Thinkpads Forum

Ive had a few problem with my T60 overheating and shutting down, now im thinking of getting a good fan to keep it cool. Ive looked at a few cooling pads and found this one on amazon for pretty cheap.

Targus PA248u notebook chill pad

http://www.amazon.com/Targus-PA248U-Not ... 920&sr=8-2

What do you guys think? Any other suggestions particular to this situation?

It gets really hot on the top left area of the base btw.

Thanks

cl0ne wrote:Ive had a few problem with my T60 overheating and shutting down, now im thinking of getting a good fan to keep it cool. <snip>What do you guys think? Any other suggestions particular to this situation?

It gets really hot on the top left area of the base btw.

Thanks

I your fan running? The T60 fan is very quiet, sort of like a low "whoosh" but you should hear it come on from time to time, or run a lot when doing big jobs.

If the machine is shutting down due to heat, the fan might be broken.

I do not hear the fan at all but i do feel a very slight wind coming out from the fan holes, how can I really tell if the fan is broken?

http://staff-www.uni-marburg.de/~schmit ... 25beta.zip

Thinkpad fanctrol .. This is the new version and it rocks. keep in mind that this version starts automaticly in smart mode wich means it tunes your fan to run 1.000 rpm more than it is factory set wich means it reduces the lifetime of it.

Just choose BIOS mode if you are unsure and you can monitor temps and monitor how fast your fan is running.

The extra tune in the fan speed helped me to get my CPU temp from 92 C under VERY heavy load to about 75 C.

cl0ne wrote:I do not hear the fan at all but i do feel a very slight wind coming out from the fan holes, how can I really tell if the fan is broken?

A slight breeze from the vents near the ESC key is a good sign. The fan is very quiet, and not easy to hear. (a good thing when you want a silent machine).

My next step would be to go to ThinkPad Power Management and set everything to max performance, and listen for any changes in fan speed. Also, run some of the programs that have caused overheating and shutdown, and check for fan speed changes. You whould feel a definite change in the breeziness from the vent as fan speed increases in response to increased system heat output due to workload.

If the machine is shutting down due to overheating, perhaps one of the thermisters that senses heat on the CPU or GPU is not working, thus the failure to increase fan speed for proper cooling.

I assume you are not using any 3rd party overclocking or fan control programs that might be causing problems?

Also, you might want to download TPFancontrol version 1.8 (available somewhere on this site) to monitor fan speed and temperatures. It does not install, just run the .exe to start it up. At the default settings it will not change anythig, just monitor what you have going.

By the way, a separate cooling pad will not solve the real problem, it would just be a band aid.

I dled the TPFC v.41, is it better or the same than beta v. 25? I tried the different settings from 0-7, fan goes from 0 to 39xx+ rpm respectively and I could hear the difference. So im guessing my fan is working.

The shutting down thing happens mostly when im watching movies using VLC player bsplayer wmp, etc. How can I check if the sensors on my cpu is working properly?

Or anything that detects the heat properly? It also gets much hotter when I plug the AC adapter in.

When im just browsing around websites the temp on the GPU shot up to 91 f and cpu at 74 f using TPC v.41. Fan is over 3700 rpm. Is this normal?

cl0ne wrote:I dled the TPFC v.41, is it better or the same than beta v. 25? I tried the different settings from 0-7, fan goes from 0 to 39xx+ rpm respectively and I could hear the difference. So im guessing my fan is working.

The shutting down thing happens mostly when im watching movies using VLC player bsplayer wmp, etc. How can I check if the sensors on my cpu is working properly?

Or anything that detects the heat properly? It also gets much hotter when I plug the AC adapter in.

I have not run any of the thinkpad fan control versions you mentioned. Most likely those versions still have the ability to ignore various sensors by changing the .ini file. (instructions are there, within the .ini file). try setting the program to ignore various sensors and see if the fan speed still changes. The critical sensors are for the CPU and GPU. If only the CPU is enabled, you should see fan speed changes as the temperature goes up.

As an experiment, I ran tpfancontrol ver 1.8 on my T60 and here are the temperatures I showed at a manual setting of 7, which is around 3800rpm:

This is in Windows Vista with no load, but again fan setting manually forced to speed #7.

CPU 54°C (0x78)
APS 38°C (0x79)
PCM 35°C (0x7a)
GPU 70°C (0x7b)
BAT 50°C (0x7c)
BAT 32°C (0x7e)
BUS 38°C (0xc0)
PCI 46°C (0xc1)
PWR 47°C (0xc2)

The fan speed you stated sounds very reasonable, and it would appear your fan is working ok. Now, are there any obstructions that would restrict air flow to the computer? I have the back of my T60 elevated about 1 1/2 inches to allow better airflow, and improved keyboard angle. Have you tried just getting the computer chassis off the desk? Reflected heat from the desk surface will radiate back into the computer's chassis. That can add 10 degrees of heat to the entire system.

