My 1-day-old Sony Vaio CS laptop has this intermittent whirring noise from the fan when my laptop is on!

were going to pick it up tomorrow at the sony center. it was a shame i was the one who recommended it to my gf because it looks cool (pink a girly thing). the instant she saw it she was very happy. i do have regrets now, it was pricey before we bought it $1000, average specs and it was heavy for a 14.1. all in all $1300 with wireless pink mouse and extended 2 yr warranty. we have discount when we bought it. she doesnt want the looks of the T400 which i prefer. The sony cs review here in notebook review was kinda late. so now when someone asks whats a good laptop i make it a point that they take their time to research common problems in the net about that model and dont settle with looks. and also dont buy new release laptops. wait a month for users around the world what to say about that model just like the release of studio xps (eg. system lock up, heat). and for power users avoid sony (eg. VT disabled)

Ryo is right, don't mind paying a little bit more for a product if it offers a decent quality and reliability. almost all sony cs have the fan problem. even the cs notebookreview author have observed the noisy fan.

crossing my fingers till tomorrow. ill come back for details of the repaired sony cs.

 

we have the newly repaired cs. were going to test for hours so ill come back later about the status of the fan noise. btw, they told us that they have replaced the fan assembly.

 

our sony cs now is quiet. lets see after a week if indeed the problem was solved.

in the paper,
GD2 COOLING ASSY-INT(ASV/FO)
A1563411B

thumbs up to sony for this matter!

 

i just got my vaio cs31s/w back from repair. they replaced the fan and now the new one A1563411B is installed... but in my opinion the fan is as loud as bevore. i really don't know what to do now ...:cry:
accept the fan noise?
send it a second time for repair?
bring it back and try to get the money back?

any other suggestions to solve that problem?

*overstrained*

 

if you can get it back and return the money it it is still possible. i recommend not to accept the fan noise if you have the warranty. return it to the service center. you can make a recording of the sound coming from the fan so that they can hear it properly.

good luck. anyway this is a good experience for us in buying laptops.

 

Hi,

I also have the same model like yours which is cs115d and I am also having the same problem. I just want to ask if Sony really solved the problem because I am planning to send my computer to the repair center which will really cost me a lot, for about P10,000.00 (in Philippine money). I just had this as a gift from my mom, she bought it in Japan and sent it to me here in the Philippines last July. I am really disappointed because I have to shoulder all the charges even if it was really the cs issue and because they dont have international warranty.

 

I agree with users89898, if it is possible to get a refund, go for it. Because right now you are not happy with the fan noise, dun stress yourself to adapt, we buy a product to serve us, not to create more troubles to us.

 

yeah cs model was released first in japan and judging from your model no(1x,1xx series), it was the first batch of cs and likely has the fan problem. some even reported the 2nd batch (2x,2xx series) has also the fan problem. i believe the 3rd batch (3x,3xx series) has the B model fan and dont know if they have problems with it.

im also a filipino btw. i believe sony center in the Philippines cant repair it for free because your mother didnt opt for an international warranty. the only option is that to pay for the replacement part which i believe cost around $100us and also a service charge. P10,000 is a lot of money there just for a fan! and the chances of fan would solve the problem is around 50% because some have posted the B fan didnt solve the problem.

Be careful if you plan your cs be repaired in a non-sony center there in the Philippines.

from this day, the repaired cs is still quiet. the on and off of the fan is still there but unlike before there are no creaking sounds. dont know if some tweaks were made in our unit. my gf is happy with her laptop now.

others have the fan replaced by the B model fan but the problem still exist. so i guess were lucky right now.

if only sony would recall all cs models in the market to replace the fan for free, that would be your lifesaver.

