Aspire One AO722 fan runs from computer start up

Bought an AO722-BZ454, my first laptop, a week ago Sunday. For the first week, the thing ran silent. Or I should say that I wasn't aware, even in quiet locations, of any noise except the occasional beep - and I think I would have, especially in longer sessions. For the past few days, however, the computer has started silently and then about 1 minute into that the fan kicks in. This occurs no matter what the room temperature - 60s, 70s or low 80s F. Is this normal behavior? It sure doesn't seem right, or at least the temp to kick in seems set awfully low. The noise, which I assume is the fan, is loud enough to be easily heard in a quiet room, and I imagine it wouldn't be appreciated sitting next to someone. Before I put in an SSD and more RAM, I better be sure what's up. BIOS is version 1.01. Thanks,

 

Is there any load on your CPU at the time? Run the task manager and look at the CPU load to see if it's using more than a few %. If you've installed new software or enabled antivirus that could cause an increased load on the CPU, raising temperatures.

My fan is always on but is usually pretty quiet.

 

Good suggestion, although virtually everything currently installed was there from day 2 or so, when I thought I didn't hear - or wasn't aware of - any fan. Watching the laptop's first start in a few hours and then a restart, what I saw early on was 1) SuperAntiSypware was running up to 35-50% of CPU and staying there briefly or for about a minute, presumably depending on when the last update check was; and 2) the AMD non-driver apps - Catalyst Control Center and others - were sometimes running up in the 30-40% range. I've eliminated those from start up. The rest of the time CPU usage is 1-8%, though occasionally it jumps up to 30% or 40% momentarily, but the numbers don't show in the process list. The other new real-time new app, MSE, draws little. So, would what I've described cause the fan to kick in and stay on?

I wouldn't say the fan is loud; it's just not silent ever except for the first minute of start up irrespective of room temp, and that surprises me.

 

My fan is always on, just sometimes it's real quiet (I just got an AO722 at Target for $249 with a $50 GC deal last week)

 

I got one from the same Target batch. Is the fan supposed to be on all the time?

Btw, CPU usage is ~100% during start up and just after, even though the individual numbers don't show anything like that.

 

you guys got an unbelievable deal. wish I had heard of it while it was on.

on the fan:
- hope you checked the vents for any obstruction
- did you by chance leave auto-updates 'on'? on any given tuesday there is always a chance microsoft will push something out their door that is not good for your system. if updates were downloaded Tuesday/Wednesday you might try rolling back to just before then and just see if your issue disappears
- what they all said about performance monitor; anything taxing your cpu?
- also, using perf monitor, and task manager, while the fan is cranked up I would find and shutdown anything that is loading the system to see if the fanspeed remains high even with little/no load. If so, then its not an issue of errant programs.
if that is the case I would compare my bios rev with what's available from the website. if there is a later one ask around here and see who knows anything about the later release, and if it looks safe, do it.

this little notebook is now the #2 best seller on Amazon, higher than the macbooks et al..... amazing. its not just that its relatively cheap, either... there are a lot of 300 dollar netbooks/notebooks...

 

I recently picked up the AO722 and have had a very similar problem with the unit. Constant fan, CPU running at full or very high usage although nothing visible in task manager seemed to be using that much.

The only thing I had changed since taking the machine out of the box was the McAfee security suite which I immediately uninstalled. Although I had uninstalled it and couldn't see any of it's processes running I immediately deduced that this was the best place to start troubleshooting the problem. On top of that, I had seen a similar issue once before on a computer I had repaired months ago. McAfee running the CPU full bore 'from the grave' so to speak.

And so, after downloading and installing McAfee's MCPR.exe (their homegrown removal tool) and rebooting... Both cores running at a nominal 3-15% with spikes up to 30-40% when opening a browser or a game like Minecraft.

Hope this helps!

 

McAfee, among other apps, came off the first day, so that wasn't the problem. SAS then SAS Pro, which I did put on after I noticed the fan, run at up to 50% during start up. I don't think that's it, though. The key seems to be choosing Power Saver and setting the screen brightness to moderate to low-moderate brightness. After that, the fan was off or on low the vast majority of the time. After that, I swapped out the RAM for a 4gb stick and installed an SSD, both of which also seem to be helping.

 

you just THINK you took mcafee off.
check the registry.

 

I just picked up 2 of these myself. Main issue I'm having is CPU usage being sky high. Right now, looking at processes (7 running, fresh install of 7 home 32bit) on both, CPU realistically is sitting at between 0 and 2% usage, yet system lists CPU usage at 37-75%, averaging about 50. Watch video of any kind and it pegs to 100%. I can't figure for the life of me what is causing the issue, but it causes some really bad video playback. If anyone has any ideas, please let me know!

 

you might look at some of the 'discussion' thread on amazon. it seems that amd has a gpu control applet - i don't know if its stashed in a pack that includes drivers - basically some of the content was it stuttering on vid playbacks & such which to me says the cpu or gpu is hitting its head. after removing the nominal drivers and installing something from amd's site, far better. also check the very long epic ao522 thread in the gamer forum here - those guys have pretty well figured out every aspect of the similar platform.

 

Well I tried to go that route, allowing AMD Vision Engine Control Center to install, but after the install I am unable to actually get the base program to show up to mess with the settings. The icon in the task bar is there, but when I click to open the full program nothing happens. Suggestions?

 

are you sure the device is installed right? no bangs in the Device Manager? it might help if you could check the vid device and post here the driver rev level, as it currently appears in device manager.
and on this system, does the GPU itself show up in windows as a separate device, or not shown at all?