Although I do not play games on my system I occasionally give it very big, intensive copy jobs to run, while other apps are running at the same time. During these heavy tasks the computer has never shut down due to heating, so you might want to think about what other programs are running and putting an extra workload on the system. (Vista's Aero, Indexing, backups, Norton, etc)

I do have the system flat on the table with no elevation but the air vents are not blocked.

Programs that I have active are iTunes, AIM, McAfee, Blue tooth ( for mouse), using Wifi, Firefox, and all the various thinkpad programs.

Which version of TPFC do you recommend?

As I am typing this message, the temp for the gpu rises to 94 f while cpu at 78 f

Thanks for the replies

I thnk i was deceived by the program i was running, it was actually at degrees Celcius not Fahrenheit.

Im using v.21 now and on smart settings, the fan is running at 5700 rpm temps at GPU = 195 F, CPu = 163 F.

Also I cannot seem to find v1.8 as you have mentioned. Where can I download it? Ive elevated the laptop at an elevation with a ruler now and going to see how that works.

Is it safe to keep the fan at 5700 rpm?

cl0ne wrote:I thnk i was deceived by the program i was running, it was actually at degrees Celcius not Fahrenheit.

Im using v.21 now and on smart settings, the fan is running at 5700 rpm temps at GPU = 195 F, CPu = 163 F.

Also I cannot seem to find v1.8 as you have mentioned. Where can I download it? Ive elevated the laptop at an elevation with a ruler now and going to see how that works.

Is it safe to keep the fan at 5700 rpm?

CPU temp of 163 deg is a little warm, but not scary. The fan speed of 5700 seems rather high to me, but that is based on my own T60 which spins the fan at around 3800 (at idle more or less) as I stated earlier. My other Thinkpads run in the low to mid 4300 rpm range, so your speed of 5700 needs further investigation.

tpfancontrol ver .18 is at: http://sourceforge.net/project/showfile ... _id=153962

Just unzip it and move to root directory in its own folder. If you are running Vista, you need to run it as Admin. Sometimes you get an error message. Just run as admin again, and it should go the 2nd time.

In XP it will just start and run with a little icon in the taskbar.

If the program helps you, send the author a few dollars. He has worked for a couple of years on this applet and would appreciate lunch or coffee money as a "thank you" (just a suggestion)

There's a long thread "light at the end of the tunnel" or something like that in this fora somewhere. There's a sticky for it, as I recall.

Once the Thinkpad is elevated and if the fan slows down then it means the enviornment is cooler and the machine is getting some relief from the heat.

Im using TPFC v.19 for the T60 it seems to work ok but the fan is at a constant 5500+ rpm to keep the gpu at 84ish degree Celsius.

Im trying to see if lenovo tech support can help me determine if it can be repaired but I cannot find my warranty on the website. It did an automatic search but saids cannot find any. Does this mean it expired? or just cannot be found?

I bought this T60 in 04/2006. The warranty at that time i remembered was 3 years. Can anyone confirm this?

cl0ne wrote:Im using TPFC v.19 for the T60 it seems to work ok but the fan is at a constant 5500+ rpm

how did you get your fan running so fast? i would be very interested to do the same with mine. my current max speed is around 4800rpm.

mattbiernat wrote:

cl0ne wrote:Im using TPFC v.19 for the T60 it seems to work ok but the fan is at a constant 5500+ rpm

how did you get your fan running so fast? i would be very interested to do the same with mine. my current max speed is around 4800rpm.

Im using the T60 specific TPFC v.19 i found somewhere in this board. I put it in smart mode and it just starts going that fast after 5-10 seconds.

You guys are talking too much about TPFC. I don't know if its just me but the TPFC does not seems to be the problem if cl0one's laptop is burning with 91 C when he is just browsing.

The change bestween C anf F here is confusing me.

But if it is infact Celcius you are talking about. and it burns up to 91 when you are just browsing websites.

Then there is someting seriously wrong with your laptop. Contact lenovo. TPFC cannot help you with this matter.

I've been having overheating issues as well, usually when using very intensive programs (such as games or other high CPU/GPU use programs).

I've found that 0-7 is not the only settings for the manual settings. 7 for me will run the fan at approximatley 3200rpm. 9 will bump it to 3800 and another setting, 64, will jack it to approximatley 4700RPM.

I just downloaded the FanControl program today, but based on the fan noise, it never went over 3800rpm. the fan/heat sink just can't cope with such high cpu/gpu usage at that slow of an rpm.
I've configured the SMART levels as follows and seems to keep it from crashing (these are F settings, divide by 2.12 for C):

Level=122 0
Level=131 1
Level=149 3
Level=158 6
level=165 9
Level=170 64

Good luck.