 

i have news!

sony support service wrote to me that in the end of september "overworked" fans - that should solve the problem - will be available in the sony repair centers (germany)! so i sended in my vaio for repair today. i'll write here when i found out what type of fan this exactly is. and of course i'll give you a report when i get my vaio back from repair, but it'll take a few weeks.

kind regards,
tina

 

tina_86, great news you have there. i wonder what solution sony is taking up when A1563411B didnt work for you.

sony should write to all cs owners and make it up with this mess, the fan problem is due to the low quality fan they have installed upon researching in other forums.

 

fantastic, sony needs about 9 months to find out what actually went wrong on a laptop fan, good job sony well done.

While i just got back my cs16g last week after a fan and usb problem, now once in a while there is a line appears on my screen from nowhere (looks like screen corruption). I'm going to send in again tomorrow, this laptop is the worst nightmare i ever had in my entire life !

 

OMG! i think you should ask for replacement. did you go at the same sony center with your problem in the fan and usb. try changing sony service center.

and also try lenovo for your next laptop.

 

My Brother's VGNCS21SR has a fan that keeps coming on every 20 seconds or so, at a low to medium level. No scraping or other non-fan noises. I'd rather the fan stay on at a low level. I updated my BIOS to the latest one I could find on the VAIO support site but it made no difference. Also fan stays the same whether you are in silent or performance mode or if you turn the HDD off feature to " Never ". I am in UK. It was the last model of this one in the shop (PC World) bought at a discount for being ex-demo. Brother bought it because he liked the colour

As a quick review of it, it's quite good. As long as you can get past the fan noise going on and off every few seconds once it's warm (which I have kinda learnt to ignore) then it's otherwise a reasonable machine. NO dead pixels, but the screen is not great in contrast but is OK and does an OK black (not really that great though, it has the CCFL conventional non-LED backlight) but goes really quite bright, maybe 50 per cent brighter than my old Compal TS3013 . The screen hinge allows it to tilt beyond the point where it can be folded flat , so it can tilt more than 180 degrees , not less, which I like very much, my old laptop did that too.

Keyboard is solid, but a little lacking in travel but you soon get used to it and it's accurate and well made and you can type very fast on it, CTRL is in the right place, full UK double height enter key , special function keys are via the FN button not reversed like they are on some recent Dell laptops where you have to press FN + F1 to get just plain old F1. My volume down doesn't seem to work hardly at all on the special touch sensitive strip at the top of the keyboard. Volume up works. But the 2 functions are doubled on the F3 and F4 keys.

There is no SVideo out. No serial port. But there are 3 USB's on the left just past 1/2 way towards the front. Then comes a miniDV socket which worked just fine with my old Sony PC110E miniDV camcorder, I was able to transfer my video and edit it, and the transport control via laptop DV socket worked. Mic socket present but not tested yet. Headphones work fine in their socket, 3.5mm stereo jack. Great sound, no distortions, no hiss or other noises. Don't know if the VGA socket works, my projector ( IN76 ) has the M1DA socket so I need the special cable. Power socket seems loose but it's engineered that way so you can pull it in many directions without it loosing contact, I tried it and it's great. The looseness is not a fault it's part of the clever design (constant spring contact).

Built quality is pretty good. Mat s h i t a DVD drive burns flawlessly to Ritek G05 8xDVD-R discs at 4x, the discs created as usual work on everything including my fussy Pioneer DVR-545HX and DVR-LX60D recorders, every single time, and read back at 3 to 8 speed (depending on amount burned) with no errors. USB mouse works. HDD is very very quiet indeed. No access noises or whining that are off putting at all.

CPU is very fast. 3x speed of AMD2800 AthlonXP that my desktop uses. 2 cores at 2GHz and 2MB cache instead of 1MB. Plays BBCHD without going jerk at any time as no frames are lost. At least with the downloaded version. BBCHD whilst streamed looses some frames but very little, it's extremely watchable. Almost totally smooth at almost all times, with NO breaks in sound. To get this, don't run Firefox LOL as it consumes some CPU (only a little but enough to slow it down a little).

