Thinkpad Fan Noise Problem: Light at the End of the Tunnel

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Zeitgeist · #91 Post by **Zeitgeist** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 12:15 pm

Shimodax wrote:
Zeitgeist wrote:Sorry for my ignorance, but how can I set the .ini file to "active=1 "to allow program to modify ?
As described in the Readme.

Right Click Fancontrol.ini, Open With, Notepad, change value, Save

Markus

Thanks for your patience, it works!

TimWang · #92 Post by **TimWang** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 12:53 pm

Has anyone tested what max. temp would be during basic word processing/wed browsing with fan disabled and undervolting with NHC? I tested my computer for 30 minutes and the temp seemed to get progressively higher and I stopped around 54. Does the temp just keep getting higher? In addition, when I ran a single CPU intensive program, temp spiked to 63 within 1 minute.

Aristotle11 · #93 Post by **Aristotle11** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 1:15 pm

I tested max temp with adaptive NHC undervolted to 0.7v 600MHz, 1.004v 1700MHz. Underclocked the ATI core/mem to 159/159 (the GPU gets hotter than the CPU).

Emailing, Word, Firefox, etc. My apartment is about 65 degrees F (18 C) and the temp never gets above 52 degrees C.

Hope this helps!
Aris

TimWang · #94 Post by **TimWang** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 1:38 pm

Wow! 52C! I didn't start undervolting but I did set fan level to 0 so it was off. After a while of more testing I found that under minimal CPU stress, temps seems to stop increasing at around 56. However, I was using firefox when I was testing and opened a PDF link. I'm not sure if other firefox users get this but the browser doesn't seem to work well with PDF links and sometimes, when exiting a PDF, the browser may crash.

I guess when firefox crashes, it puts the CPU on a constant loop and the temps reflected this. Within 30 seconds after my browser crashed, the program was reporting temps of, and I'm not kidding, 83C!!! I quickly used task manager to abort firefox and I changed the fan level to 7 and now temps are back down.

Not exactly sure what this is all about but I'm just posting my results.

DIGITALgimpus · #95 Post by **DIGITALgimpus** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 2:37 pm

If Firefox "crashes" the process dies, end of story. If you have talkback enabled, it will capture the stack, and ask you to transmit it back to the server. This is relatively quick though.

christopher_wolf · #96 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 2:38 pm

That is why I rarely, if ever, use the Adobe Acrobat Plugin with Firefox.

I use Foxit or the like, and I *always* download the *.pdf first.

pae77 · #97 Post by **pae77** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 2:49 pm

christopher_wolf wrote:That is why I rarely, if ever, use the Adobe Acrobat Plugin with Firefox.

Haven't had any problems since the latest Adobe update:

"The Adobe Acrobat 7.0.5 Professional Update will update Adobe® Acrobat® 7.0.0 - 7.0.3 Professional. This update provides new browser support for FireFox 1.0 and Mozilla 1.7. It also provides added support for Hebrew, Arabic, Thai and Vietnamese. The update also addresses known issues with forms and provides improved security. Adobe recommends all Acrobat users install this update."

They probably have released a similar update for those who use Adobe "Reader."

christopher_wolf · #98 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 2:52 pm

Are you sure this fixes the problem completely?
I remember updating to some version 7.0.x and it still had the same issues.

#99 Post by **Shimodax** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 3:13 pm

News from the German forum:

- if you disable temp. readings in NHC, it lives happily together with FC

- the fix in 1.04 seems to have fixed the issue, that upon starting the fan went to full speed before going off again.

Markus

ruthlessbrad · #100 Post by **ruthlessbrad** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 3:49 pm

Shimodax wrote:News from the German forum:

- if you disable temp. readings in NHC, it lives happily together with FC

Markus

Woo Hoo!!! I had to reboot my machine before the "Can't read Status" messages stopped showing up while running NHC.

Shimodax wrote: - the fix in 1.04 seems to have fixed the issue, that upon starting the fan went to full speed before going off again.

Markus

Are you referring to when you first turn on the laptop and the fan spins up to max speed? Mine still does that after installing v 1.04.

nrj45 · #101 Post by **nrj45** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 4:25 pm

@people who wants to make their thinkpad "fanless" by forcing the fan to be off :
If you don't want to fry your machine, check the checkbox "Use only multiplier #1 and voltage #1"in NHC so your cpu will stay at its low speed even under load. This avoids sudden high temps when a process eats 100% of cpu

christopher_wolf · #102 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 4:39 pm

Ehhh, I am not so crazy about shutting off the fan at the risk of increasing the temperature alot. All it takes is one uncontrolled spike and you could be in for a good deal of work. I have only tested level 0 so far, and I haven't ever kept the fan off for long periods of time; it is there for a reason. Either do what nrj45 said or simply leave it at level 1 or level 2 under a light load. For me, anything above Level 3 is what I would really notice. I have compared this to my T43's Normal (BIOS Controlled) Fan Behavior and have noticed little, if any, difference in the fan behaviour. Especially since the ambient temperature right now is around 18-19 degrees. Although it does come in very handy when I want to immediately take control of the Fan. I also, with a tiny amount of persuasion, got my friend to try this out on a T42; from what we both noticed, it appears the two have similar fan setttings for a given temperature sensor. It could be that it is paying attention to all the temperature sensors and is trying minmize the temperature in all of them at the same time. That would be the most likely reason for the fan to stay on for prolonged periods of time. I will experiment with it a bit more when I get some more time.

nrj45 · #103 Post by **nrj45** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 4:54 pm

Lol... actually my post was not directly addressed to you

... I was thinking about timwang ...

