Thinkpads Forum

I have a problem.

When I'm using Win 7 normally, without any big software, my notebook is barely warm. But when i run my linux slackware, after about 30min, notebook is very hot and suddenly shuts down. The same thing happen if I enter BIOS setup for few minutes, also extremely high tempreature. Only one time notebook shut down when i worked on windows (I opened eclipse, word, excel and few other software for long long time). Every time if notebook shuts down suddenly, it has high temperature. I noticed also that my ac adapter is quite hotter than when i bought it. My t500 is 2,5 years old.

Get some canned air, remove the keyboard and bezel, and go to town.
Blow all the dust out.

Also, flash your BIOS to the latest version if you haven't already done so.

I've got air compressor and I remove all dust every few weeks. I upgrade my BIOS maybe a year ago, so maybe I'll try, but I think it doesn't help.

Any other suggestions? I read some about thermal greases, but I don't know if I should use it...

Is your fan even spinning?

When using compressed air are you making sure the fans aren't spinning freely while blowing the air? For instance I use a paperclip to keep the fan blades stationary while using compressed air on my laptop.

IIRC blowing compressed air causes the fans to spin freely far beyond the intended RPM which may do more damage than good.

Just a thought.

I think my fan is working, because hot air is blowed out of my notebook.

Yes I know it, and I always stop fan with toothpick if I use compressed air.

Do you have switchable graphics?

Yes, I have switchable graphics now, because I must check if the problem also exist if switchable graphics is enabled. But I detect the problem when switchable graphics was disabled and only ATI Radeon was running.

BTW, slackware linux doesn't load if switchable graphics is enabled.

I downloaded intel processor diagnostic tool and ran it with maximum load of cpu. Test was working 2 hours but my notebook in top left corner was just warm. I decided to disable switchable graphics in BIOS and enable discrete. While I was doing it notebook was extremely hot in just few minutes...

I upgraded my BIOS two days ago.

Any ideas?

My T500 did the same thing when ever I forgot to turn on the cool pad that came with it. The guy I got it from said he opened it up and cleaned it and was sure it was the windows 7 he put on it that was the problem. I got cpu fan from ebay for 17 bucks. When, I went to put it in. I found the real problem was a doughnut of dog hair in the fan shroud. I pulled it out in one piece, and figured I'd try it to put it together. I could always we open it and put the light weight aftermarket fan in if it wasn't better. Well, it works great. I just wish I didn't blow about 20 bucks before opening it.

yurig wrote:I have a problem.

When I'm using Win 7 normally, without any big software, my notebook is barely warm. But when i run my linux slackware, after about 30min, notebook is very hot and suddenly shuts down. The same thing happen if I enter BIOS setup for few minutes, also extremely high tempreature. Only one time notebook shut down when i worked on windows (I opened eclipse, word, excel and few other software for long long time). Every time if notebook shuts down suddenly, it has high temperature. I noticed also that my ac adapter is quite hotter than when i bought it. My t500 is 2,5 years old.

Because you need Lenovo Power Manager to optimize the cooling. It's Windows based so when you are in BIOS mode or running Linux you are running the hardware "naked" or without the additional tweak necessary for the case design and system hardware build. I've noticed that heat in a range of TPs ranging from old school classics to modern era machines like yours when in BIOS mode. It's normal.

I was just wondering if you have any report about your problem. Have you fixed it?