HOT Laptop while running WoW?

Hey all. Not as computer savvy as you would probably like me to be.. if this is the wrong area to post i apologize. I play world of warcraft on an HP ZX5000 laptop and the laptop shuts off a lot. A LOT! Just bought a new power supply cause i was convinced this was the problem...NOT. Still shutting off on me. At $111.00 for the new power supply, I'm a bit disappointed.The laptop will run over night (for defrags and such) with no problems so I am now fairly certain that the problem is overheating or some other issue that is occuring only when running WoW. The only info that I can give at present is that the OS is windows XP. Also, not sure if this is important or not, but the battery is completely 100% dead. Just ordered a new one. Any advice on how to keep this from happening would be very much appreciated. TY!

 

One more thing...I use no mods while running WoW except for GEM.

 

Have you cleaned the laptop out?

 

i just had the fan panel off and did wipe it down, even used a small brush and the vacuum on the fan blades...i would have liked to remove the fans completely and clean them off as there is some dust kinda stuck to them, but i wasnt sure how...if its even possible. also i do use a cooler stand for the laptop as well as a room fan behind it.

 

its the vents that most people do not look at... the fans are not a good indicator of dust clogs.

Get a flashlight and look through the vents... if you cant see the light on the other side, then its clogged.

 

Get a can of compressed air, aim it into a vent and let it loose. Otherwise you have already done a fairly good job by cleaning out what you did, most users never think to do that.

 

I have also noticed that WOW heats up my laptop (vostro 1500 w/ 8600gt) more than ANY other games I have played on it. It's mostly the gpu that gets hot, but it's 5-10 degrees higher than when I play UT3 assassin's creed, bioshock, even crysis...

 

Sadly, despite the seemingly easier graphics, WoW is still a very intense game on your system.

Last year alone I knew three people who blew their computers from playing World Of Warcraft.

A 7600GT desktop, a Go 7900GS laptop, and another desktop of which I don't know the graphics.

The fact that there can be so much goign on at one time can esily bog down your computer and cause it to get a bit to warm. Add this onto the fact that some people can play for 4-12 hours a day... This is pretty heavy for any system.

What resolution are you playing at? Is the room fan pointing directly at your vents? What driver are you using?

 

There are no new patches today as far as I know, but today the laptop will just not stay on for more than about 5 mins when running wow. The laptop ran for 4 hours without running wow, once i started wow..went about 5 mins and shut off. I used to get varying times of game play, sometimes would run all day without shutting off but now its just crazy.

 

I'm not sure what driver I have. The resolution is set to the default setting. It's much worse today than it ever was.

 

Probably why is because wow is not very cpu intesive. For alot of laptops (especially with speedstep enabled) the cpu is what triggers the fans, or causes the fans to run at a higher rpm. So while your cpu is not being utilized much the gpu is and it heats up too much. You can try disabling speed step in you systems' bios, which solves this problem for some people.

 

One more clue perhaps...the new power supply has a little blue light on it, when the laptop shuts off the blue light on the power supply goes off as well and I have to unplug it and plug it back in to make it come back on. Although I have not waited a very long time before doing so. It may come back on I suppose if I left it sit a while,..dunno, too impatient.

 

yet another odd discovery: For those of you familiar with wow- at the log on screen if instead of entering my password I click on the "manage my account" link, the laptop shuts off. Happened twice.

 

can you use HWMonitor and post your temps?

 

I downloaded HWMonitor as suggested. Still trying to get on the game. I plan on running it in a window so i can check the temps. Here are the current temps: ACPI runs from 51 - 61 degrees C. ST980829A runs 41 degrees C.
Will post temps while WoW is running once I'm able to stay on long enough to check it.

 

alright well the targus power supply i bought doesnt support this laptop.... the reason why it was shutting off even more with the new power supply. one of the tips fits nicely but the website doesnt list this model so it not supported. so i'm back to assuming my original power supply is bad, i just have to find one that will work properly with this model. thanks for you help.

 

Gonna have to order from HP I'm guessing.