Thinkpads Forum

I have a new x300 and the fan is annoyingly loud. It kicks into high speed after 15-20 minutes of normal computer use (email, web browsing), then goes on and off every couple of minutes. When it goes on, it stays on for quite some time and is very noticeable and distracting. I've read a lot about fan problems on this site, so I know other people have experienced this. I called Lenovo and they said to send it in for repair - they may have to replace the fan. So here's my question -- is this loud fan just a fact of life for x300's or is it something that can be fixed? In other words, is it worth sending it in at all? Do other people out there have x300's without this fan problem? Thank you.

Hi there,
I'm also the relatively new owner of an x300 - when I was getting ready to purchase, I read how quiet this machine was, but in everyday use, I've found that it's been one of the noisiest notebooks I've ever owned!
As many people have been having the same "problem" you've been describing, I don't think a faulty fan is the problem - I just think it's the result of the machine being so thin (although I thought having a Ultra low voltage processor would have made it much easier to cool). Many thinkpad owners have downloaded this program - tpfancontrol
http://www.staff.uni-marburg.de/~schmitzr/donate.html
It will tell you how hot your cpu gets, as well as let you adjust your fan speed. I've found that the fan is inaudible on setting 1 (2000 rpm), but once it goes to setting 2 (5000 rpm), it sounds like a jet engine. Unfortunately, the fan kicks up into setting 2 at 50c after about only 10 minutes of light web browsing/word processing (10% processor usage). The fan is usually on only a minute or two, but then it kicks in again after 5 minutes over and over. I've configured tpfancontrol to kick in when the cpu goes over 60 degrees c, and have used the thinkpad power manager to limit my processor to "slowest" speed (it runs at 700 mhz) but this is an imperfect solution, as keeps the computer hotter than I'd like it, and it cripples the processor speed. If you do find that you send it back and it is a fan problem, please post here again, for if this is a problem with the fan, then I've got the same problem, and I'll be sending it back too!
Hope this helped,
-V

I stress-tested three demo-X300 at three different vendors: they were all very quiet.
I guess you should let them repair it. I suspect that the variation in product quality
is very high and that the end customer is being degraded to some kind of last line of
quality control.

thank you for your replies. I'm definitely going to take the machine in for repair and see if they can fix the problem. If they can't fix it I will probably try to return the laptop. It's way too annoying and the tp fan control sounds like an iffy solution. I'll keep you posted on what happens after they make the repair.