Fan noise on Studio 1558

Just received my Studio 15 today and it's a nice looking machine but the fan seems to run more often than I'd like. I've updated the BIOS to A03, the most current, but it doesn't seem to resolve the issue.

Anyone else have this issue? Specs for my laptop are in my sig.

 

For me, fan only comes on when i'm playing games or watching a video. Any other time it is silent.

There is one thing you can check though. If your on Windows 7 go to power options. Go to advanced section and there is something under CPU i think it says cooling method. Active or passive. Selecting active will turn on the fan first to cool the processor, but passive will throttle CPU speed in order to try to keep it cool and the fan will cut in at a later stage.

What applications were you using when you experienced the problem?

 

I got my 1558 yesterday, same specs as yours CAL. I really haven't had the opportunity to kick it around very much yet (5 yr old at home and all) but when I was doing some basic configs I had not noticed the fan at all, in fact it thought it was pretty quiet.

A question, I have the 9 cell battery which does raise the back of the lap about a 1/4 - 1/2 inch or so from the table, thereby making more space for the 4 vents underneath as well as for the vent at the back. Do you have the 6 or 9 cell?

 

@A77guy: I opted for the 6 cell as I wanted to keep the laptop as light as possible. I know the 9 cell will vent a little better and perhaps that is why the fan is going off more than I'd like. I'd call that a slight design flaw on Dell's part.

@tryagain1990: Just regular webs surfing and software installs. No games, nothing to tax the system.

 

Actually the battery is not your problem here. I have the 6 cell battery and it sits flat on the table but I am not experiencing the same issues as you. I think you may have an installation problem. Possibly not assembled correctly from the factory. I would recommend you download a program called real temp. And report back with what kind of CPU temps you are getting.

 

I seem to also be seeing the fan kick up more than usual. Here are my temperatures:

 

Anyone solved this? My fan runs for 15 seconds on high every minute. Even with zero activity and cpu use! My temps are normal (idle 43-45).

 

Do you haev A04 bios?

My temps are the same between 40-45C with light browsing.
With no activity the temps fall to 35-37C range.
When I used the program to stress the CPU the temps reached 70C.

My fan also turns on and off quite a bit. I am hoping Dell comes with an improved temp manageemnt system that runs the fan at 10-20% range all the time and then kick it up when needed.

 

Yes. I am running the newest A04 bios. And honestly, I think this is a bios issue. Dell needs to tweak this behavior. The fun should run on low with little activity, and then only cycle to high for high activity. None of this completely off and then on for 20 seconds in spurts. It drives me crazy!

 

Great tip, but it didn't change anything for me.

 

Appears to be a common problem for the complete Dell Studio line. My 1537 does the same thing.

I'm at the point where I'd either like to try a new fan or replace the fan controller chip on the motherboard.

Anyone know what chip is the fan controller on these laptops?



For me, the fan will constantly turn on at max RPM. If you rock, bump, or in anyway slightly move the laptop (without changing the airflow characteristics), the fan will IMMEDIATELY shut off. Give it a few seconds and it'll come back on.

I've monitored the temperature of the CPU cores with Real Temp and both cores are usually around 25-35 degrees C. This temperature should NOT require max fan speed. I'd be OK with the "slow" RPM speed as you can barely hear that. Often the fan will be at max RPM right from a very cold boot or resume.

I'm running Win7 64-bit, latest (A09 for the 1537) bios, latest ATI drivers.

I cleaned out dust from the laptop and fan area with compressed air. I also removed the heat sink and applied arctic silver 5 compound for the CPU and reinstalled. The thermal pad for the GPU was nearly melted through so I've also applied AS5 with a copper shim to that. As noted above, the laptop isn't overheating and doesn't require full speed fan usage.

Searching the forums, I've also changed the power management settings in Win7 to use "Passive Cooling" strategy and configured the video card to maximize batter life instead of performance. I changed the laptop's power management when plugged in to act as if on battery (optimize for battery use vs. performance) in an attempt to keep heat down. None of the settings appear to change anything.

I called Dell and a new heat sink/fan combo is ~$60. I can't imagine the fan is *bad* as it does work. If anything I'd think the BIOS software is incorrectly enabling the fan at high speed or faulty temp fan controller sensor. I also tried all of the fan diagnostics in the Dell boot utility and all tests pass with flying colors.

It's also very odd that just lifting up or shifting the laptop will instantly turn it off. I mean INSTANTLY. Some posts have suggested that it's the excessive motherboard flexing that is reason for that. There's also a few youtube videos of the problem.

I also tried the remove-the-battery-and-let-the-power-drain "fix" that some people suggest but that doesn't fix anything.

 

FWIW, a tech left about 45 minutes ago after replacing the motherboard. Had a fan but declined it as it works. Anyway, same start, stop, start, stop as before. I think it's a controller or BIOS controlled.

 

OK, so I investigated further last night....

I removed the media button panel and noticed 2 odd things:

1. the media panel (at least on the 1535's) is perforated with holes across the entire panel. The entire panel also has a strip of plastic on the underside that covers all of the tiny holes/vents except for where the speakers are. Where the speakers are, the plastic covering has a small circular cutout for the sound.

