rickNS wrote: ⤴Fri Jul 30, 2021 2:36 pm
ThaCrip wrote: ⤴Fri Jul 30, 2021 11:27 am
I might start to think the fan is dead. or really plugged full of dust/buildup.
So I popped the keyboard out, love my T420 only one screw, and a minute to get the keyboard out. There was a "little" dust in there, but I know from experience that it don't take much to make quite a difference.
Temperature is now 10 degrees cooler, and fan running about half as fast.
Code: Select all
Sensors: System Temperatures: cpu: 38.0C mobo: N/A
Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: 1961
Still don hear a fan, it's quiet, but a match flame by the exhaust port does move a little.
I normally clean my laptop once a year in the fall, guess I missed last fall.
Yeah, like you just said it can make a solid difference with a bit of a dust on laptops.
on my main PC (desktop), which runs pretty much all of the time, I typically clean it out twice a year (or so) (I would say at least once at the bare minimum (I suspect in many cases I am more in the 6-9 months range and generally and more concerned keeping CPU heatsink clener in summer since room with PC is noticeably hotter were as in winter area it's probably cooler than the average home)) as even when some dust builds up on the CPU heatsink area it don't seem to effect CPU temp much.
hell, sometimes with the PC on, since I can see into the case door as it's got some holes near the CPU area with a cone thing on it pointing towards CPU, in about how much dust build up there is and sometimes if I see some on it, ill just remove the side of the case with the PC running and, with my mouth, blow on it close to the CPU fan/heatsink area which removes the bulk of the dust. still, I do a proper cleaning of the case about twice a year by shutting it down and using a air compressor to thoroughly clean the entire case, CPU area, GPU area etc.
but speaking of my GPU (1050 Ti 4GB)... it's already pretty good with heat not being a problem already (idles low 30's even with room temps about 80f or so (even under a full load I am sure it's still well below the danger zone)). so for that to become hot would likely take A LOT of dust, which would be well over what it will get in I suspect even a year of 24/7 use as I would not be surprised if I could go years without cleaning the GPU heatsink area (even though I still do for good measure to ensure things are good).
so I guess, in short, a little dust seems to effect laptop heat much more than desktops where as a little dust on a desktop is not really a issue until it starts to get a bit heavier/thicker and then increases in CPU temps can increase, especially if there is a decent load.
but come to think of it... the size of fan etc on some level might effect things to because on my old Radeon 5670 512MB GPU for a desktop (which it's cooling fan is nothing special and probably more closely resembles laptop cooling on some level), while it generally runs cool enough I remember running GPU stress test with FurMark years ago and peak temps were noticeably lower after thoroughly blowing dust out of it with air compressor as back when I was using that, I would say that seen the largest decrease in temps after it's thoroughly clean vs after say 6-12 month of running all of the time with dust build up more than CPU. plus, it seemed with that cleaning with air compressor was needed to concentrate burst of air through it (and you could see some shoot out a bit etc) as just blowing on it with computer running with my mouth is basically useless unlike the CPU where I can get most of it off (or a good percentage at least) without having to shut down computer and do a proper cleaning.
with all of that said... I guess it depends how often one runs their computer/laptop on how often they got to clean it. as I would tend to assume someone who runs theirs pretty much 24/7 will need to clean it out a bit more vs someone who only runs their maybe 8 hours a day tops. but I can imagine with laptops in general they tend to be a lot more dust sensitive than a desktop, short of those extreme cases with desktops where the dust is full-on packed into the heatsink area so much that it pretty much stopped all airflow over the heatsink. but even with these more extreme desktop cases... since a desktops stuff is bigger, which makes the heatsink bigger, it can probably still function even with more packed in level of dust, especially under light-to-moderate CPU load without overheating because the sheer size of heatsink vs a laptop will noticeably help get rid of heat etc.
although, if you have seen those pictures of people online, who I assume have not cleaned their heatsink area on a desktop computer in probably many years (and are probably in a more dusty area than usual) you can see the dust is PACKED into the heatsink so much it's a wonder the thing did not overheat since it's like a wall of dust which appears to have completely blocked the airflow over heatsink. even on my worst times, mine was not even close to that bad and I noticed since I added in 120mm intake fan years ago (so instead of just having a 120mm exhaust (along with the PSU's small airflow with it's 120mm fan) and that's it, it's got one 120mm intake (which blows over my HDD's and keeps em noticeably cooler to the touch) and one 120mm exhaust (along with the 120mm PSU fan)) that my PC pulls in a bit more dust because of it, but it's still not too bad, especially given I clean it out roughly a couple of times a year, or probably at least once every 6-9 months or so as you can see decent dust build-up on the each 120mm intake/exhaust fan and some on GPU/GPU area as expected and general dust inside of the case.
p.s. I only have one laptop, which it's CPU (AMD E-300 CPU) is pretty weak(definitely the overall worst of the three computers I got), and airflow on that is good so far but then again it does not see much use in general (occasionally a bit of browsing and occasionally used for playing videos on a TV in another room) so dust is unlikely to become a noticeable problem for years to come. even if it slightly starts to... I can probably just use air compressor and shoot a little burst of air into the exhaust area (with laptop off obviously), and even intake area a bit, and will probably make things enough enough for quite some time once again. I usually avoid having to take apart laptops as some I have seen over the years got so much crap in them, it's hard to remember where all of the screws go
; so I usually avoid taking them apart unless really needed.
