptop and don't havve any tools. Any disassembly guides just so I can cut holes and clean fans? I've seen some for other models and god damn it's a lot of bits ...

 

Service Guides can't be shared here due to copyright clause in them (that's unless they are hosted by Acer themselves)
You can find service guide for 5738G on the net though.
This guise contains detailed instructions on how to disassemble the notebook complete with pictures.
Once you do that make sure you also apply some high quality thermal paste,

 

thats the same as the 5536g?

 

Exactly the same ... the guide is quite informative but take care the disassembly itself of that chassis is horrifically annoying because in order to reach the heat sink you will have to completely dismantle the machine ... I mean like everything will be taken apart so take great caution because you said you didn't miss around with a lappy before

 

That's what I mean I don't fancy taking iit apart as I'll never remember how it oes back ....

How much work to just cut the holes?

 

Cutting the holes is the easiest part if you navigate to earlier posts in this thread you will know how to ... but the most important part is to be sure that you can reassemble your machine after doing it

 

I simply drilled my 5536G from the outside: http://img804.imageshack.us/img804/8863/img2009f.jpg
Quick and dirty. Lowered Prime95 temps by about 20 degrees C. I would not recommend this if you are not willing to take some risks and perhaps ruin your laptop, as the drill will continue its way down after you are through the plastic case, and it will be hard to stop that motion. I was lucky and accidently hit the metal rimb that encircles the fan early on. I then tried to hit that metal rimb with the following holes in order to not ruin anything delicate in the laptop.

Fan sound is different and louder now.

 

Don't think I will drill like that personally, maybe a razerblade and tweezers ... lol

Anyone have the SATA drivers for windows XP on 5536? I don't plan on being forced to use IDE.

 

here for 5738zg MEGAUPLOAD - The leading online storage and file delivery service

 

Ok I drilled holes also . First I drilled a small holes and then I later expanded rest easy. See also the condition of a previous thermal paste. Basically now the temperatures are lower by 15-20 C.

 

dmr2, but did you replace the thermal paste, and was that the main thing that caused the improved cooling?

I've read through this thread and it seems that many (most?) people who have reported improved cooling have also refreshed the thermal paste because of the large stripdown they have done.

 

Of course I replaced the thermal paste, and you are right that maybe that is main thing to improve cooling. I tried to close holes with duct tape and temps are similar. Before I do anything temps in load are cpu 65-70 gpu 70-75 hdd 45, with holes and changed thermal paste cpu 50-52 gpu 55-60 hdd 45, and with closed holes, with duct tape (see pics), and of course changed thermal paste cpu 55-60 gpu 60-65 hdd 43. So main thing is probably change thermal paste.

 

Thanks, dmr2, that's really useful info.

 

These work for the 5536 also? Design might be same, but the chipset is as well???

 

don't know.

NP . One thing is certain, the fan is noisier with open holes. So I'll probably put some kind of sticker and close the holes. Because temperatures are not too high with closed holes and the noise is reduced.

 

Sam, I don't think the chipsets can be the same as they have different processors, but I followed a hint given earlier here and have downloaded the service manual for the 5738, and it does cover the 5536 fully.

 

7738g had a similar issue, half of its vents were closed.

My temps dropped 10-15C.

I used a knife to scratch away till I got the inner strong plastic at which point I forced it through from both sides and cleaned up the edges.

 

It's ridicious Acer don't supply the drivers or even the Acer support, even my old emachine had SATA drivers for XP. My temps ideal / underload around 60-70 for ACPI and 80-95 for underload on CPU. Biggest joke for the price of a piece of hardware I've ever owned.

Never ever again will I buy Acer, for the money I coulda built a nice system. I'd like to sell it and just build a desktop here, but I'd never get anything for this POS. When I try and install XP or run a linux Distro, with in 15-20mins the system just turns off (100c temp warning). It doesn't in 7 because it throttles the system when it gets too hot.

 

You should change the thermal paste on the CPU / GPU. After I did this "mod" and change the thermal paste can now overclock GPU from 680 to 800MHz and still have good temps

 

I just don't fancy taking evey last piece apart and then it not going back together.

 

If you can find the service manual, it's a piece of cake to take apart/reassemble. Trust me.

 

Thanks for all the tips, I made my Acer Aspire 5536G cooling down by 20 degrees with only adding new coolpaste to the CPU and the GPU!!
Thanks again

 

Need to get my self on some tools and AS5 it seems.

 

I also drilled small holes in the lid of hdd. This lowered the temperature of the hdd for 5C. Also, the whole system is now cooler. I shut the 2 rows of holes beneath the cpu fan and leave one row open. This proved to be the best for cooling the CPU / GPU and the hdd because it is obvious that if all holes are open there is no underpressure in the case and the cooling of the disk and the rest of the system are weaker. I hope this will be helpful to someone.

 

Hi,

I just ran into this interesting discussion. I have a 5738G and aso have the shutdown issues. I got two questions:

1 - what SW do you use for temperature monitoring? I have Speedfan (W7), but that only reads my CPU cores temp.

2 - I read this thread and concluded that improving the thermal paste/pad under GPU+CPU is the best inprovement? Even better than opening the "closed" holes under the fan?

BTW: my CPU temp (while typing this) is 43C. Fans are rotating all the time. Gaming/video processing etc. rises it to about 75C and at >80C or so it shuts down. All temps read with Speedfan.


Thanks, FF

 

1. I use speedfan for cpu and hdd temperature monitoring and gpuz for gpu

2. I recommend you to open only the middle row of holes as shown on my picture

 

Just stop in. Unscrew the bottom, and drill some damn holes into it.

 

You can use HWInfo32. Very comprehensive.

As for 2, you'll be better of doing all of the below:

1 - Change thermal paste. Should net around 5°C improvement.
2 - Clean the fan. If your laptop is old, and a lot of dust in there, should help lower temps by about 5°C more.
3 - Cut open the backplate. Should provide more air flow and decrease temps by 5°C more.
4 - Grab the fan control utility in my sig and tinker with it to find your maximum fan speed. Then set it when you want to play games. This, coupled with the above, should really drop temps. Read the links in my sig.
5 - You can further decrease the temps if you're using the older gen Core 2 Duo by undervolting them. Best utility for this is ThrottleStop. Google it. May reduce temps by 10°C alone.

All in all, I believe you can net at least 20°C from doing the above, with 30-40° being the more likely scenario.

 

Ok, for sure I need to open mine up, bought some IC diamond thermal paste. But got no tools here with me, would this be enough to completely disassemble everything? Set of 30 Screwdriver Tool Stand for PC Laptop Computer | eBay

 

bump bump.

 

I think the Service guide for the 5738G is online for free with all the steps to open up the machine + all the required tools ... google it

 

The set I use can be seen at

15Piece Precision Screwdriver Set : Precision Sets : Maplin

They often feature in offers at Maplin stores - I think I got my set free with a low cost set of screwdrivers for the car, and certainly paid less then the price shown for the lot.

They have long thin strong blades, so you can see what you are doing and the blades don't break or bend. You can also apply strong downward pressure to stop the blade slipping out of the screw and causing damage to the screw head.

Drivers with removable heads can be really useful, but they are always, in my experience, more wobbly and often have a big lump of metal where you need to be looking.