R40 - SUDDEN Shutdown Problem

[iminj]

Hi:

My R40 (out of warranty) has recently started instantly shutting down. No warning - just "click", and it's dead in less than 1 second.

I have to wait 15-30 minutes before it will boot again .. which gives me reason to suspect I have a heat problem. Once I boot it, it can stay up for as long as 6 hours before it crashes again. I've been up for approx. 50 minutes, and my CPU temp. is 56C, HD is 38C.... not sure if that is good or bad.

I re-seated the memory modules, my wireless mini-pci card, and looked for anything loose inside the case (nothing found), but that didn't solve anything. I also ran PC-Doctor 5 for Windows, and every test result was a "Pass".

The fan on the R40 always ran infrequently and silently, I can't tell if it's working or not. Is there a recommended diagnostic test specifically for the fan?

Also, if anyone has any other suggestions, please let me know.
Thanks.

[Pookster]

Hi there,

I had a similar sort of problem, it was solved by replacing the fan, if your fan is making a clicking noise it's possible that it's on it's way out.

I ended up changing the fan twice on my R40e, but this was probably more to do with me re encoding movies constantly for my mobile phone and ripping dvd's killing the fan cpu usage @ 100% constant doesn't help much eh.

I would suggest you see if it tends to cut out when u have heavy CPU loads, e.g. when the CPU will be running hotter. The fan should be running at a slow speed most of the time and be quite quiet, but under load it should revv up, my fan stopped revving up hence it just let the temp build and build until click, it would just switch off and then wouldn't switch on for about another 10 min.

Hope this helps.

You can get a brand new fan from IBM for around £20 + there stupidly expensive postage, or £8 from ebay for a second hand one including the postage so it's dependant upon how much u want to spend, would go for brand new if cash isn't an issue.

All the best with ur R40,

Warren

[mypointz]

Does increasing the RAM lessen the heat problem while running movies or voice applications. I currently have 1.25 G on my R40 but heat is a problem while running streaming video, VOIP. I guess I'll have to change the fan but I was just think if increasing the RAM to max of 2G will help??

Venkatesh