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    Sony Vaio Heating Problem

    Discussion in 'VAIO / Sony' started by dcraigdc, Mar 17, 2011.

  1. dcraigdc

    dcraigdc Newbie

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    Hi all,

    My girlfriend's Vaio has been making horrible sounds for the past 2-3 months which to me sounds like a duff fan or hard-drive, it whirs loudly then stops, then whirs loudly then stops and so on. In addition the screen keeps flickering, which is not a problem I've encountered before on a laptop. It seems to be fine when it's been off for a while but after a lot of running the problems start up again, so it feels like a heat or fan issue. I got her to run a diagnostic on temperature and got the following:

    CPU
    Intel Mobile Core 2 Duo T6400 @ 2.00GHz 55 °C

    Motherboard
    Sony Corporation VAIO (N/A) 48 °C

    Graphics
    Nvidia Defaul (1280x800@60Hz)
    256MB GeForce 9300M GS (Sony) 50 °C

    Hard Drives
    313GB Hitachi Hitachi HTS543232L9SA00 (SATA) 37 °C

    I'm aware that processors can run to 90 degrees upwards but these seem higher than is normal to me. Not being an expert on this I thought I would check. I know the noises are a known issue, I've searched a lot and everybody just seems to say "take it apart and blow the dust out", but that doesn't really seem to work and nobody really has a definitive answer as to what's causing this.

    The other thing I thought of doing was getting her to run a diagnosis using Speedfan to see what that throws up in case that's wrecked and she needs a replacement part.

    Any help or advice anyone could offer on this issue would be greatly appreciated.
     
    dcraigdc, Mar 17, 2011
    #1
  2. namaiki

    namaiki "basically rocks" Super Moderator

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    Those temps are quite normal for a laptop. Does that laptop have switchable/hybrid graphics?
     
    namaiki, Mar 17, 2011
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  3. dcraigdc

    dcraigdc Newbie

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    It's a GeForce 9300M so Google tells me hybrid...
     
    dcraigdc, Mar 17, 2011
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  4. namaiki

    namaiki "basically rocks" Super Moderator

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    It might be safer to search the model of the notebook. Some models with GeForce 9300M are hybrid and some are not.

    Anyway, disabling nVidia PowerMiser should hopefully fix the flicker issue, but it will dramatically increase heat/reduce battery life if the laptop is not a hybrid graphics model.

    You could also try older drivers. Perhaps the one that came with the system, if you aren't going to be gaming, etc.
     
    namaiki, Mar 17, 2011
    #4
  5. ota-con

    ota-con Notebook Deity

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    What model is it?
     
    ota-con, Mar 17, 2011
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  6. dcraigdc

    dcraigdc Newbie

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    It's the CS21, not sure which model, possibly the S/P.

    I guess the flicker is the partial worry, but the more the whirring continues, the more performance issues there are. It's shut itself down a few times and randomly restarted as well. It's definitely not a virus issue and it's not a software issue as I've wiped the disk and reset everything previously which didn't solve the problem, so it's got to be a hardware issue, all of which led me towards the fan, but not really sure...
     
    dcraigdc, Mar 17, 2011
    #6