My own G73jh overheating experience, SOLVED

Before all of this, let me first say that the G73jh is a fantastic laptop. Powerful, silent, sleek... if built and maintained right. Sadly, some factory problems may severely cripple your laptop's capabilities. Like they did for mine.

So I did a bit of poking around the internet, and identified a couple of usual problems and their solutions. I created this account just to post this up, and I probably won't check back any time after this. Here we go...

Now that I've flashed the vbios and updated drivers, the GPU idles at 47 celsius, on Furmark 99% load plateaus at 78 degs (when the fan kicks in). Before I flashed the vbios and updated the drivers, but after I repasted, it idled at 55-ish and plateaued in Furmark at 92 celsius (again, when the fan kicks in). I have never been more satisfied. I started out with overheating problems playing Dead Island at 1024x720, it was that bad...

For ASUS G73jh owners with overheating problems:

1. Check the model of your laptop. This guide is for G73jh only, the one with Radeon Mobility 5870 HD.

1a. I cannot stress this enough. G73jh ONLY.

2. Clean out your fans. Open up the main access panel on the underside of the laptop. Be very careful not to break anything. Use compressed air and spray the heck out of the fans. Outwards, inwards, doesn't really matter. Get the fans and the vents clean.

2a. Are you still very sure it's a G73jh?

3. Read this thread.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/asu...blems-useful-threads-read-before-posting.html
Seriously, research like a boss before you attempt to fix anything else.

4. Re-paste. If you're squeamish, you can skip this step. Take off your socks and long johns, do it in cotton clothes only. No carpet; laminate or tile is fine. Earth yourself to any non-functional metal bits on the laptop frame. Assemble your tools: small Philips screwdriver (preferably magnetic), small tweezers, alcohol, q-tips, paper towels, thermal paste.

Watch the whole video twice before attempting disassembly. Instructions are here:

BTOtech.com | G73Jh & G73Jw & G73Sw Disassembly Take Apart G73 g73jw service manual - YouTube

LISTEN to what they say, especially regarding how fragile everything is. This is micron-level stuff we're talking about here. The following comments are just about specific things not covered in the videos that I've had to work out myself.

Remove the keyboard carefully. As in, really carefully, especially if it's your first time. Don't rip it out. You want it to remain as straight as possible. The metal tabs at the top of the keyboard can get bent through violence; you can bend them back into place (horizontal) carefully to reseat your keyboard better. Straighten it out before you replace it.

Make sure the heat sink is seated properly. Once you remove it, there will be two rubber strips that come up along with it. BE VERY GENTLE; if your laptop has been overheating a lot, they will be very soft and easily breakable. Make sure that one rubber strip is over each row of black rectangles when you replace the heat sink. If you mess this up, the contact on the chip is going to be affected, which will drive your temps up 10, 20 celsius easily.

Before you re-paste, clean the area with alcohol, then use a dry q-tip gently to remove all alcohol residue, both on the chip and the heat sink contact. That's what I did, anyway, tp get the chip to a mirror finish.

Re-paste using the ball method. Nothing else works as well. 5mm should be fine. The brand of paste shouldn't really matter (if you're complaining about overheating, yeah). I used Arctic Silver 5, if you plan to overclock in the future you might as well use something better right from the start.

When you replace the motherboard, make sure the WiFi wires (the two soldered to the WiFi chip) aren't over the reset button. They're on the underside of the motherboard. If you replace the motherboard with the wires over the reset button, it won't start up. Trust me. I simply used a piece of tape to hold them away from the reset button.

Watch out for all the connections. If it won't boot Windows even after you've replaced the hard disks, but loads the BIOS fine, check your devices. If your laptop doesn't detect any hard disks, open 'er up again and check the connection between the hard disks and the motherboard (the short, folded blue wire in an "L"- shape). Mine fell out; I had to take it apart again to put it back in place.