What I ended up doing was removing the plastic covering that was blocking the tiny vents/holes just above the fan. I believe that this would allow better air flow and ventilation of hot air. When reassembled, you can't notice that the plastic backing has been removed. I'm really not sure why you'd want to block the little vents. It now allows the hot air to escape naturally and a better intake of cooler air when the fan is on.

2. the flex connecting the media panel was really kinked in multiple spots. I know flex cables are a little sensitive, so when reassembling I tried to limit the unnecessary bends in the flex.


So anyway, after those 2 things, the fan is quiet. I then really forced the laptop to heat up and switched my settings back to max CPU. The fan would barely come on and when it did, it wasn't at max RPM anymore. Since it's working "normally" again for the first time in several months, I'm afraid to disassemble it again =).

I'd suggest trying the same investigation. Remove the media panel (pops off after removing 2 screws under the battery) and get rid of the plastic backing blocking the vents and check the flex cable.

 

I have a 1558 that doesn't have the built in media keys. I'm not sure if this newer model has the plastic backing. However, I think you might be onto something with this flex cable. Which side is it located on under the keyboard? I also have a good deal of keyboard flex on the right side. I'm betting some cable is improperly routed and causing it to bulge. Anyone else have this?

 

The cable comes out near the top center of the keyboard. I should have taken pictures when I had it apart. If I'm feeling risky I'll take it apart again and upload some pictures.

It's been 3 days and still working great.

 

Please do so and post as many pictures of the 1558 open as possible. I tried to look through the manual and cannot make head or tail where the fan and CPU are exactly located. It is so much easier on the 1340 as everything is there once you remove the bottom cover.

Also is there a good program that accuratly monitors the fan rpm?
I have used PC Wizard thas shows fan rpm that I know now is incorrect. I had the fan going full speed and the thing was stick around 87rpm and when the fan was stopped it was shoing 599rpm.

 

+ 1 rep.
Excellent discovery. If it will solve the nervous fan issue, why not. Dell is not willing to solve this. I have to disassemble my wife's (!) Studio 1749 to find out if there's something possible too. She will be mad.

 

I received my studio 1558 today with latest bios A04. While I have not incurred any random shutdown, the fan in this computer seems to be crazy. It's louder than my Inspiron e1505, which has its fan ON constantly...

What should I do...?

 

join the club,
do us all a favor and bug Dell enough and escalate it so someone at DELL spends a couple of days to come up with a better heat managament system for 1558 so fan runs constantly ate low rpm rather that on and off.

 

Well it was running like crazy right after clean install. Now all the drivers are in place and mine seems to be running ok without noise...

Hope this would last.

 

Very strange, fresh install should not impact how fan runs maybe it is the bios...

I am going to also do the fresh install of Win 7 in a couple of days and see how it goes...

btw, how much space is allocated for the Dell restore? can you shrink it in the Win 7 install process. I want to keep it but not waste the extra space Dell tends to leave there

 

I can't really remember, but it wasn't outrageously large. I just left it as it was. I don't know if you can shrink it either. All I did was formatting partition 3 (where original windows 7 was) and clean installed there... sorry!

And for fan problems, I'm pretty sure yours will go away after clean install. I was surprised...

 

sk2609, Is yours a Studio 1558? And was you fan running constantly? Or was it exhibiting the behavior most of us have on this thread, which is it being completely off and then running on high for 20 seconds. Then repeating over and over every minute or so regardless of cpu activity.

 

When I was using the factory default windows with all the dell bloatwares, my 1558 had symptoms like yours. After a clean install, fan was running at full speed constantly for the first boot up. After I installed drivers and rebooted, everything seems fine.

I don't think fan turns off completely off. Right now my CPU usage is around 5% and I hear fan spinning when I carefully try to hear it. But comparing to my inspiron e1505, which also has a fan constantly running, this thing is very quiet.

 

FWIW, a clean install did not affect the start, stop pattern of the fan. Tech came out and replaced the motherboard and no change. I installed all of the drivers and Device Manager is fine.

 

So your fans still operates full on and off every 30 secs or is it fixed ?

Since you 500GB HD can you verify if is Seagate 7200rpm? Do you feel light vibration near the touch pad?

 

fyi, my hard drive is 320gb seagate 7200rpm

 

do you feel any light vibration to the left of the touchpad?

 

Well, I can't say there's no vibration. But barely. It's not annoying or anything.

 

Ok i'm having this same problem and is doing my head in. CPU fan is constantly on, even with no programs running. Just idle on the desktop. I have all the latest drivers and BIOS flashed to A04. Might have to send a complaint to Dell. I can't find any programs to control the fan speed. And I know its not overheating, the CPU is hovering at 40 degrees C. I'm now convinced this is a BIOS issue.

 

It's not the CPU, IMO it's the PCH that is getting too warm. I really wish I had taken a look under the aluminum heat sink when the motherboard was being swapped!

The PCH chipset is an Intel 5 Series chipset. Several changes have taken place in this series in comparison to its predecessor. The primary change is that the southbridge has been eliminated completely and its functions along with its connections are merged in to the northbridge, now called the PCH.