Vista SP2 is very good indeed actually I find, no blue screens , no crashes . Loads of memory so you can really load it down with IE8, Firefox, Emule, GE, video conversions, e-mail, PS, and still no problem. Suspend and hibernate seem to be flawless, I don't get a loss of web connection when I resume. With my G+ MIMO Belkin router I get about 21Mb / sec downstairs where router is and 16 Mb upstairs and always > 10Mbps even right down to the bottom of the back garden 40 feet away. Cool. Networking is flawless, I can always see my desktop machine in the wireless connections and files transfer from or to my desktop machine without issue at 2.73 MB / sec mostly. I don't have to do anything to connect to my wireless internet connection, it does it all automatically.

All in all a good machine with an annoying fan issue but then I can't hear it all when I'm out on the patio, and it's my Brother's anyway so it wasn't my choice in the first place!

When you do video conversions the fan stays on constantly at a low-medium level, which stops it being distracting. When you start to play games the fan gets VERY loud since the GPU kicks in in a major way. Most annoying. The built in speakers are fairly good but not outstanding in any way. They go fairly loud but not much bass as you would expect.

The underside stays warm but not hot anywhere, so your nuts don't get fried when it's on your lap. LOL.

The sound from the built in microphone is very good considering, and the picture from the built in webcam is high res (TV res) and detailed and smooth not grainy and the movement is very smooth no jerkiness.

Cheers,

Alistair G.

 

it is sony service center, i definitely going to ask for replacement tomorrow, but looking at how sony treat us, i doubt i can get a replacement. Let's see how it goes tomorrow

update...
All right, after sending my laptop in and an email to sony about my dissatisfaction, they replied me in the following day, apparently they finally admitted that there is a problem with the fan on cs and bz. And sony offers two years warranty for the fan problem, here is what they replied to me.

The announcement is on sony-asia website (since i'm in asia), i believe they also made similiar announcement on other region as well, so please check your local sony website for the announcement.

 

GREAT NEWS! This is a milestone for all cs users. now finally, sony has publicly admitted the fan problem in all cs.

At Canada site,
"Posted: September 10, 2009

Sony takes pride in the quality of its products. Recently, we became aware of a potential issue affecting the following VAIO computer models:

VGNCS1xx, VGN CS2xx, and VGNBZ5xx series
No other VAIO models are affected.

The issue involves the potential malfunction of the cooling fan in these affected models. The symptoms caused by a malfunctioning fan are: continuous scraping, whirring, chirping or clicking noise.

While it is normal for a cooling fan to revolve faster and make a louder sound initially upon startup that fades away, a malfunctioning cooling fan on an affected product makes a continuously loud noise while running, which may also increase over time.

Note: Continued use of an affected unit may cause the fan to stop running altogether, which may lead to the product shutting down automatically during use."

Sony of Canada Ltd. ("Sony Canada") will: (a) repair the computer at no charge, and (b) in addition to the standard limited 12 month manufacturer's warranty covering the product as a whole, provide a one year warranty extension for the fan. The one-year extended warranty will commence upon the expiry of the original manufacturer's warranty.

For complete article, link here: http://www.sony.ca/view/830.htm

what we all need to do is to spread the word and help our fellow cs users.




great job RYO!

 

Yeah, sony finally did some good work about this mess. Now we just need to spread the word to other users, anyone is from vaio club ? please let them know about this news too.

 

hmmm... mine is VGNCS31S and definitely affected!

 

mine is cs115 and its not included in the list... I am really desperate. I can't use my computer when I need it. Sony should include all CS model, (including the CS11xx which are the earlier model).

 

try to contact sony USA for your model. ask them why they didnt include USA models, other regions has the announcement regarding the cs fan issue. please post back.

 

Bah!!! Sweet vindication!! I wish someone could wave this in front of the sales rep who refused to believe my complaint when I took my laptop back, making me feel like I was some kind of noob who didn't know what I was talking about.

Anyway, have they stopped producing the CS? I see it's no longer listed on the sony style canada website.