Of course i would also prefer the smart function

Cloud! · #104 Post by **Cloud!** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 5:20 pm

I've just tried the program, and it's great. The noise I hear from my TP is from the HD. Thank you for this awesome program.

I'm currently running with the fan off, an it's 45C, with an ambient temp around 18-20C

.

I'm also running NHC, but had to disable the temp reading, as it gave me the "Can't read Status".

Info:
Active= 1, Cycle= 5, FanBeep= 0 0
Levels= 50°C -> 0, 55°C -> 2, 58°C -> 5, 62°C -> 7

CPU 45°C (0x78)
APS 43°C (0x79)
X7A 35°C (0x7A)
GPU 43°C (0x7B)
BAT 32°C (0x7C)
BAT 28°C (0x7E)
XC0 38°C (0xC0)
XC1 45°C (0xC1)
XC2 44°C (0xC2)

The only thing I miss is, minimize to tray and while minimized showing temp. Or getting FanControl in NHC, but you're allready working on that.

Again thanks a lot.

#105 Post by **Shimodax** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 5:27 pm

Minimize to tray is in the makes. But temp. dispay in the tray is too complex, but I'll do some colors there.

Markus

#106 Post by **Shimodax** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 5:59 pm

New version.

Now with taskbaricon ... see comments in fancontrol.ini (MinimizeToSysTray and IconLevels).

Current Version: http://www.emtec.com/zzstuff/tpfancontrol_v014.zip
Previous Version: http://www.emtec.com/zzstuff/tpfancontrol_v013.zip
Previous Version: http://www.emtec.com/zzstuff/tpfancontrol_v012.zip

Source Code: http://www.emtec.com/zzstuff/tpfancontrolsource.zip (MS Visual Studio 6.0 project)

As always:

README.TXT updated in 2nd post of this thread (version changes, tested models, some adjustments etc.)

Please read the README.TXT before running the program for the first time. This is a bare bones tools with no bells or whistles (you'll need to modify the ini file to be able to access the function to turn chang the fan).

Also see the links section on the readme.txt for tech background.

If you want to discuss temperature settings, sensor locations etc. please use this thread: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=17733

Questions, suggestions, and reports of successful tests on various untested models (see readme) should be posted here.

Enjoy

Markus

ruthlessbrad · #107 Post by **ruthlessbrad** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 6:19 pm

I'm using FC version 0.13 and setting "Active=2" starts in Manual mode after booting and BIOS mode all other times. It never starts in Smart mode.

Aristotle11 · #108 Post by **Aristotle11** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 6:29 pm

"Active 2" starts me up into BIOS mode.

#109 Post by **Shimodax** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 6:34 pm

I knew that 13 was an unucky number

This should fix it:
Current Version: http://www.emtec.com/zzstuff/tpfancontrol_v014.zip

Markus

Tonic · #110 Post by **Tonic** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 6:53 pm

Shimodax, your program works perfectly on my system, finally my t43 can be quiet when its not doing anything. ps. I dont know if this is already implemented, but it is possible to have fancontrol to start minimized in tray?

christopher_wolf · #111 Post by **christopher_wolf** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 7:18 pm

Yup, latest version (v0.14) works fine; the ability to minimize to Tray Icon has been implemented in v0.14; Great Job Shimodax.

#112 Post by **Shimodax** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 7:23 pm

Tonic wrote: I dont know if this is already implemented, but it is possible to have fancontrol to start minimized in tray?

I'll add that in a later release.

Markus

Tonic · #113 Post by **Tonic** » Tue Nov 29, 2005 8:24 pm

Shimodax wrote:
Tonic wrote: I dont know if this is already implemented, but it is possible to have fancontrol to start minimized in tray?
I'll add that in a later release.
Markus

You are the best

I think this thread should get a Digg.

edit: http://digg.com/software/Thinkpad_Fan_N ... m_Solution

Jmmmmm · #114 Post by **Jmmmmm** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 1:04 am

Minimize to tray - awesome

I'm still getting errors with CHC, even with the temp readings turned off (both the hd and the cpu temp). Is there a special way of turning them off to get them both to work?

Jmmmmm · #115 Post by **Jmmmmm** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 1:05 am

whoopsie...it gave me an error message, must have been submitted anyway...ignore...

Jmmmmm · #116 Post by **Jmmmmm** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 1:06 am

clupid floropope (triple post - SORRY!!)

kw · #117 Post by kw » Wed Nov 30, 2005 1:36 am

@Shimodax: thank you so much for this program. Halfway I had a noise-solution by editing the "PWMPSDF.INI" of the energy-manager which works fine, but your fantool is perfect. Still go on for this and good luck!

greets
kw

Aristotle11 · #118 Post by **Aristotle11** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 2:36 am

New version works perfectly in Active mode 2. Thanks!

#119 Post by **Shimodax** » Wed Nov 30, 2005 4:44 am

kw wrote:Halfway I had a noise-solution by editing the "PWMPSDF.INI" of the energy-manager which works fine, but your fantool is perfect.

How exactly does that work? Do you have background info on that?

Markus

kw · #120 Post by kw » Wed Nov 30, 2005 5:50 am

It's not that kind of perfect thing you would expect.

The ini-file has a readable sourcecode you can edit with the texteditor. On top you can find the specs of the predefinied power scheme data offered by IBM. I simply created a new profile and combined cpu- and fan-speed in a way IBM doesn't, e.g. cpu=2 (medium), fan-speed=3 (slow) and OptiFanControl=3 (minimize fan sound). With that "office-mode" i have temperatures about 48°C and the sound of the fanlevel is 1-2 (HD-noise).

It's okay for me, but hypersensitive people who always prefer a "zero-solution" couldn't agree with that.

kw

Thinkpad Fan Noise Problem: Light at the End of the Tunnel

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