Fan and harddrive on the Z63A

I finally bought the Z63A! I've got a few questions and hope other Z63A owners can chime in...

Is the fan supposed to keep running once it goes off? I used mobilemeter to monitor my CPU and harddrive temp. It seems that the fan kicks in at around 44C, but then even when the CPU temp goes back down to below 40C, the fan just keeps running forever. Athough it's running in low speed mode (1200rpm as per Asus Probe), it's still quite annoying. The fan on my old Sony VAIO would only kick in as needed to cool the CPU (eg. prolonged 100% CPU utilizations).

Also, anyone here using a Fujitsu 5400rpm harddrive on their Z63A? I have the MHT2080AH and I find it rather loud at idle (I know it's subjective, but the Hitachi 30GB on my old Sony is virtually silent at idle.) I'm now considering getting a WD Scorpio.

 

Yes, once the fan starts up...it will never turn off unless it gets really cool; I don't know the exact temperature...but it's pretty much unattainable unless you live in a really cold house.

I can't vouch for your hard drive noise, but I know my Samsung HDD isn't very loud at all.

 

Hi Pardi,

Just curious, I see you live in Toronto, where did you get your Z63A and how was the service?

I'm thinking of getting one this week too!

K

 

CanadaSys is probably the best place to buy ASUS notebook computers in Toronto...

 

drumdoc:
I was going to PM you, but since the name was mentioned, I got mine from CanadaSys.

 

Bummer. I hope there will be a new BIOS update that will fix that. The fan is really getting on my nerve.

As for noise from the harddrive, it isn't as bad as the fan (i.e. the fan in low speed would usually mask it). I was wondering if it's because the harddrive isn't secured to the notebook chassis by screws? I'm thinking about stuffing some foam into the harddrive compartment and see if it helps. BTW, my harddrive is constantly running at high 40's/low 50's degrees Celcius. Too warm for my liking.

 

Hi guys,

I was thinking of buying from Canadasys because they are fairly close to where I live....but why do you say they are the 'best' place to buy from? Is it based on price, service, quality and variety of components they offer to customize your Z63A, etc....?

Thanks,

K

 

I don't think that padding your hard drive with foam is going to improve the temperature situation very much

 

Hmm. I have a z63a and I don't *think* I have this problem. My fan behaves exactly like you'd expect. High speed when hot, very low (and quiet) speed when not. Are you saying yours never drops back to low speed once it hits high?

There is a new BIOS out and I am running it. Perhaps that might help? http://dlsvr02.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/W3A/W3A0702A.ZIP

 

Assuming the fan is always on whenever the machine is turned on, then so far I've noticed 3 fan speeds/modes.

1. Very low (almost inaudible)
- "Off" as per AsusProbe

2. Mid
- Kicks in at around 44C
- Not terribly loud but loud enough to mask the noise of my harddrive in idle, and loud enough that I find annoying
- 1200rpm as per AsusProbe

3. High
- Very loud. Happened once so far, and it did drop back to the "Mid" speed after a while
- 1600rpm as per AsusProbe


My concern is whether the fan will ever go back to Mode 1 (very low) once it goes to Mode 2 (mid). Apparently mine doesn't -- once the CPU temp crosses the ~44C threshold the fan goes to Mode 2 (mid) and stays there, even after the CPU has been sufficiently cooled down to below 40C.

Thanks, CoolVanilla. Maybe I'll give the new BIOS a try.

 

Um if you stuff foam in the hard drive compartment that will make it worse. the heat wont be able to dissapate through the chassis as much. it will be trapped in there. as for comparing it to your sony. your sony was probably a less powerful machine if you compare it to the 13.3 in sonys those things run even hotter than the z63a

 

I'm sure that your speed 1 is actually off. Normally, my computer runs for about 15 minutes before the fan comes on, but once on it stays on. I find the 1200rpm (reported as 2500rpm after the latest BIOS update but is the same speed) to be inaudible except in a very quiet room. Speed 3 is a rarity - it's winter now and I can't get the computer to reach the 60C that triggers this speed (undervolting the CPU also contributes).

John

 

Thanks, John. So it seems like your Z63a acts the same -- that once the fan is on, it stays on.

I guess I'll just have to live with it... (keeping my fingers crossed that there will be a new BIOS version to fix this).