 

i believe they will not discontinue the cs in canada. new model VGNCS3xx are still being sold in the main site, sony style and in future shop.

thanks to you pleasance for starting this thread. ive been following this thread ever since we noticed the fan's unusual noise. we simply ignored it until my gf can't tolerate it anymore especially when some family members laughed at the laptop's noise.

 

I can’t send my query to sony canda/usa because the zip code and province/states are required in their websites. But I already mailed sony global and asia, but they just forward it to sony philippines and told me that they can’t do anything because mine is a foreign vaio.

I already decided to send it back to japan for repair, because my computer is getting worst. I also asked my mom if she can just sell it to someone who is in the country so that if ever the fan needs to be replaced again they can use the warranty from the store where she bought it.

I’m very sad and disappointed to know that they can't make considerations regarding my situation. I badly need a computer, but i don’t have any choice but to wait again for a new one.

 

i think that is the best solution for your case. pay for the service fee or ship it back to your mom. if you have relatives or your mom's friend going back to japan, you can ask them to take the laptop to avoid shipping fee.

ingats.

 

June, then, now almost October. Sound comes back, this is a brand new fan mind you, $96 or something, it might be dust since I put it on my carpeted floor a lot but I will open it on Saturday/Sunday night since midterms are coming real soon. I don't want anymore errors and whatnot anymore. This sound isn't "whirring" sound from before as it is very subtle. I just experienced this today. Hopefully it's just me having a lot of programs on.

SONY VAIO VGN-CS110E.

 

Let me tell you my story, you will enjoy it ... or possibly cry ..

About a year ago i bought the Sony CS11S model. Like other users i liked the design, performance, and value of the model.

Also, like other users i experienced the constant fan noise, coupled with the froggy, scratchy sound.

I live in Prague, czech republic, took it to local dealer, they just upgraded the bios, of course problem persisted. was about to get in touch with sony service europe when .... my cs11 was stolen from my car.

then i possibly made the most naive mistake of my life.

i found out that the Vaio CS31s model will be released and im stupidly assumed that sony would obviously fix such a glaring manufacturing fault like the fan issue, so i bought the laptop.

To my amazament, while the froggy, scratching sound disappeared the fan still kicks in constantly, and is basically on at around 80% of the time, which in no way is an acceptable standard and benchmark.

Solution:

I sent the Vaio 3 times to the service centre in germany, while dealing with their support team in dublin. first two times the vaio returned with new fan, appologetic note and wiping cloth, much like another users experience here.

Both times there was no improvement to the fan frequency.

send it third time and a note comes back that NO PROBLEM DETECTED.

Now sony claims they there is no issue, no refund even though i even emailed them recording of the fan noise and frequence which can not be ignored.

Its become an amazingly frustrating experience with sony and a major disappointment. I work in marketing and i cant believe that sony is willing to potentially damage their brand so much by such a pathetic attitude to this clear worldwide problem (they also claimed my problem, if it realy exists is isolated).

It is a very good thing that sony fianlly admitted there is a probelm with the CS 11 and 21 models, but clearly this extends to the CS31s model also. My fan is going crazy as i write this post and the comparisement to a vacum cleaner as mentioned by another user is not far off.

Im insisting to talk to supervisors of the customer service staff as i will not drop this case, mainly because of their arrogance which has really got on my nerves.

I urge everybody with this problem to keep fighting and use such forums, blogs and any medium where the world can find out how widespread this problem is.

Sooner or later Sony will be forced to adimit and fix this problem with all CS models, sadly by then a once great brand will have suffered considerable damage to its image, which could easily have been avoided.

Mark from Prague

 

Hi there, im interested in buying the Sony VAIO CS320DQ model. Do you guys think that this model will have the fan problem?

 

@EuroAussie

Hi EuroAussie (Mark), welcome to the cs thread. from your story the 3x/3xx CS series has also the annoying ON/OFF fan kicking problem. good to hear feedbacks to help others to decide in buying a cs laptop.

