[wooza]

hey there, I am running an Acer Aspire 1600 laptop. Fairly old I know but it's been an absolute dream up until now, and is still super fast considering its age. The problem is it works fine for about an hour then randomly turns its self off and won't boot up again until after an hour or so. I'm pretty sure this is pointing to over heating because the bottom of the laptop gets very warm when in use, and the fans come on excessively and loudly. i have checked the intake grills round the side of the laptop but i cannot see any build up of dust. I have also ran a program called speed fan which is supposedly meant to tell the temp of the CPU and HDD, but the temps shown by speed fan were normal, and the laptop still turned off. I wanted to get inside the laptop to see if the heatsink or fans are clogged up with dust, but I tried for long time to open the case but i cant get in. Does any one have any suggestions? Am I right about it over heating? Or is it another problem? Just last week I reformatted windows to see if I had a virus of some sort but the problem still occurs with a clean install.

Any suggestions will be welcome, and I'm sure very helpful
Cheers

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You can buy a can of compressed air in a computers shop and blow through the inlets/outlets. Do this several times to make sure everything is clean. You can even blow air with your mouth but there is a chance that dust, blown from the other side, will dirty you.

When using the computer try to create a space between the bottom of the computer and the top of the table. You can use a book for that. Just make sure not to block the vents at the bottom.

Download Everest from the link in my list of programs below. Click on Computer and then on Sensor. Leave the program open and run a scan with your Antivirus program. After 10-15 minutes look in Everest for cpu, motherboard and hard disk temperatures. Please write them down.

[The Skeptic]

You can buy a can of compressed air in a computers shop and blow through the inlets/outlets. Do this several times to make sure everything is clean. You can even blow air with your mouth but there is a chance that dust, blown from the other side, will dirty you.

When using the computer try to create a space between the bottom of the computer and the top of the table. You can use a book for that. Just make sure not to block the vents at the bottom.

Download Everest from the link in my list of programs below. Click on Computer and then on Sensor. Leave the program open and run a scan with your Antivirus program. After 10-15 minutes look in Everest for cpu, motherboard and hard disk temperatures. Please write them down.

[wooza]

Hey thanks for the response I have blown the intake/outlets and I couldn't see much dust at all. I never keep the bottom of the laptop completely flat to a surface, I always prop it up to make sure air can enter and exit. I have now ran an antivirus test using AVG, whilst running everest sensor in the back ground. The starting temps for my fujitsu D: temp was 38degrees/100F, CPU was 23degrees/73F. After about 10-15 mins the D: temp went up to 42degrees/106F. There are no other temperatures available to see. I may not though that pretty much from turning the Laptop on, the fan/s are running constantly. What next?

Edited by wooza, 01 January 2008 - 12:33 PM.

[The Skeptic]

The recorded temperatures look very good. At the same time, your description in post no. 1 do indicate to high temperature. Try to run your computer as you always do, keeping Everest open. Record the temperatures after about an hour of runnung the computer.

What is drive D? is it your hard disk? Where is your OS installed?

[wooza]

Just after I posted the last post, the Laptop turned itself off. I would say from start to finish it was on for 20 mins, with the fan on constantly. I dont think it would run for an hour. The fujitsu D is my hard drive I presume. That and CPU are the only two temps available on Everest. What do you mean by where is my OS installed? It's installed on my laptop, on my Hard disk. I am only running one Hard disk

[The Skeptic]

Usually, by default, the operating system is installed on C.

There can be many reasons for the shutoff but your description indicates to overheating (the sense that the computer is very hot, the full speed fan). In many computers there is an extra sensor that reads the motherboard temperature. It is very possible that the problem of your computer is there. To make a brief, general, hardware test please do the following:

download Sandra XII from the link my signature. Install and run it. Click Tools and then Burm-In Computer. Click the green arrow key and choose Make Choices and generate Report. Check all the items in the list and click the green arrow. Now choose Run for a Time Period and set it to 30 minutes (that's very short for a hardware test and I hope the computer will run that long). Leave all the other parameters as they are. Keep clicking the green arrow and create a report. Save it to your desktop and attach it to your next post.

Edited by The Skeptic, 01 January 2008 - 01:31 PM.

