Fan or Harddisk making noise? (T61 7664-16U T7300.)

[docherty058]

Got a noise and I thought it was the Fan. Now I am not sure. I downloaded RealTemp.exe to monitor the temperature, and all looks fine; always below 50*C. Once, when wife woke computer from sleep, it made some funny beeping sounds and shutdown? If fan, time to sell to someone who can replace, or if disk, new disk & Window 7 maybe? Any test I can do to tell which is problem?

Appreciate any guidance. Thank you.

[RealBlackStuff]

Temp and noise are not mutually exclusive.
If the fan is worn out (quite likely after 5-6 years), it needs to be replaced.
No reason to sell the computer.
With a Phillips screwdriver and the HMM you can do it yourself!
HMM here: http://support.lenovo.com/en_US/detail. ... MIGR-67760

[docherty058]

That is great. With HMM I could replace. But how do I determine if it is indeed the fan or the disk? Is there a test tool I can run? Would diagnostics help? And if proves to be the fan, where do I order from, and get exact right part? I am in Canada, but I'm sure that doesn't matter or restrict me from ordering on-line from anywhere? Recommendations?

Thanks a lot! Were also considering new laptop! This will save $ big-time!

[Cigarguy]

Use HWMonitor to monitor CPU temp. If it indeed is a fan failure, then the temp will shoot up real quick and the system will shutdown. Chances are the fan have not completely failed but will make such a ruckus that you'll want to toss it out the window.

To get the heat up, run Prime95 to stress test the CPU.

For all things T61, I'd contact forum member TuuS.

[twistero]

Hmm, why don't you go directly to the source? Just remove the palm rest, lift up the keyboard and turn the machine on. If the fan really is making abnormal noises you should be able to tell pretty easily.

Alternatively, run the computer without the hard drive to rule it out as the source of the noise.

[TTY]

In order to determine whether the sound came from the fan or the hard drive, i installed ThinkPad Fan Control.

http://staff-www.uni-marburg.de/~schmitzr/tpfc_v062.zip

In that program, you can switch fan speed manually. And if it's the fan, you'll hear the sound change when you switch fan speed. If it's the fan, you don't necessarily need a new one. I took the old one apart, put three drops of sewing machine oil in the bearing, let it seep in for a few hours, and reassembled.

Here's the home page for ThinkPad Fan Control:

http://www.staff.uni-marburg.de/~schmitzr/donate.html

I read that ThinkPad Fan Control might interfere with the ThinkVantage Power Manager, so in the meantime, i've uninstalled it again.

[docherty058]

BIG Thanks to everyone! It was the fan; dust & dry bearing. I acquired some Arctic Silver 5, shared instructions, sewing machine oil and went at it this past weekend. (Thank goodness I wasn't charging hourly.) Got Heat-sink & fan out, carefully separated the two by gently peeling back heat tape & copper tabs, cleaned everything and put drop of oil on shaft of fan, & a little drop on motor bearing hole, and she purrs like a... well, like a new fan! I'm using TPFC.62 in manual mode and we're quietly whirring along at about 4000rpm. A couple things concern me, but all-in-all, did a reasonable job.

- Left speaker is "vibratey!" crackles a bit, so will need to investigate.
- Tape holding wires in a couple spots obviously not sticking that well; will wires shift?
- Heat tape on heat-sink pressed down, but wish I had bought some to replace new.
- Thin foam weather stripping used to divert/control air-flow fell off or is thin in areas.
- Wish had know to get some to replace, or does that matter that much?
- Wish had more detail on exactly how to apply thermal paste; not sure if correct?
- Put half pea shape dollop in center of chip and applied pressure when seating heat sink.
- Reading application instructions at Arctic Silver web site left me worried!

Again, big thanks, I've breathed some life back into faithful T61 for a while longer.

[Saucey]

With TP Fan Control, as long as your unit doesn't run at 70*C at idle, I think you applied the CPU paste and GPU correctly.
I usually have it at low settings, it will jump to 75*C when I'm watching videos before the fan wants to kick in.

[RealBlackStuff]

Here are the proper AS5 instructions for a laptop: http://www.arcticsilver.com/pdf/appmeth ... d_v1.1.pdf