BTW what's the temperature of the harddrive at idle for you guys? Mine is hovering around 47-49C. Isn't that a bit too warm, considering the max safe operating temp is like 55C?

 

Depends on the hard drive manufacturer....
some hard drives can operate safely at 60 or even above...

47-49 is quite normal.

 

I reckon on my (Seagate 5400 120GB) HDD temperature being around 20C to 24C above ambient temperature depending on HDD activity and the time it has been running - the whole computer chassis around the HDD warms up over several hours. Last summer I was working in an ambient temperature of 30 to 32C and the HDD temperature was often 50 to 55C (and sometimes more). Now (winter) the ambient termperature is about 10C lower and the HDD correspondingly cooler.

Although there are some air vents by the front of the HDD, the airflow of the CPU fan has very little cooling effect on the HDD.

John

 

Actually there are at least 4 states for the CPU fan, as I reported here http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=1208798&postcount=10. These 4 states are: off, 1200rpm, 1600rpm, and 2000rpm (as measured by asusprobe with older bios). The 2000 RPM speed kicks in a little above 70C, and is easily obtained from about 10 minutes of video transcoding work.

 

You will find with some bios the fan state changes perhaps more so with new bios. The at drives from fuji are 4200 rpm so i wouldnt know but i am very familiar with the 5400rpm drives from them and i can say they are as loud as the rest. WD will only get you a cooler running drive. The trick is not to listen becuase they all make noise.

 

I was talking cpu fan not disk drive noise.
I can tell when video transcoding is complete because I can hear the cpu fan from a hallway 20' away during the transcoding, but not aftewards. That's excessive noise levels IMO.

 

That sounds abnormal for this model.

 

That sounds like you are blowing it out of proportion. As compared to what? a 10lb 4 year old dell? Sure they are silent. Find alot of centrino notebooks lately that are silent? none of them are especially when you are "transcoding" but i am sure you will find a few that are less loud.

 

Actually, it's typical of any CPU that's being utilized to the MAX.
Doing that causes heat and it has to go somewhere.

 

Hi all,

In my original post I mentioned the Fujitsu harddrive on my Z63A is noisy.

I found something interesting and I thought I should post an update here, in case this helps anyone's purchasing decision.

It turns out my Fujitsu drive (MHT2080AH - 5400rpm/80GB) is actually extremely quiet - both at idle and during read/write operations. So why did I say it's noisy? Ok this is really weird. If I lift up the notebook off my desk, the noise gradually decreases until I can just barely hear the drive. Slowly lower the notebook back, and the noise gets louder. In other words, it seems like the noise is travelling directly down through the harddrive cover, and I'm not sure if it's the surface of my desk (which is just a typical office desk with painted/laminated MDF). It doesn't really bother me anymore right now because I've put it aside on the top of my bookcase farther away from where I sit - I "dock" my Z63A and use external monitor/keyboard/mouse).

With the culprit sorted out, I'm rather impressed with the Fujitsu drive. Quiet even during head seek/read/write (like running hdtune).

 

As compared to a 2ghz desktop. Pentiums in pre-northwood desktops don't have the heating problems common with new processors.

 

I have yet to see an asus centrino model with inherent cooling problems. We are talking about pentium M here not pentium 4. Pentium M is made to withstand temps up to 100C while pentium 4 about 70C. Average opperating temps for pemtium M is 60C out of the box in an unmodded lappy while 40C for pentium 4 give or take. Pre northwood cpu's sometimes didnt even need a fan on the crappy aluminum coprerless heatsink........

 

My point here was to correct mis-information about fan speeds; I'm not really interested in fighting over centrino cooling problems

 

Really? I can definitely hear the fan from 20' away when the CPU has been under full load for a while. However, it's not bothersome in the least, and it's easily masked if there's any other noise in the room. I wouldn't describe it as 'excessive', but to each his own.

 

Salut to that.

 

I might be wrong. Thinking about it, the only time I have had it under full load for more than a few seconds was when I did the NHC stability testing, and I didn't really listen much to it. I was thinking more about under normal use, when I never hear it now that it has been undervolted...

 

Gotcha. The only time I really notice the fan is when I'm running some Matlab code, especially when I'm processing a huge amount of data. That tends to strain the CPU, and the fan usually goes to its highest speed. Otherwise, during normal use (email, web browsing, word processing, etc) I never really notice the fan. I'm not undervolting though, so that may make a difference too.