I hope there would be no 4x/4xx series of Sony CS in the future.

@ method91

At this point of time, i think you should avoid Sony CS IMO. why?
1. in coming months there will be new laptops arriving (launch of windows 7, and mobile core i7)
2. there are more good laptops in these price range.
3. the cs series has annoying issues. the fan noise was really stressful to deal with. (read the whole thread) unless youre really after the color like the pink and purple.

 

I have one other approach to make Sony take notice and fix this glaring CS issues.

As the fan is heating up and kicking in more frequently over the months it is starting to become a considerable safety issue, as the heating makes the laptop shut down and in worse case scenario potentially could make the laptop catch on fire.

If Sony is too arrogant to listen to the complaints of individual customers, having a serious safety concern is something they will be forced to address.

I have a good contact at the consumer safety board in the czech republic and they will be shortly taking a good look at it as they agree this is unaccaptable behaviour by Sony.

They could possibly force a recall which will address the problem on an indvidual level, but also be a PR disaster for Sony. But then, they've had plenty of opportunities to fix the problem and choose not to.

I urge everybody with the fan problem to contact your consumer safety board and express your concern about the safety of this product as I believe then Sony will start listening once they realise their precious brand image might be damaged on a mainstream level.

 

No, please dont buy the cs. I just saw a video from youtube and it seem that cs3 series are having the same issue as well. It looks like sony plan to keep replace the faulty fan to us until the warranty expires

 

I have a cs320 and it has the same issue, I am hoping that sony will fix it, I emailed them and I am waiting for a response

 

Ryo - are you able to post the link to the youtube video with the cs3 series having the same issue. i would like to forward it to sony customer service in europe as they claim my case is an isolated one.

 

my advice: keep your hands off all cs series!!!

i have cs31s and the same problems... i sended it in for second repair now

for me: never ever a sony laptop!!!

 

the new "overworked" fan is called A1754159A. i think that this week i'll get my vaio back from repair and i'll report you how this fan works. but i have little hope that this one will work well i'm very very frustrated... even if teh fan will work i'm fed up with sony vaio!

 

Yeah, luckly i still found it, this is excatly the same noise i had all these while. I doubt sony have a solution for this mess, since it also affect the cs3 series
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Tn2vzK_8P0

 

i googled up the part no, it is the part no for VGNCS385J. I hope this is the real solution.

 

i have my vaio back. i'm testing now how the new "overworked" fan works ... but i'm not very optimistic ... after 5 minutes the fan goes on and off now ... i'll report later.

 

i'll bring the vaio back today! same problems as bevore: fan is loud and goes on and off all teh time.

 

can you make a recording of the sound produced by the fan. our fan goes on and off all the time but no whirling and grrrrr sounds produced. i think all cs have fans, that go on and off every min. thats the main problem of cs. fan kicking on and off even if your just surfing the net. compared to my lenovo, i barely hear the fan, only the hard disk. dont know what the sony engineers are thinking when they designed it.

well today sony announced the Sony VAIO CW. well it should replaced the miserable CS.

 

i brought the vaio back today. was a little bit difficuld but in the end i got my mony back! so i can't make a recording, sorry. but the fan of my CS31S reacted exactly as you described, no matter if
A1563411A (which was original installed),
A1563411B (first repair),
or A1754159A (second repair; the new "overworked" fan) was installed. maybe sony should make a new improved bios version which could help also...? but anyways: i'll definitely keep my hands of sony vaio now!

kind regards, tina

 

im also thinking a bios update would fix the problem but it seems the bios has no control to the fan speed and sensitivity. this is the flaw. the engineers put a bios that doesnt fully control the laptop and wont accept customization in settings. then pairing it up with an unreliable cheap fan. looks like sony didnt implemented QA in their consumer laptops like the cs.

well, i congratulate you for having your money back. you can invest your money in a better laptop. and dont forget to take your homework before buying a laptop again. if you dont care about the looks and your aiming for reliability i can personally recommend lenovo. mine is a lenovo. their thinkpad series are popular among business executives and ceo wannabees like me. lol.

good luck and happy shopping.

