Vaio Pro 13: The quest for silence thread!

Hello happy users of the noisy pro 13.

If like me you think this machine is perfect EXCEPT for this noise issue, here is a thread to start working on it and maybe figure it out thanks to an amazing program named Notebook Fan Control.

Now we can complain forever and wait for a fix from SONY (most of the time, they never do such fixes), or we can work on a solution ourselves.

So, I've started to work on the software and try to understand how it works.

First you need to download it here: http://goo.gl/3POBA9 (in the release folder).

Then, the hard part: You need to figure out how to make a profile for our SONY SVP 13.

In the "tools+doc" folder you'll find a "Notebokk FanControl - user manual.pdf" I spent an hour on it, and I don't really understand what I've done, but here's the theory.

With a software named "Read & Write" ( RW - Read & Write ) you'll look at values that are changing when the fan is of and when the fan kick in (using a cpu burner software like prime95).

Here are my fvalues fan nearly off:



Fan super noisy (after 5 minutes of prime95):



Now we need to look for what values have changed. Here they are:



Now, according to the NoteBook FanControl guide, we should be able to change the values manually in "Read & Write" and see if the fan kick in at a certain stable speed. If you find what value to change, to change the fan speed, you're done. Then you just have to input this value in NetBook FanControl and the software will be able to control the fan.

My experience: I've tryied to change the values, but it doesn't stick. as soon as I change one, it goes back to its original state.

So here I am guys, it seems I'm not good enough to figure it out, and I ask for your help.

Thank you very much!

PS: I have a i5 with 8GB of RAM and 128 GB SSD (and W7).

Update:

I hadn't paid attention, but when I click on the EC button View attachment 99691 like asked in the pdf tutorial, I've got this:

View attachment 99690

Anyone with the same error? (Windows 7 x64)

 

I'm all for a fix, but isn't this something that needs a fix via the bios?

 

No, we can do it manually with this software. As you can see in the "config" folder, there are already config files for SONY netbooks. So this should work!

 

Fantastic post guilamu!!

Only wish I had the ability to further assist finding a solution. Altering the minimum fan speed to a higher RPM in effort to avoid/limit the fan running at max RPM could be huge.

thanks!!

 

Yes, this is the whole point of this thread. It doesn't seems that hard to accomplish, I'm quite confident someone is going to figure it out soon ^^

 

Great idea and great beginning of a difficult work. I really hope that this creative approach will turn out to solve the fan noise issue! I will also add that I am a bit optimistic, if all of you who have the technological knowledge can contribute.

Keep up the good work! And please keep us informed during the process!

Thanks a lot!

 

Do you suppose that the varying opinions on how bothersome the fan noise is may be a function of users with laptops having different configurations experiencing different fan speeds?? For instance, different configurations (i5 v. i7) I assume result in different demands/cooling requirements.

I wonder if Sony adjusts RPM of the 'minimum fan speed' depending upon which configuration (hardrive, memory, operating system) is purchased?

Odd thought I supppose, but I assume this would be possible, perhaps even preferred to do so.

 

No clue, the only way to know that would be to have two vaio pro (one i5 and one i7) and compare. Or we could also compare our "Read & Write" screenshots. FYI, I have a i5.

 

Indeed, now all we need is some with an i7. Would be very interested to see what the results of such a comparsion would be.

 

Nice thread. I was thinking of having a go at this myself a while ago, but I found that greasing the fan shaft (after a thorough cleaning, of course), quietened my fan quite a bit.

Be careful what values you change. If in doubt, ask for advice - here or elsewhere - before doing it. There are no safeguards in the embedded/ assembly language world; everything is on you.

 

I am not sure if you looked at the right place using R/W Everything because I noticed there is a battery P/N (VGP-BPS38) which is usually hard coded in battery eeprom and can be accessed via smbus.
I doubt fan controller data has that battery part number.

 

Oh, maybe you're right. Strange thing though, is that a lot of stuff are changing when running Prime95 and going back to their previous state when stopping it.

 

I hadn't paid attention, but when I click on the EC button like asked in the pdf tutorial, I've got this:



Anyone with the same error? (Windows 7 x64)

 

Hi. Sorry to hear that Sony seems having same bad quality control considering fan noise as ASUS and most other vendors (I thought that was resolved with haswell TDP...) I did not went for Sony but cheaper Asus with AMD platform (U38n). But I have same issue with to high fan noise in idle, and trying the method with RW and NoteBookFanControl. I'd think managed to modify correct register values in RW for my model (I can e.g. turn off the fan), but however within a few seconds the values revert to original settings (I think it is due to ACPI windows driver?)

I do unfortunately not have any insight on he register address for Vaio Pro

Another method would be to download he BIOS file from Sony (if possible?) and try to edit it using some BIOS editor. Should be easier on Intel than on AMD - not yet figured out on U38n Asus.