Platform Controller Hub - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Contacted Dell about the fan constantly cycling off & on. I included the link to this thread. Someone from Dell called me and said they would look into this and call me back.

Please contact Dell about this and or post here so we can hopefully get this at least looked into.

IMO, they rushed the A04 BIOS out to fix the crashing/shutdown issues and over compensated.

 

Agree, They need to have much better temp manageemnt system then this on/off thing

 

At this point, I think having a tech come out and replace the motherboard is useless as that doesn't fix the problem. Those that have had new mboards installed just have the same problem. This leads me to believe that it has to be either a design issue (we're screwed if so) or a BIOS/fan control issue. Let's hope a resolution to this issue makes it into the A05 bois update. I'll call dell and report this thread to them as well.

 

This whole fan issue is for the Studio 1745/47/49 the same. I hope it can be solved by bios. If it turns out to be a design issue we're indeed screwed.

 

Replacing the motherboard did nothing regarding the fan cycling so I wouldn't bother. I still think it's either a BIOS issue or PCH getting too hot.

Their solution is to send me an i5 or i7 replacement PC. I currently have an i3 so I won't complain. The dispatch number has been created and it will take 2-3 weeks to complete.

 

Hi all,

I just recently received my studio 1558 laptop (core i7) and also have some problems with fan noise. In my case it's not that the fan is cycling on and off, but rather it is constantly on. I dont know the exact RPM since there does not seem to be a sensor for this value, but from what I can hear the fan has 3 possible speeds and most of the time it runs at the 2nd speed (pretty noisy imo). Sometimes it switches back for a few minutes to the first speed, in this case the noise production is OK.

According to dell tech support this is normal for a laptop with this configuration, so naturally I'm curious as to your opinions on this. Are there any people with the same config who can tell me if their fan is acting the same, or differently?

Thanks!

 

it sure would be easier if you had your specs in your sig

 

My replacement laptop is in production. All the system specs will be the same except the processor. They are upgrading it from an i3 to i5.

I don't think it will solve the fan issue as it seems to be across the board for threes, fives and sevens. But that's alright I guess.

EDIT: I just looked more closely at my order and they upgraded the graphics card from integrated to the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4570 512MB.

 

I haven't seen anyone post this fan problem with the ATI card. You may be saved! But unfortunately, it doesn't help us narrow down whether this is a widespread design issue or a defect.

 

I haven't seen anyone post this fan problem with the ATI card. You may be saved! But unfortunately, it doesn't help us narrow down whether this is a widespread design issue or a defect.

 

I have one (ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5470, 1 GB). It is a 1558 with an 2.26 GHz i3, 500 GB 7200 RPM disk (Seagate), 4 GB of RAM and Full HD screen. Essentially, what some others have described here - the fan is on almost all the time, which makes it rather noisy. It takes a few minutes for the fan to become this loud, so it is related to temperature management. Now, what is actually wrong, I don't know - the laptop doesn't appear particularly warm on touch. The BIOS is A04, so nothing to upgrade there.

I have two other Dell laptops, both Inspiron 6400 and they are almost completely silent, even when pushed a bit.

I installed Fedora 13 x86_64 Beta on this Studio 1558, so it's not Windows drivers that's doing it.

The replacement machine in due in a couple of weeks or so. I'll bet $5 it'll be just the same as the one that's going back. But, let's pretend for a sec that Dell actually fixed this ;-)

 

Jotttle, I hope you are correct. I guess I need to go back and re-read the posts in the main thread. But based on what
bsmojver posted, I think it's a BIOS/thermal control issue.

 

Did someone test the CPU an GPU temperatures of his laptop?

I tested my wife's Studio 1749 with i7 620M CPU and HD 5650 GPU while web browsing. It looks like the fan controller is reacting to the CPU temps. The GPU temp is still low. Maybe it's an i-Core issue what also involves the Intel architecture. Just a thought.

BTW, CPUID recognizes the i7 M620 cpu as an i5. I think it's just an i5 with higher clocks.

 

Received replacement and noticed that the hair dryer effect is gone! Also, this has an energy star sticker on it. No more constant cycling off & on! It still kicks on, but it's much quieter. Dell called this morning and said this has a new motherboard design. The fan is much quieter than the one I am sending back.

 

Hmm, I wonder if that Dell tech. made that up or this is actually true (new MB design).

 

Having lots of trust in Dell support, are we? ;-) You are not alone.

Anyhow, if the problem is really fixed, then it doesn't really matter. I'm still waiting for mine to come.

 

Does your replacement have the nvidia discrete graphics or the integrated intel graphics? Most of us
with the fan cycling issue have the integrated intel graphics.

 

Are you sure that these are the Intel boards which suffer this issue?

 

I received my 1558 (ordered May 6, arrived May 13), and it also has the "energy star" sticker. The fan noise is not too bad; even though it's almost always on, it's pretty quiet. It does speed up rather often, but it's quieter and less annoying than my EEE was before using the custom fan control program eeectl. My 1558 has the ATI 4570 graphics.