 

thanks! i found a lenovo model which seems interesting to me: LENOVO Thinkpad SL500 PERFORMANCE-GIGANT. so i'll do my homework now

 

I wanted to post an update from a while ago. I had the original chirp/buzzing sound and after 3 replacement fans, the 4th finally fixed the issue.

At least it did for about 4 months.

While the new fan doesn't have the chirping sound at spin up/down, when it's on, it makes a loud buzz that makes it sound like it's unbalanced. I sprayed air into the vents to clean out the dust but it's no use.

I'll contact Sony support again (like the 4th or 5th time now) and see about getting a replacement, again. I may just take it apart, again, and attempt to re-oil the fan myself.

Never again am I buying Sony. I have Dells from many years ago that are of higher quality. No more.

 

looks like the fan problem isn't solve yet, i already have my 4th fan working under my cs now which sony replaced on september, let see how it goes. But yeah, never ever buy a sony again, i used to like sony products but this issue turn me off big time.

 

just a note, see also if the brand of notebook has a service outlet in your country. some have different service policies which varies to what country you are in. some will make you pay for the shipping if your laptop is broke so take note of that also even if it has the warranty. this is important in buying a laptop, the ease and convenience of having it repaired. all gadgets with mechanical moving parts will eventually fail over time (e.g. harddisk, dvd drive) even if you care for it. good luck.

 

Qualex came out and replaced the fan in my laptop and it still starts and stops constantly,going to call sony again on monday when support opens again ...the laptop isn't even warm and the fan is turning on and off...I almost want an entirely different machine....I wish that I had known about the fan problem earlier I probably would've returned this computer

 

I contacted Sony e-support regarding a noisy fan on my CS-320J and received the following response:

"Thank you for contacting Sony Support.
I'm sorry that the Computer fan is making excessive noise. The Computer's fan may be running at a high speed to cool the CPU. By lowering the CPU speed, you also lower the speed and noise level of the computer's fan. Please use the power schemes to lower the CPU speed.
Thank you for being a valued Sony Customer.
The Sony Email Response Team"

Isn't this pretty lame to recommend that the CPU speed by reduced because the fan is inadequate?

 

Hi exactly mine aw laptop doing same it's freaking horrible sound of that fan and I cannot stand it as well it has something to do with chipset drivers as well and they set that cpu will be overclocked even when is in idle mode ..about 3 or 4%
mine goes up and down ..from 2900 and something to 3080 something like that and fan soundit horrible ... I hate it ..
I will not bothered if I will hear just air only ... but there is added note sound of fan disghusting ..

 

I had the same problem with the fan a couple months after I bought it. I always thought the fan was loud and the constant swirl every 20 secs was extremely annoying but not to an unbearable state. 3 months after I purchased the laptop, the fan was so loud it sounded like a stone got stuck in it. Instead of the usual swirl, it started grinding every 20 secs.

So I sent it back to SONY and they replaced the fan. Came back without the horrendous grind but it went back to its usual self; loud as compared to the other computers I previously had. Since SONY replaced the old fan for a completely new one, it seems to me that the fan itself is just generally noisy. My warranty has already expired so I'm thinking of taking it to a local repair shop and see if I can get any advise but I think this may be the way it was built and there are no other ways to change that =/

I have to turn up my music all the time so I don't hear the fan. Sometimes I just want to throw my CS out the window and put a mac pro on my credit card.

 

your cs laptop is entitled with extended warranty for the fan only. dont try to take it t local shops. take a look at the announcement at your regional sony website.

 

lol. nice advice from their customer support. they should have told us all before to buy an atom powered netbook than the sony cs if that is their reasoning. bring the laptop to a sony center and tell them the noisy fan. save yourself from stress.