8740w overheating issue and issue installing a 2800m

I have owned my 8740w for about 6 months (bought used) and I use it mostly for CPU intensive 3D work such as VRAY rendering. Recently the CPU is overheating and the laptops getting extremely hot. Temps hit 100 degrees and it shuts off.

I removed the heat sinks etc and the thermal compound had dried and was really crusty. I cleaned with alcohol and got the mirror finishes and reapplied thermal paste (arctic silver 5). The problem persisted so I thought it was too much themal paste, so a further 2 times I reapplied the paste, each time was a blob in the center the size of a small pea, each time I put a bit less, the problem has not gone away.

I decided to take my laptop to a specialist in the city and they told me it was the GPU causing the issue. They then offered to repair it for a ridiculous amount that I had to say no too. I check the GPU temps and they are fine.

I decided to buy a cheap fx2800m (currently using 3800m) off Ebay to see if there was any improvement. I bought the HP Nvidia Quadro FX2800m and installed it. I turn on my laptop but the display stays blank and never lights up, however the laptop does boot into windows as I hear the startup sound when windows loads. I left it for a minute and could feel the laptop still getting too warm so I believe it is still overheating.

I have reinstalled the 3800m and I use HWINFO64 to set my fan on full and then use throttlestop to set my multiplier to 7x, then my laptop is just about usable for basic tasks.

I am not sure where to go from here, any ideas?

edit: I just want to add I use all 4 RAM slots but have tried using 2 and the problem does not go away. I also updated the BIOS to the latest version and no change. The fan I can hear so I think the fan is working correctly.

 

Can a CPU break?

 

Are you using single or double pipe heatsinks for CPU and GPU?
And yes CPU's can break but they will slow down/power off if they get too hot but it will wear them out more than when they run at cooler temps.

 

Double pipe heatsink and the CPU is an i7 720QM

 

Make sure the heatsink vents are not blocked and the thermal paste need to be as thin as possible.
I like to spread it out myself with a really thin layer but others say a grain of rice is enough.
With that you should get high 80's in my experience (I had 60-70 on my dual core).

If everything looks alright(except temps) I would start to think the cpu might be worn out.
Anyone with a 8740w I would recommend to be on the look out for cheap zbooks anyway.

 

Vents are clean, I'll give the thermal paste one last go. I was planning on getting this up to 32gb ram from 16gb and putting in a GTX 780m and maybe upgrading the CPU to the extreme, but you might be right in that I should just get a zbook, I'll be on the lookout for one.

 

The heatsink itself could be broken, it happens (the smallest cracks - barely visible to the eye, if it all - render it useless)! I've had this problem with my desktop PC (running a socket 775 C2Q) once, it suddenly stopped cooling as it should. Put another heatsink on it and had a temp reduction of close to 30C.

 

I re pasted and no difference, so I think I'll change the CPU and buy a new heat sink. I need to decide which CPU to buy. 840QM for $150 or 920XM for $250? I do render using the CPU a lot but am unsure how much performance increase I would get for the $100 difference? Any suggestions?

 

I would sell the laptop and buy a Zbook 17 with that and the upgrade money.
It will give you a much faster CPU, allow you to use 32GB of RAM, allow you to upgrade the GPU, more HDD space.
The Zbook's are also a much newer platform with support for newer hardware.

If it sounds like I am pushing the Zbook it is because I am, switching over has been the best thing I did in years.
The K2100M it came with was much faster than my fx3800m and things looked better as well!

I am now running a Zbook 17 G1 with 32GB, 3x 512GB SSD, GTX860M, I7 4910MQ, Blu-Ray and 4G WWAN

 

Nice setup. I'de love that laptop. I do want to upgrade to a zbook, but funds are tight at the minute. And I probably will do in the near future, but before I can even think about selling this machine I need to address the overheating issue. I do have a few hundred dollars spare but not much more.

I thought the 8740w could upgrade to 32GB RAM? I previously considered the upgrade.

 

Intel website mentions 8GB but I believe the actual max was 16GB.
http://ark.intel.com/products/43126/Intel-Core-i7-920XM-Processor-Extreme-Edition-8M-Cache-2_00-GHz

If you want to replace the CPU I would go for a cheaper QM instead of the XM.
I would try to replace the cooler first though since it's much cheaper than a cpu.

Also maybe a stupid question but the fan is working correct isn't it?
Edit: Also make sure there is not gap between the fan and the cpu heatsink(tape the top and bottom)

 

yep the fan still works, I use HWInfo64 to turn it up a bit to help with cooling the system at the minute..

Right I'll get a new cooler off Ebay. Is there any chance the CPU could be overheating because of my GPU as the shop told me? I just got the feeling they was trying to rip me off for over $600 which they quoted me. My GPU idles at 50C in ambient temperature of 27C. Ive never noticed my GPU go over 70C?

 

LOL, $600?! Are they insane?! Get new heat-sinks total price around $50 and you should be good to go.

