XPS M1530, A History of Heat

Yeah, I really should be writing my english essay instead, but after all this time, I'm better at writing forum posts about my laptop's massive heating issues.

On a good day, my 4 month old XPS M1530 32bitVista Home Premium laptop will run at about 65 degrees celcius. From what I've read, this is a normal temperature for the laptop.

Note that my fan used to run, but only does sporadically now. I don't know what triggers it on or off.

http://www.techsupportforum.com/har...22-dell-xps-m1530-red-multitude-problems.html

http://www.techsupportforum.com/har...-xps-m1530-overheating-redux.html#post1944707

(these are both me, if there was any doubt)

I want another opinion. The issue came up today as I was casually browsing the net and listening to music. Normally, my temperature doesn't go above 70 if I'm not playing games. Team Fortress 2 runs until my computer mass overheats (90+) then stutters from heat and slows to hell.

Today my laptop hit 87 degrees celcius running:
MSN Messenger
A live TV stream
NHL.com (has live updating of scores, could be relevant)
Songbird (think iTunes but smaller, made by Mozilla)
4 MS Word pages
Speedfan

I since put it on top of a textbook (even further away from my bed than it already was), and it has since cooled down to 69 degrees. This isn't because of the problem I faced today.

In November (This is my first laptop) I realized that temperatures of 85 degrees + were not normal for a laptop (this was when the fan was working full time, it was still hitting over a hundred degrees while playing games (I didn't have a monitoring program, didn't know that this was bad, etc)). I couldn't send it in at that time as I needed it for school, so I waited until december after classes were done. I called in dell tech support, and to my surprise, they sent a guy in to fix it.

After two months, he had to replace the motherboard, the heat sink, and the graphics card. It seemed to work for a while, then killed itself again. The fan has only worked half-assedly since January. I can feel it, but only very faintly, in contrast to when it would run full blast but not seem to cool the laptop down.

Now I know this laptop can get down below 50 degrees. I've seen it below 45 degrees, it just never gets there anymore.


Almost all of the problems from the first thread have been solved, save the overheating and source games freezing in-game. At the end of typing this, it's back up to 72 degrees celcius.


I'll be calling dell some time to have them come in and fix it, but I'm wondering, does anyone know about the fan issues with this computer?

 

Im not sure about the fan issue, I think you should update your BIOS to the latest A12. Mine has only ever got to a max of 90C. Modded with AS5 and a homemade cooler, now GPU idles at 55C and 75C when under intense load. http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=344810

 

hmm, thanks. I thought I had updated my BIOS a few times already, but it turns out that I guess I hadn't.

after the reboot, fan isn't turning on, even though speedfan says it's at 69 degrees. I still can't control the fan speed from inside speedfan.

 

So if the motherboard + the heatsink + the graphic card were replaced and u still have the heat issue then the problem can be somewere else.

U have m1530 like me. I have T9500 what is 2,6 Ghz 33watt and the idle tem is 40-60C , load 75. After 10 min Orthos test it max 80C.

1. maybe it is not hardware issue but software. maybe u have some hidden malware causing more processor usage. Maybe u shoud reinstall whole win and all app!

2. try DELL diagnostic. In a Custom test u can choose Fan test - maybe u will find out something . But u sad heatsink has been replaced.

3. maybe after all this it can be bad processor -can work properly but maybe something- but I've never heard about it.

4. what about the graphic card temperatures -is it overheated too?

5. dont u want to try change thermal paste, or just only take a look under back door?

 

I had the same overheating issues as you, in fact I've been having them for months and months and I'm worried about the longevity of my computer's motherboard and GPU after so many intense thermal cycles, but just yesterday I discovered undervolting. There is a very thorough guide here on NBR, it basically reduces the power consumed by the CPU at no cost to any performance, which in turn reduces the heat put out by the CPU by at least 10-12 degrees C, and as the GPU and CPU share the same cooling system, the GPU all of a sudden runs much cooler as well! I had been running into the same source game stuttering and downclocking issues as you when my temperatures would go into the high 80s and even 90s, but after undervolting, my GPU hasn't hit higher than 82 C and usually stays in the high 70s. I'm also going to apply AS5 thermal paste when I have the time, this should further reduce my maximum temps, but I'm still worried that all the heat cycles my components have already been through have damaged them in ways that will show up later...