 

It's nice to see some people did manage do locate the right register to change their fanspeed.

No problem, thanks for your input.

Yep, would be a nice one, but it's totally out of my range of expertise...

 

I have an i5, 8gb, 256gb ssd, touchscreen and the oem operating system. CPU idles at 45c and peaks at 65c when playing hd videos. It seems to run pretty quiet unless the cpu is being tasked. I noticed that Windows 8 starts the "automatic maintenance" when it's idle and the cpu/temps shoot up. I disabled the "automatic maintenance" completely because it never seems to finish. It has a scheduled task to run on idle AND on a fixed schedule (non-idle).

How To Disable Windows 8 Automatic Maintenance Or Change Its Time

 

maybe i'm just too stupid but where can i find this user manual pdf?

UPDATE:

jip i was too stupid. just found it on the sky-drive...

 

Hehe, no problem, I hope you come up with something!

 

I'm possibly going to get a Pro 13 with an i5, could someone enlighten me as to the overall problem here and when it is apparent? Thanks

 

problem is that sony has implemented a rather strange cooling policy. they removed the way to control the cooling policy through windows8 directly. instead they supply a tool inside their "vaio care" manager. the policy inside this manager activates "active cooling" aka the fan when the cpu reaches a very low 50degree celsius. this is just above the normal operating level of the cpu at around 40degree celsius. so if you start watching videos on youtube at around 10% cpu the fan starts making disturbing noise. word is that the macbook air 2013 that uses the same cpu starts the fan at around 70degree celsius if i remember right. at the moment some people here are trying to figure out how to overwrite the cooling policy by sony as they have not supplied a fix for this problem yet.

 

Would a clean windows 7 install fix this problem?

 

I did a Windows 7 clean install, it did not changed anything about the noise.

 

have you tried to change the system cooling policy to passive like described here: How does "System cooling policy" function work? ?

 

Interesting, I only have balanced (active), high performance, and power saver, I can't seem to change the active vs passive on my vaio

 

Sony utility VAIO Control center has this configuration.
Maybe you should wait for sustaining BIOS update will release soon....

 

Still no passive vs active in vaio control center

 

It should be the power managerment performance option in VCC, It is defined in BIOS thermal policy.
Unfortunately there is no more interface for end user to custom their thermal policy.

 

This is all I have for my VCC



? I checked in details, but it only takes me to the control panel and using advanced power settings still yields no active vs passive.

 

Is there a massive Bios update planned?

 

Allright guys, I think I might have a small breakthrough here. I just looked through the Sony Vaio folders, and found a small app that, when running, it will put the fan to 100%. Now, why does this matter? Because everything we need lies in that .exe file! That program can, somehow overwrite the fan settings, and thus set the cpu to a fixed speed. This means that, if we can edit that .exe file, we could make a small app, that will set the fan to something quiet, like 50% when we need silence.

Unfortunately, I have absolutly no experience in hex editing, so I was hoping that some of you had experience there, it should be relatively simple to change a single number.

 

whats the name of the exe file?

 

FDU.exe

C:\Program Files (x86)\Sony\VAIO System Diagnostic\CPU Fan Diagnostic

 

Well, if no solution has turned up in 10 darys, I will be returning this notebook I'm afraid.

 

This seems quite promising, I hope someone will come up with a solution now! (an I'll try myself this afternoon)

 

there might also be the option to write a special cooling policy. i looked through some windows api pages and even found cooling policy entries in the registry. but it looks like the windows cooling policy tool on the command line does not let us set the options regarding the fan manually so i guess visual studio or some registry trickery is needed to go any further.

im also going to look into the exe file later. hope this finally solves the only problem i have with this notebook so far.

 

so i took a look at the binary yesterday and it should contain the solution somewhere. due to the usage of a windows-gui and me being not a windows developer at all i got lost in api-calls using ida and ollydbg. also i have the feeling that some anti-debugging voodoo is going on in this binary. today in the morning i discovered apimonitor which should finally allow me to find the calls to enable/disable the fan in this binary but i did not have the time to go any further. so if any of you is searching for a good api-call-tracer API Monitor: Spy on API Calls and COM Interfaces (Freeware 32-bit and 64-bit Versions!) | rohitab.com is probably what you are looking for.
has anybody looked at snyutils.dll yet? it seems like it also contains some functions to speak with the hardware and it is used by FDU.exe too.
i plan to take another look at fdu.exe after work today.

 

Okay, since I'm totally out of use here (sorry) I'll just say a big "Thank you!" and wish you the best of luck for you afterwork reseach!

