Fan Control Problems

I have a Toshiba Satellite Pro a210 from about 4 years ago. (incidentally I am never buying another one). It is running Vista. The processor is running at anything up to 90 deg C and then often switching off. But the fan is never going at 100%,

There are no settings in Bios to change (nor for the CPU speeds), there is nothing in Toshiba Assist (Hardware Settings) and only ACPI Fan under Device Manager, but this is effectively inaccessible without knowing where to go in the registry to change these.

Speedfan appears not to work or not to be able to override the settings and I can't find any tool that will give me access to the text of the fan settings. Even at these high temperatures the fan appears to be running at only 50% or so and only at 80 degC does it come onto something faster, usually not for long. Nor is that top speed either. Setting all fans (though there is only one) to 100% on exit from Speedfan does nothing either.

The odd thing is that I cleared out the fan about three months ago and for a while it ran incredibly cool, without needing the fan to come on. The cpu usage seems a bit high at 33% on average with perhaps a dozen tabs open in Chrome, but not much else.

Can anyone help me change the fan speeds?

Thanks in advance

CT

 

I would recommend you verify you have the latest BIOS, which can be found here: Toshiba Support - Homepage
Click the "Product Support" button in the top-left of the page, and fillin the boxes.


I'm not sure why your fans wouldn't come up to full speed, but how are you determining how fast your fans are working at? Maybe the fans are still clogged with dust and need additional cleaning.

Have you checked the thermal paste on the CPU? Heatsink ok? [no cracks etc...].
Here's a disassembly guide of a "similar" model: Disassembly instructions for Toshiba Satellite A200 and Satellite A205 series laptops


I hope others can chime in with additional tips.

Good luck

 

Hi, thanks for the reply and the link. Am I in any danger of freezing the machine by installing a new BIOS? My model, which has a part number but no model number, doesn't seem to be listed, so I can't be fully sure of compatibility. But I do need this machine and can't afford a whole day lost to it.

I have download TVAP. Is that safe? It seemed to want to reboot the machine rather than just run?

 

There's 3 different Sat-Pro a210 models listed: EZ2201, EZ2202X, EZ2203X
The full model should be on the underside of your laptop.

a210- EZ2201 Model Content Page

a210-EZ2202X Model Content Page

a210-EZ2203X Model Content Page

Usually the rule of thumb with BIOS installs is "if it "ain't" broke, don't fix it"; however your having a problem. I would follow the Toshiba instructions on how to install the BIOS [can be found on your laptop support page]. BIOS updates would be at your risk; you can however exhaust all other routes before doing a BIOS update.



I'm not sure what Toshiba Value Added Package [TVAP] includes or does.
Here's a Support Bulletin that includes information on what TVAP does: Content Details


Good luck

 

Hi Alex

Well, it is closest to the 2X, and at least the chipset is the same, though much of the spec isn't. And, no, that number is not on the bottom of the machine. It can find the machine from the serial number, but won't tell me what it is! Different wireless on this one (Realtek), different disk and more mem (though that will have been an option). No indication of which BIOS chip.

There's quite a lot on the machine for its price, now that one looks at the spec again. Still v. concerned about updating the bios, esp as the power supply on my Lacie backup drive has gone (they all do i discover). TVAP would appear to give more access to the BIOS settings, though that wouldn't be difficult as this must be the most threadbare BIOS I have ever seen. I have a Win95 machine with more options!

The problem is not paste as the fins are very hot. Squirting a bit of compressed air in there brings it right down, v quickly. I can can only assume that the cpu is ding more work than it used to. 30%+ on average does seem very high for effectively tickover. Nothing computational and no films playing. If I could just keep the fan on a bit longer and have it cut in earlier it wuld be just about OK. It can't be doing anything for the life of the cpu and at v. high temps it just slows right down and you can barely use the keyboard commands or mouse.

It's pretty much in bits as I type (and one of my complaints is how many brass inserts and bits of plastic have fallen off it, or just tumbled out of the casing) so if anyone knows of anything I should look at (preferably from the top as lifting the board up might need more undoing) then please let me know.

Thanks again for your help.