@tamarinde - Just to get the facts straight. There are at least 3 users with 32GB, I'm with 24GB, so I don't know what are you talking about. The GPU is upgradeable as well, only the CPU is holding back and not by much, considering the newer ones can't be overclocked (maybe the ZBook can, but I'm not very certain). The 920XM can be clocked to 2.7GHz on all 4 cores relatively safely (depends on the CPU and your heat-sink). I personally wont give the awesome 16:10 ratio, but it's just me.

 

I wasn't sure about that since I only had 8GB in mine, I was actually hoping someone would jump in who had more RAM than me.
My CPU is able to overclock with the Intel Turning tool but only up to Boost speeds but I just use it to undervolt since the cpu is fast enough for what I do.

Also for $600 I will hand deliver and install my 860m for you, that includes a return flight from the UK for me.

And have a look at the HP part store https://parts.hp.com sometimes it has cheap parts like heatsinks etc.

 

I have ordered one Brand New off Ebay for $20 from the US. Just got to wait for it to get to Aus now I really hope it is that but my temps pick up soooo quick that I feel the CPU could have worn out due to all the rendering I do with it at 100% load. I'm still wondering though to upgrade from this 720QM to a 840QM or 920XM? $100 difference in price between 840 and 920, is it worth it?

 

Just replace the heatsink first and in the mean time be on the lookout for a bargain.
Personally I wouldn't if the difference is $100

 

Well the 840QM is running @1.8Ghz, where the 920XM can be safely clocked @2.7Ghz, that's almost a full GHz above. You are the one to decide. Get a small upgrade and get a new machine in a year for example, or get the XM and postpone the new machine for a few more years.

Not only that, but I wonder if Crucial's 16GB modules would run for total of 64GB

Is this on all 4 cores?

 

Ordered heatsink, some thermal compound and some copper sheet to do the cooling mod. I'm also looking at a "New intel cpu Intel core i7 920XM Q3B8 Processor ES version" on Ebay. I'm not sure what the ES version means, would this work in the 8740w?

 

That would be sick
Maybe then vmware wont complain I dont have enough memory....

And yes you can clock all 4 cores to work at boost speed.
With my undervolt I managed to drop my max temp by about 10C, havent tried to overclock yet.
Just FYI; overclocking the Intel GPU makes it unstable really quickly.

 

I see the ES version is engineering CPU so I'm guessing it wise to avoid these?

 

There are good ES and bad ones. The good are similar to the final version, the bad might be missing something (temp sensors for example) and could perform worse. Last time I checked, the price difference between OEM and ES was non-existent, so better stay on the safe side.

 

In general yes you should avoid them.
They are mainly used for testing or review samples so they have not always treated well.

 

I see the fx2800m I bought was actually for a HP ProLiant WS460c G6 Workstation so that is why it would not work, I can send it back though so that is all good. I can see that I can pick up a k4000m considerably cheaper than a k5000m , I'm not sure if its compatible though and if I need modded drivers. I'm unsure how to mod drivers so I might have to wait and fork out for the k5000m as there seems to be a little bit of support for it. Any thoughts on this?

 

also do the Kepler cards have to be HP or will Dell ones work? Or are they the same thing? All I can find are the dell or Clevo k5000m when I look.

 

It is cheaper, but the performance is different as well. Drivers should install without modification. DELL K5000m would most likely work. Actually it's the newer HP GPUs that have something in the vBIOS missing, which prevents them from working properly/at all.

 

OK so I got a brand new extreme cpu 920xm, got a brand new dual pipe cpu cooler and a cheap used fx2800m to test, installed all 3 and used cool laboratories liquid ultra for CPU. I'm still overheating. I replaced the thermo pads on GPU and used arctic silver on the GPU. I'm feeling a bit lost now. Could this be a :

(1) Bad motherboard?
(2) Bad BIOS? (although I did just flash the latest and no change)
(3) Bad windows?
(4) Something going wrong with drivers?
(5) Bad fan (but the fan boots and I can hear it, and I can control it using HWINFO64 so I dont think its bad)

do you think it would be worthwhile doing a fresh install of windows?

 

Can you actually feel a breeze coming out and is it warm?

 

yes I can feel a breeze coming out and it is warm. I can feel the cold air being sucked in through the keyboard and if I feel underneath too I can feel the air being sucked in.

 

I wish I knew where I could send it in Aus to have it looked at. I walked around Melbourne CBD and most shops would not touch it when I told them the problems. The only place was c1 computers and they charged me $80 to just look at it and then quoted me a ridiculous amount for changing the graphics card, which it seems was not the problem anyway. I should contact them and ask for my $80 back.

Anyways, has any one any idea where I could send it in Australia? Or should I just wait for a cheap one to show up on Ebay?

 

You can lift your keyboard and touch the CPU and GPU heatsink to feel which one is actually generating the heat

 

ahhh man, I'm such an idiot, earlier I took out the fx 3800m to replace with the fx 2800m, I cleaned the 3800 and had them side by side, I only went and put the fx 3800m back in doh. I'll switch them out and see how that goes, fingers crossed.

