Thinkpads Forum

hi everybody. i have just bought second hand Thinkpad x61 laptop. 2.0 Ghz CPU , 4 GB RAM, and 120 GB SSD instead of HDD. It is with installed Win 10.
10-15 minutes after turning on, the body gets hot - mainly the whole area under the keyboard ? I removed the keyboard to see if it is dirty, but it looks clean ? what to do ? may be to reinstall the software and to take Win 7 ? ( sorry for my english ) thanks. Peter.

Welcome to the Forum.
Download the illustrated X60/X61 manual from the HMM link above.
You will need to replace the thermal paste between CPU and fan (something like Arctic Silver 5 / AS5).
Most likely that was never replaced until now, which causes the overheating.
While you are at it, clean the fan itself as well.
Make a rough diagram of the bottom and the inside, with all the screw locations.
When you take the screws out, tape them in their proper place on your drawings.
You will need to take the whole machine apart, since the fan is on the bottom of the motherboard.
Have fun!

You'll probably need at least one thermal pad as well. There's one sandwiched between the heatsink and the northbridge chip, and it can be damaged while removing the former. The hardware maintenance manual actually recommends replacing it every time the heatsink is removed.

Before you go disassembling the entire machine, why don't you install TPFanControl to monitor things like CPU temperature and fan speed, and let us know what the actual numbers are. Also - what is the CPU usage over time? Perhaps some background processes grind it so much that it's close to 100% all the time?

thanks for answers. first I decided to reinstall Windows and made it to Win 7 ultimate. now it seems that the CPU is ok. I will install now CPU monitoring program. But the heat from the area above the wireless modules (when i opened the black plastic cover i saw 2 modules) is continuing. I will disable wireless and will wait for result. Is it possible to have some problem with wireless ?