Also note, I've read on a different forum that there are two revisions of T60 and subsequently two different fans. The T60 Dual Core(2 single core cpu) and the T60 Dual Core 2 (2 double core cpu, can't remember the marketing name)

the 2 double cores has a fan that runs much faster than the single dual core due to the extra heat the beefier processor generates.

In terms of cooling pad, it's a pretty cheap pad. I wouldn't suggest getting it. It's just plastic with two fans that blow. It's quiet, but I don't think it will do you any good. One of my roommates has one and just uses it just cause he has it.

I ordered the Antec Notebook Cooler and I think it will do a better job. It's $7 after rebate at Buy.com. My T61p doesn't have trouble with heating, but I wanted to get one. I don't think it will solve your problems from the sound of it. 91 celcius is really high.

Shade wrote:http://staff-www.uni-marburg.de/~schmit ... 25beta.zip

Thinkpad fanctrol .. This is the new version and it rocks. keep in mind that this version starts automaticly in smart mode wich means it tunes your fan to run 1.000 rpm more than it is factory set wich means it reduces the lifetime of it.

Just choose BIOS mode if you are unsure and you can monitor temps and monitor how fast your fan is running.

The extra tune in the fan speed helped me to get my CPU temp from 92 C under VERY heavy load to about 75 C.

Where did you get/find this version exactly? This is a sourceforge project. I'm curious as to why this version is hosted at a university currently and not on sourceforge.

madflava54 wrote:In terms of cooling pad, it's a pretty cheap pad. I wouldn't suggest getting it. It's just plastic with two fans that blow. It's quiet, but I don't think it will do you any good. One of my roommates has one and just uses it just cause he has it.

I ordered the Antec Notebook Cooler and I think it will do a better job. It's $7 after rebate at Buy.com. My T61p doesn't have trouble with heating, but I wanted to get one. I don't think it will solve your problems from the sound of it. 91 celcius is really high.

The Antec really is great. It beats the Targus and others.

What's the deal with the version numbers of TPFC?

I see varied version numbers in this thread (V0.18 , V0.19, V0.21, V0.25, V0.41 etc), but I only see V0.18b (A beta?) at Sourceforge at the moment. Where are the higher builds?

Are there separate groups doing these different builds? I worry about running the latest version if it's just put out there fast to beat another group.

By the way, the links to the service version listed on the wiki seem dead. Are the V0.25 and V0.41 version service builds?

Also, has anyone configured NHC to run better than this on a T61?

I would love to know. Thanks.

V0.25 referenced in this thread is a service build. i'm curious as to it's origin as well since it's not downloading from sourceforge. But it seems to be stable and works well on a T60.

NHC?

Notebook Hardware Control. There's a thread about it here:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=28482

It would seem to do the same job and more, if it can be configured properly. (I don't know how to do it on a T61 w/Vista though)

I solved the problem for me and I think it's worth sharing the information!

If your T60 overheats it is a hardware problem!

Why this? Well, my T60p with ATI FireGL V5250 had also the problem getting to hot and even shutdown due to heat. I searched many forums and found out about tpfancontrol and compiled me a version with some modifications, but it did not solve the problem.

I also found out about NHC and RMCLOCK. Nothing really helped.

So I opened my T60p and disassembled the cooling device with the 2 heatpipes. There are 2 thermo pads as gap fillers to cool the graphics card. These are the crucial parts!

So if your T60 is getting to hot and especially the temperature of the graphics card exceeds 75°C I bet those pads are the cause and the assembler of your T60 did not handle the stuff correctly.

Since I had no spare thermo pads I tried this solution:

1. Disassemble your T60p until you can remove the cooling device with the 2 heatpipes.

2. Remove it carefully and ensure that the thermo pads stick to the heat pipe.

3. Clean the CPU, the graphics chips and the cooling device (I used fuel to remove all fat). The copper must be shiny again.

4. The thermo pads show squares where the graphic chips are pressing agains the thermo pad. Use a sharp knife or a razor blade and cut that square out and remove that square.

5. Use a good (the best!?) thermal conductive paste (e.g. MX-2) and add some to the copper where the CPU will contact it. Then fill the cut out squares of the thermo pads until it fully compensates the hole.
(Maybe it also works if you use new thermo pads...)

6. Insert the cooling device - avoid any sliding around - and fasten the screws to the CPU. Then fasten the clamp over the graphics chips.

Start the labtop and run CPU intensive then gfx intensive and later both intensiv programs and watch the temperature.

If you are content with the result assemble your labtop and enjoy.

My T60p temperatures after surgery:

idle: CPU 42°C GPU 59°C
100% load: CPU 71°C GPU 72°C
gaming: CPU 68°C GPU 75°C

hope this helps you

SF

stefanfranke wrote:
If your T60 overheats it is a hardware problem!