 

Nice! Unfortunately I neither have the knowledge nor skills to assist you there. However I do understand that it takes a huge effort to pull this through, and I think that it should be rewarded. So allow me to be the first to pledge 50 bucks to whoever makes that fan silent at low to medium temps. My only requirement is that the solution shouldn't void the warranty, so a software solution would be preferable.

I encourage everyone else to do the same, plegde af few bucks to the guy who sacrifies time for all of our benefits.

 

I can't pledge that much, but I'll spare 5 bucks too (via Paypal).

 

5 bucks from me as well

 

20 bucks from me and 20 from my friend.

 

So i made some promising progress yesterday. using apimonitor i found out that my guess at snyutils.dll was right and that FDU.exe indeed uses it to communicate with the fan-driver. i identified the addresses of the calls to snyutils.dll and then loaded FDU.exe into ollydbg. after some playing i found out that after 4 calls into snyutils the fan is started. i don't know yet what the calls are really doing but after inserting some Nop's on the calls i had a temporary FDU.exe that is only using the counter and telling the fan to be quiet but not start it in the first place. So the next step is to find out what arguments get passed to the synutils functions and then write a proof of concept code using these calls and not using the gui at all. after that we should have a binary that tells the fan to go quiet. the holy grail on this project would be to find out how to set the temperature threshold for using passive cooling over active cooling. blindly shutting of the fan could work against the noise but maybe also damage the cpu.
so back to the work after work

 

You sir, is a hero! And we're up to 100 bucks, great all!

Perhaps we can use the Core Temp files to know how it reads the temps? THen we can just write our own thresholds for the fan, like 40-70 = barely spinning, 70-80 = a bit noisy, and 80< = Full steam ahead!

Even if that doesn't work, fan or not, the CPU will downclock itself to remain below 75 degrees no matter what, so passive should still work while not being optimal. Even when heavily stress testing (Gaming, rendering, and Prime) I'm not able to press the CPU to more than 81 degrees before it immediatly downclocks and settles in the low 70s. That downclock is rediculus early, so Sony/Intel got our backs.

 

10 dollar or LTC (litecoin) Already returned mine (because of annoying 50 degrees fan noise)

 

Hows things going with this - has anyone managed to make any further progress?

 

New BIOS with fan managment improvements online!

Sony : Mises à jour pour SVP1321C5E | Télécharger des mises à jour pour SVP1321C5E | SVP1321C5E

Since I'm using Windows 7, I can't really tell if it's better (at least I can tell it's not worst) since I have no "silent mode". Can anyone try it with Windows 8 and report please?

FYI, officials Windows 7 drivers will be online on Sony's website at the end of the month.

And there is also an all new wireless driver: http://www.sony.fr/support/fr/product/SVP1321C5E/downloads/EP0000306999_8876

 

Have replied in the main thread. New BIOS makes little or no difference to fan management and noise at low CPU temps.

 

So, this is it, I suppose? We're just going to accept the noise

 

Hello,
I have a noisy Vaio X and I wished I had sold it right away after realizing the noise will not go away and will be bothering me for the next years, every day, every hour, every hour. The longer you keep the computer, the more you get "attached" to the thing that is annoying you (it's like humans..).
Having been "burnt" by a wrong decision with regard to nois, Iam now doing extensive research before buying a new one, with silence as a priority.
So, as blasphemous as it may sound, I encourange everyone to
- tell sony in a quick support ticket that you will never buy a Sony again unless it gets good reviews in terms of noise emissions. sony have a history of not caring about noise.
- consider selling your notebook if you can afford it. you can buy a (briefly) used notebook as a replacement so it's no financial loss.
- when a professional reviewer misses the fact that a laptop is noisy, by either not mentioning, or by giving too good grades on this, or by not testing adequately, send them a note that they mislead you in your buying decision. ; ask reviewers to give more attention to noise, in general (often left out)
- also consider that loud keyboards can be just as annoying, especially to others in the same room. this is seldom mentioned in reviews.
- don't trust reviews that only give emission data on "full load" and "idle", like notebookcheck. that's not real life. i hope they change this.
- look into possibilies that enable you to transfer your OS installation "with a click" to a new, different, replacement PC. that way, you are no longer tied to a buying decision, when a problem arises (like noise, or whatever is getting on your nerves.)

 

This thread has been inactive for some time now, but I don't think that this is because its addressed noise problems have been solved. (Many recent reviewers and posts from users still bring reports from such problems.) Also, the whining noise from the screen has been mentioned again recently.

When the Windows 8,1 soon to be officially available later i October, perhaps there will be a refresh or re-iteration of the Sony Vaio Pro both 11 and 13 also?

I hope that this expected refresh now at last will bring us flawless machines with regard to the different noise problems, and also the WiFi issue and the other issues that have come to our knowledge in various forums and reviews.