[wooza]

Hey I downloaded Sandra III and did the burn in. Throughout the 30 mins the CPU temp was around 20degrees and the HDD was around 37-38degrees. I have added the report below. However about 30 mins after this the laptop turned off. I put a fan near the laptop and turned it back on and the cpu temp was 52degrees and there was a red flame icon indicating high temperatures. Any suggestions?

***** Start of Report *****
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

<<< >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CPU Core Power: 81W (Min 81W; Avg 81W; Max 81W)
Error: No environment monitors detected!

<<< Processor Arithmetic >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


<<< Processor Multi-Media >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


<<< Power Management Efficiency >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


<<< File Systems >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Error: 3.5" 1.44MB (A:) @ FUJITSU MHS2040AT D 40GB
(ATA100, 2MB Cache) : Cannot obtain drive
information; check that a disk is in the
drive and it is correctly formatted.

<<< Physical Disks >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Error: FUJITSU MHS2040AT D 40GB (ATA100, 2MB Cache)
(C:) : Write Performance : Disk must be empty
to be write-benchmarked.

<<< Removable Storage >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Error: 3.5" 1.44MB (A:) @ FUJITSU MHS2040AT D 40GB
(ATA100, 2MB Cache) : Cannot obtain drive
information; check that a disk is in the
drive and it is correctly formatted.
Error: 3.5" 1.44MB (A:) @ FUJITSU MHS2040AT D 40GB
(ATA100, 2MB Cache) : Cannot obtain drive
information; check that a disk is in the
drive and it is correctly formatted.

<<< CD-ROM and DVD >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Error: MATSHITA UJDA740 DVD/CDRW (ATAPI33, 24x CD-R,
24x CD-W, 3x DVD-R, 512kB Cache) (D:) : Read
Performance : Cannot obtain drive information;
check that a disk is in the drive and it is
correctly formatted.

<<< Memory Bandwidth >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


<<< Memory Latency >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


<<< Cache and Memory >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


<<< Network Performance >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Error: MSHOME : No hosts detected! : Could not
obtain the IP address of the host.
Error: WORKGROUP : No hosts detected! : Could not
obtain the IP address of the host.

<<< >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CPU Core Power: 81W (Min 81W; Avg 81W; Max 81W)
Error: No environment monitors detected!

<<< Processor Arithmetic >>>
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[The Skeptic]

52 degrees for the cpu of a laptop is not too high. By your description of the flame I understand that you you use SpeedFan. SpeedFan will show the flame if real temperature is higher then set temperatures. For example, you can set tmp to 20 degrees and have the flame showing up in 25 degrees. For this and other reasons I don't use SpeedFan (which is quite popular) but Everest.

All along this thread we assume that the temperature is too high because of the symptoms described in your first post, but this is not necessarilly the case. Please do the following:

1: Enter BIOS and see if cpu temperature is shown there. If yes, see if you can set the temperature in which the computer will automatically switch off. Set it to 75 degrees C.

2: Download from the link in my signature Microsoft's Memory Diagnostic Tool. Make a bootable CD, boot the computer with the cd in place and run the test at least for an hour. Please report if there were any errors and if the computer shut itself.

3: From this link download Fujitsu's hard disk diagnostic tool (Windows Diagnostic Tool Ver. 1.0 For IDE/ATA Hard Drives) and run a comprehensive test. Please report if there were any errors and if the computer shut itself.

[pyrocajun2707]

It sounds like your RAM might be going out. Try to download a program called MemTest. I forgot where to download it, but it allows you to stress your CPU, your RAM, and both at one time. Run all three tests and see if there are any calculation errors. It seriously could be bad RAM.

If it's not the RAM and you feel comfortable taking your laptop apart, try to get to the motherboard and check the capacitors. If some of them are bulging or leaking... well... It's probably time for a new laptop.

[wooza]

hey cheers for the replies guys. I have changed the temp in the bios as suggested and this seems to have done the trick. So far it hasn't turned its self off and I've had it on for nearly 3 hours.

However there is one small problem, my @ key is now my " key and vice versa. What in the [bleep] could have caused the two keys to operate each other???

cheers again