5. Are you still sure it's a G73jh? If it isn't, you're going to destroy your laptop with the next few steps.

Check your driver version in device manager. If you're using stock drivers, it should be 8.6?? or thereabouts. If it's 8.911.0.0, you're in the clear. Skip this step. Damn, you're a lucky one.

I found that if I uninstalled the drivers before updating them, Windows somehow reverts them to an earlier state and restores the old drivers, which causes the BSOD when I try to update them again. The only way I've consistently gotten the update to finish was to break the drivers. Your experience may vary.

Create a system restore point. DO IT. Write down this next bit before you continue, since you won't have your laptop for a couple of minutes. Install AMD drivers. Relax, it'll fail the first time because AMD are a bunch of idiots. Halfway through, Windows will try to reinitialize the display drivers, and that will cause a BSOD. Usually atikmpag.sys is the culprit; doesn't matter.

DON'T PANIC. RELAX.

When it restarts, mash F8. You want to get to the screen where they give you a list of startup options to choose from, including safe mode, safe mode with networking, etc. If you don't see it, and the Loading Windows screen comes up, restart and try hard^H^H^H^Hfaster.

Because AMD are a bunch of idiots, you can't install the new drivers on safe mode; the detection driver won't load, and the installation will fail. TRUST ME. You need to boot up in low-res mode. 640 x 480. Old school like a boss. 32 icons onscreen at once.

Make sure that your display drivers are broken and Catalyst will not load. One easy way is to check if your desktop stretches. If it's stretched to both ends of your screen, that's good. If your desktop occupies the center of the screen, with the proper aspect ratio, and black spaces to the left and right, that's not good. That means your drivers are not properly broken.

THEN reinstall the new drivers. Your screen should NOT black out during the installation; this is a good sign that that no drivers are reinitializing during the installation. It should finish without a problem.

Restart and check device manager for your display adapter driver version. Cheer. Start up a game. Now, if it runs smoothly for a couple of hours, you're home free. If, however, you get a GSOD within a couple of minutes, relax. There's a fix for that, too.

6. Do a system restore to stock drivers, so you can mutter to yourself and get the necessary things from the website without worrying about GSODs.

Note that this next step might brick your laptop for real. As in, RMA-level bricking.

Seriously, if you're still not sure if your laptop is a G73jh, you shouldn't try the next step.

Flash your vbios. Instructions and link are here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/asus-gaming-notebook-forum/515309-how-fix-your-gsod-blues.html

Nothing fancy. If you follow the instructions, you should be done before teatime. Or brick your laptop, you never know.

THEN go back to step 4. Update drivers. Fail. BSOD. Restart in low-res mode. Reinstall drivers. You should be used to this by now.

7. Restart and try again. Enjoy!

 

OR just disregard the wall of text and use an air can

 

I can vouch for this!

 

One should always check the easiest path first, and that is to blow out the vents. If temps do not go down, then you can consider getting a repaste done.

Just remember that this requires opening the notebook, and technically does void the warranty, so have it done professionally and don't break anything.

 

Hey Chas! Glad you're back =) by the way, your website pcaudio.ath.cx hosting some of the drivers on your reference page seems to be down until now.

 

All things are a work-in-progress

 

We should really think about setting up a mirror for that site, because it's too important to lose. everytime you go away chastity things get too ugly. Maybe we should clone you too...

 

Is the warranty truly void though? If you can't answer fully due to your employment with Asus I completely understand.

The reason I'm asking is because I usually perform all repairs on my own with parts supplied by the manufacturer. I actually had IBM (ah, the good old days when they still made amazing laptops) ship me a new motherboard that I was allowed to install myself. All I had to do was convince the person on the phone that I knew exactly what I was doing, which I did.

The fact that I can't take apart my G53SW without voiding my warranty bugs me. The thought of having to RMA my baby if something goes wrong, having someone who is paid $10/h fix it just doesn't sit well with me. Especially after all the horror stories I've read on this forum of botched repairs by authorized centres.

 

Customer Care backs up the service centers when needed.

And yes, according to the warranty policy, if the chassis is opened (not the underside tray) that would void the warranty.

Case: 1595941