4. The thermo pads show squares where the graphic chips are pressing agains the thermo pad. Use a sharp knife or a razor blade and cut that square out and remove that square.

5. Use a good (the best!?) thermal conductive paste (e.g. MX-2) and add some to the copper where the CPU will contact it. Then fill the cut out squares of the thermo pads until it fully compensates the hole.
(Maybe it also works if you use new thermo pads...)

SF

I agree with your diagnosis that this is probably a hardware problem and the OP's money will be better spent fixing that than buying a notebook cooling pad.

Just one caution - thermal paste should be a wafer thin coating between the chip and the copper heatsink. Any thicker and it acts as an excellent insulator!

Just one caution - thermal paste should be a wafer thin coating between the chip and the copper heatsink. Any thicker and it acts as an excellent insulator!

The description of Arctic Cooling MX-2 reads:
* High Thermal Conductivity
* Low Thermal Resistance
* Non-Electrical Conductive
* Non-Capacitive
* Non-Corrosive
* No Curing
* No Bleeding

So I gave it a try and I am very content.

I agree on the fact that copper is a way better thermal conductant than thermal paste. But you have to compare the thermal paste with a thermal pad.

SF

my t60p has been over heating for years. Lenovo has replaced most of hte internal parts. I had a tech from Lenovo here last week and he noticed that those 2 rubber pads you mentioned had a piece of plastic on top of them , that were similar to the plastic you would find to protect the iphone when you purachse it. you would normally peel it off. Since he peeled those off and regreased the cpu, i havent overheated once, but i do feel like the machine is always making some fan noise, and hasnt been dead quiet for a moment. Give and take i guess.

I had a very bad overheating problem. Whenever I tried to use VMware or to watch a video, the T60 would overheat and shut down. I called Lenovo, and they said that I had to ship my laptop. Lenovo said that they would send me a box. I received the box to ship my laptop to Lenovo within 2 days.

Prior to sending the T60 I installed the TPFancontrol. I manually put the setting on 7. TPFancontrol did not appear to make the fan run any faster or to make the T60 any cooler. I would watch the CPU temperature on TPFancontrol go to 88, 89, 90 Celsius, and then at 91 or 92, the T60 would shut off. The system would heat up whenever I tried to run VMware Server. Typically I have 1-4 virtual machines running at a time. Prior to the fix, I could not run VMware, and I had to use a different computer.

When I was having the overheating problem, the fan was running, however the fan did not appear to spin faster as the T60 got hotter. About a year before having this problem, I noticed that my fan was very loud, and that it got faster as the system got hotter. Over the past 6 months, I noticed that the fan was not as loud, but it was also not cooling.

I was concerned about sending my T60, and losing all of my data. I did a back-up to an external USB hard drive, bought another hard drive, and copied all of my data to that hard drive, and sent the T60 in the box to Lenovo through DHL on a Tuesday afternoon. When arranging the repair, Lenovo said it may take 4-5 days for the repair. I received the repaired T60 two days later on Thursday afternoon.

After the repair, my system is quiet! Very quiet! I am surprised how quiet the T60 is. Also, the T60 never gets hot. If I have the OS running, with 4 virtual machines running, and 5 videos running, the T60 never gets above 67 Celsius.

My expectations with the repair were that I would have a loud fan, and that the laptop would be hot on the bottom, but that I would be able to use VMware. I am again very happy with my T60 because it is quiet, cool and I can run VMware. I do not know what Lenovo did in the repair. The documents that come with the returned laptop said that it was something like a temperature repair.

What did they fix? Did they replace something or just adjust the TIM/cooling?

I'm having overheating issues as well. I have to run on the lowest performance settings with TPFANControl forcing the fan at the max speed to even stay running most times.

suprnova74 wrote:Where did you get/find this version exactly? This is a sourceforge project. I'm curious as to why this version is hosted at a university currently and not on sourceforge.

Why ? Because sourceforge never update anything while people like Troubadix spend their time creatiing new code to make it suitable for much more Thinkpad.

Project starts here : http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=17715

sktn77a wrote:I agree with your diagnosis that this is probably a hardware problem and the OP's money will be better spent fixing that than buying a notebook cooling pad.

Just one caution - thermal paste should be a wafer thin coating between the chip and the copper heatsink. Any thicker and it acts as an excellent insulator!

Agree ! The only way to have a the best thermal solution, is to replace the pad with a piece of copper. I do it on my T60p. No more than 85°C during heavy 3D load with fan at first speed using TPfancontrol. Before, the fan was overspining and GPU was going over 95°C. I have post picture in the T60(p) temperature topic.

Those pads are really bads and low end solution. T61 and following Thinkpad have direct contact between CPU or GPU and copper heatsink.