 

So I have the brand new fx2800m installed, brand new thermal pads, brand new cpu dual pipe cooler, brand new 920xm. Vents are clean.

Its running better. BUT I still can not render, after 5 mins of rendering (100% cpu usage) it hits 98 degrees and is still climbing so I stop the render.I ran another render using throttlestop and my multiplier at 9 and it still overheats. I'm lost at what the problem is now. My GPU hits 72 degrees and HWMonitor says my assembly is at 42%.

I used arctic silver 5 on GPU and the cool laboritories liquid ultra on the CPU.

Any ideas? new laptop?

 

I'm out of ideas I'm afraid.

 

could it be the motherboard? hard drive? software? driver? or windows?

I'm not sure what to do now, I have 16gb ram a 920xm and quadro fx2800m, I might get a dell if the coolings better and I can find one on Ebay cheap.

 

Only thing I can think of is that the motherboard is worn and inefficient or giving a slightly higher voltage to your cpu.

This is the reason I suggested a new laptop, the 8740w is approaching the end of its technical life which results in component failure or in your case increased heat and slowness.
It could have been a simple fix but as you noticed it is hard to find the specific cause.

This is a cost benefit calculation your have to make of your old laptop + all possible costs to fix VS a new(er) laptop. Low spec newer laptops(Zbook I mean here) often out perform top spec older ones.

 

What are your ThrottleStop settings? You should be able to do 2.5GHz across the 4 cores without issues and if you are lucky even 2.7GHz without overheating.

 

Attached my settings, all I do is turn the multiplier down

 

Press the TPL button and make a screenshot and then press the TRL and make another.

 

24/24/17/17 55w 52a

 

The 55W and 52A are the stock for the CPU, I'm running higher than that. Not for the 8740w though (it's lower), can you try 52W and 42A, same multipliers?

 

you are an absolute legend. I set the TPL as you suggested and left the TRL. I ticked set multiplier and put it to 9, I ran a render and after 45 mins of full 100% CPU the temp has hit a max of 84 degrees, its been fluctuating between 82 and 84 for the last 35 mins. So now I can do test renders again at least. Not to sure if I'll be able to do high res final renders though, they will take me 6-8 hours at these speeds for a small scene, I'll just do them at work for now.

I might get a cooling pad and might even try one of those USB vacuum cooling fans if it will attach to the vent at the back. Hopefully I can get it a bit cooler to see if I can push it up another multiplier or 2.

Thanks for the help triturbo, it means a lot to me.

 

Glad to help. I was looking at these coolers myself as well. You need to put it on the side though, since this is where the CPU exhaust is.

 

awesome I will try one out soon and let you know if it makes a difference. I've also got a copper sheet and thermal to do the cooling mod.

with regards to the TPL values w and a, could I try and drop them a little lower or is that not advisable?

 

You could, but it would affect performance. What are your current settings? Also no need to get the multiplier so low, it would go as high as these settings (W and A) let it. I mean, find the balance. You might be able to get more work done and not overheat.

 

awesome I will have a play around with it thanks

 

I have a spare 450 USD. I am considering picking up another 8740w with the slowest i7 I can find and switching parts and then she can have this one that is troublesome. Or I might go for the m4500 as they are slightly cheaper, is the cooling any better on the dell m4500?

I am still considering my options though, I would be willing to drop to a 15 inch but I cant go any lower than that. Any suggestions?

 

I wonder if I can drop an i3 or i5 in the 8740w for her, she only browses the web and occasionally watches a DVD. That should help its cooling I think. They can be picked up so cheap on Ebay I am unsure whats compatible tho. Is there a list of all the supported CPUs anywhere?

 

Well, i5s would do, since the system was shipped with such option. Not sure about i3s, but they should do as well.

Haven't played with M4500, only with M6500. The cooling should be better, but the GPU is non-upgradeable and, as you said, it's 15". I don't see myself stepping down anytime soon, but it's up to you in the end.

 

I think I'll risk it and go for another 8740w, I've not seen any other posts on the net with issues like me so I'll say it is a one off. I will pick up a separate i5-520m and hopefully that will run cooler than the quads. I'm gonna pick up some cooling pads too, and I have some copper plate too so I'll do the cooling mod to both.
Thanks for your help.

 

I decided to give my machine one last try before buying a new one, I stripped it right down and cleaned the motherboard with a few cans of compressed air and i kept going over the piece my cpu sits in, put it all back together not expecting much and voila, no overheating, i put back in my 3800m and 920xm and its as cold as ice, not quite, but after 1 hour of rendering at stock speeds my temp max was 83, my idle temps are around 40 degrees and general use of applications photoshop, autocad max sees it go to around 62 degrees.

Will throttlestop be of any value to me if most of the time I run all my cores at 100 percent load when rendering in vray?