Incidentally, for the same sort of machine, but generally snappier and lighter, what would you guys recommend these days. This is 1.9GHz Turion 58, 15" screen, 4Gb mem, 160Gb HDD, 4 USB, Express and SD slots, SVGA, RGB, LAN + 801g, Bluetooth, Firewire and DVD RW (which doesn't work on DVDs), most of which I'd like to hang onto. I think this was about £350 in 2008, which seems like cracking value (until you have taken it to pieces a few times).

Christian

 

Whoops! I assumed you had a US model, is it a British model by any chance?

If so check these links: Laptop Support - Download the latest updates for your laptop/tablet - Toshiba
Laptop Driver Downloads:

You may find better drivers there.

 

No problem Alex. Got straight to it with serial no and got a new BIOS. Unfortunately it seems no different from the old one.

Sorry for the delay, there have been a number of reboots etc. But I'm still no closer to accessing the fan speed. Have got TVAP, but can't run it just yet as I'm in the middle of a defrag and it reboots. But that's my last chip unless someone else has an idea.

BTW Netbook Hardware control ran once and that was it. I think it has taken HW-Monitor with it as well as that now starts up with an error also. Any ideas on those. It's as though there is an army fighting to stop me getting control of the precious fan!

 

Update. There's a TVAP Installation error too, so that doesn't work.

 

The part in red really bothers me. Ran incredibly cool with no fan to now wanting the fan to run 100% because it overheats?!!?

What happened and what has been installed? It's important that you get HWMonitor to install, it sounds like you may have registry corruption.

The 4 year old fan just may be shot but as you said you don't need it.

You may have virus or corrupt system. Your CPU may be running 110% because of virus..OR..A failing TIM, so needs repaste?

So, you may have all of the above or "other". Are you prepared to open up your laptop? After four years what have you got to loose? A system restore and or repaste MAY be all you need. Can you afford to send to local shop? A fan from flea bay may be only $20... if you don't have a board problem.

Not having your laptop in front of me, i can only offer you the take down manual, sorry. Hope it's for your model. Try to use external desk fan, ceiling or/and cool pad to keep from damaging the cpu until you get a handle on your problem.

good luck!

http://tim.id.au/laptops/toshiba/equium a210 satego a210 satellite a210 a215 pro a210.pdf

Edit, just caught your post on the "hot fins". Good observation, i can only offer that you recheck your fan plug. You should have a 3 wire fan, one of those is a tachometer so may not be making good contact or is damaged.. assuming no board/BIOS problem. Did you "overspeed" the fan when cleaning?

 

Hi Hydra

The fan was mostly on tickover after I cleaned it out about 3 months ago. But possibly sometimes off.

It's hard to know what has been loaded on here because it gets tons of stuff, programming langs, various cloud drives, video dvd maker, circuit sims, you name it. I am concerned by how many svchosts there are though. What I have got to lose is all this stuff and the month that it will take to find it all again. And my desktop, which doesn't have as much memory though is on XP, has just got overburdened, probably by Visual Studio. So I can't fall back on that. Spybot Beta 2 could be a culprit, but it's not usually that intrusive.

The fan controller is working. I've got Speedfan reading off the temperatures and you can hear it click up a gear at 70 deg and then at 85, but still never to the full speed that you get during boot up. And it doesn't stay on long enough to really kick the temperature down. I've just run Smitfraudfix on it which is the same as Combofix, but nothing much showed up. It was also given a once over by MS Malicious software thingy (which is v. good) a month or so ago and came up clean. The system is protected by Avast! and there's no other AV package running at the same time (and it's v. low down in Taskman). I am currently unloading a few media players that I was trialing and whatever else I find in Control Panel that I don't need. I you have any ideas of likely culprits I'd be grateful. Speed on CPU-Z (which does still work) is bang on 1.9GHz. HWMonitor doesn't seem to be Tosh compatible in the free version so no acpi functions were showing up that were obvious. But then I'm not fussed about shutting the lid at the moment <g>.

Probably only $9 for a fan on eBay. But this machine is not really well enough made to be taken apart too often. I am sort of quite fond of it even if it is a bit crappy, though I really would like something a bit zippier. It should have a year left in it. I don't want to add it to my collection, which goes back to pre 1990!

Thanks for your help so far.

C

 

That's the right pdf for this laptop, though a slightly swisher model. Thanks for that. Though I have undone most of those screws already. Wish I'd had that to begin with (though the strip at the top is now welded to the next piece so you can't get the k/b out that easily!)