Suggested Laptop Coolers for Z11?

Hey,

Just wanted to hear what Z11/Z12 owners are using for laptop coolers and if they actually make a significant difference (i.e. lowering GPU temps by 3 degrees Celsius)

Thanks!

 

As the Z's exhaust is on the side, make sure you don't get one that sucks in air on the side, or you'll just recirculate hot air.
And that, I'm afraid, excludes around 90% of the notebook coolers on the market.

 

I had a similar idea that getting a notebook cooler might be wise after seeing my new vaio z's gpu temps hit 90C when playing Fallout 3. Interestingly, apart from the keyboard getting a bit warm around the WASD keys and a lot of fan noise, there doesn't seem to be any performance hit at this temperature, i.e. no stuttering or crashes etc. so far due to the video card overheating.

After reading this thread http://forum.notebookreview.com/accessories/304671-notebook-coolers-buyers-guide.html I decided to go for the Zalman NC1000, which looks like it will be slightly too big but should have decent cooling performance.

An alternative in the Zalman range is the NC1500 mini which they state is for notebooks up to 12", however the dimensions seem quite well suited to the vaio z.

The Zalman range appears to blow air upward into the laptop, which I believe will complement the Z's usual fan operation.

I am hoping to get delivery on Monday, and will see what difference it makes using the NC1000. Based on the reviews linked in the thread above, I'm hoping to see max and average temperature drops in the 6-10C range, as I'm a little uncomfortable having the gpu running at 90C for extended periods.

 

@Gunn Ah I had no idea that thread existed! Thanks for the heads up.

I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the Zalman cooler. I've OCd my gpu to 630/830 and it's highest temps have been around 86C while gaming. I've seen my temps at 90 only when benchmarking. But I agree that I too would feel uncomfortable with a hot gpu for extended periods.

 

Funny thing is that I didn't realise the gpu was getting that hot for a long while - I did fire up gpu-z once or twice after quitting out from FO3 (very short time delay, i.e. under 30 seconds), and the temp would always register at mid-70's.

It was only when I ran gpu-z in the background and then looked at the log that I saw the peaks at 90C.

The base cooling of the Z seems very good, as the temperatures come down very quickly once the gpu load is removed. Additionally, its quite hot now and I suspect that the ambient temperature of the room itself is adding to the max temp - When I got my Z in early May, I was often seeing idle temps of high 40s / low 50s but in the current weather I rarely see the gpu temp go below 60C.

I suspect that the gpu and cpu in the Z can easily take 90C even for extended periods, with the biggest problem I've noticed so far being that the keyboard under the WASD keys feels hot to touch. I've seen no artefacting or other signs of gpu heat stress to date, so I have no reason to believe that any damage is being done at these temperatures.

Once I get my cooler, and if the temps do drop by 10C or so under stress, I will try OC'ing to see what the practical gains are (i.e. FPS in actual games rather than academic benchmarks) and whether OC'ing causes temperature rises.

From what I've seen with my Z so far, I suspect that mid-80s temperatures are absolutely fine even for extended periods.

 

Tried out the Zalman NC1000 for my vaio z, following initial thoughts:

- The NC1000 has a larger footprint than the z, but not overpoweringly so. The cooler has a bit too much depth, but width wise it feels fine. As I only intend to use the cooler on a desk when the laptop is on ac power, the size doesn't bother me. The cooler also angles the laptop and raises the back, which improves the typing position a little imo.

- The grilled area where air is blown out is not much smaller than the Z footprint, which makes me think that the cooling is as good as it can be with this type of cooler. I was wondering about getting the nc1500-mini instead of the nc1000, which I think would have been a much better fit footprint wise, however I'm glad I went for the slightly larger nc1000 as it has 2 fans vs. 1 for the 1500mini as well as a grill area that is probably better for cooling purposes.

- the cooler is virtually silent at the lowest fan setting, but definitely audible at the highest one. However, it should be noted that the vaio z fan at full blast is louder than the cooler at full blast. I tend to use earphones, so don't notice the noise however

- the build quality is good, the zalman feels nice and sturdy. I got mine in black, which complements the premium carbon finish on my z.

In terms of performance:

My current ambient temperatures are high, due to the summer weather and no air conditioning in my flat. To give an idea of how hot, I am current using a tower fan close to my desk continuously when using my laptop, even late in the evening.

With that proviso, the temperatures I'm seeing for the 330m using gpu-z are as follows:

No cooler: Idle temperatures with very light usage (firefox browser with multiple tabs but no streaming video, gpu-z open, fraps in the background, plus other standard background applications including kaspersky) hover around 63-65C

With cooler, and the same set up, I'm seeing temperatures around 57-59c.

Closing firefox with the cooler fan on drops the temperatures down to 48C, so I have no idea what firefox is doing to cause such load (gpu-z is reporting <5% gpu load with firefox up)

With moderate firefox load, e.g. watching a full screen youtube video at either 720p or 1080p, I'm seeing a gpu-z reported temp in the mid-60s with cooler, and low to mid-70s without the cooler.

I've so far tried Fallout 3 using the cooler, as it seems to be a game that makes my z run quite hot in the current weather.

Without cooler, the gpu-z max temp spikes at about 90 - 91C. The temp gets to this level very quickly (<10 mins playtime) but extended use does not seem to raise the max temperature beyond this level. There doesnt appear to be performance degredation during gameplay, so I don't believe that the card is being downclocked. However, its possible that there is some downclocking as I do see framerates generally staying at 50-60+ but sometimes getting down to low 30s. However, this could also be caused by extra load in certain cells. Once the game is terminated, temperatures fall back to 'idle' levels very quickly.

With cooler, the max temps seem to be around 85-87C. Generally speaking, the keyboard area still feels hots around WASD and on the metal on the left hand side of the keyboard just above the palm rest. I can definitely see why sony went with plastic for the palm rest now, as an aluminium finish here would get too hot to be comfortable. As it is, even running at these temperatures, the keyboard is not uncomfortable.

My gut feeling is that the cooling would be markedly better if ambient temperatures were lower. However, even as its stands, I find a max temp of 86C to be preferable to one of 91C. At 91C, I would expect that its running close to the zone where hardware downclocking might be expected to start kicking in. At 86C, its still hot but I don't think its running into danger zone territory.

On balance, my initial thoughts are positive about the nc1000. I was hoping for a bit more temp reduction under full load, but as noted the ambient temperature is probably the culprit here rather than the efficacy of the cooler itself. I paid £31 for mine, plus about £6 for delivery. I'm sure its possible to get this cheaper, however I wanted mine asap once I realised I was getting temps over 90C.

 

I would suggest this: Speaker Lapdesk N700

 

The reason firefox and other non-gpu intensive apps are raising your gpu temp is that by design the cpu and gpu are sharing the thermal solution. Anything cpu intensive (flash) will still have some effect on GPU temps...and vice versa.

 

@Gunn, Excellent thorough review of the Zalman! Thanks for the details. I'm still unsure on what to purchase but your insights certainly have given me some perspective on what to expect.

I too would feel more relieved with my GPU temps at 86 rather than 90+, so coolers certainly have some kind of effect.