Fockwatch

I've had several laptops and all of the newer ones (last 6 years) have run pretty hot. I don't have any specific solutions, but here are some things to keep in mind -

A lot of laptops have air intakes on the bottom of the case and some have them on the sides. Air is sucked into the case, passes over specific areas (such as the HD) to provide a degree of cooling, goes through the fan, then out of the case through the CPU heat exchanger. The heat exchanger is made up of a heatsink that mounts on the CPU, a heat pipe moves the heat from the sink to the radiator, and a radiator which is typically located at the exhaust vent in the case. My Tosh A15 feels like it shoots flames out of the exhaust vent.

1. The fins on the heat exchanger radiator are fairly narrow and can become clogged with dust. This not only blocks the heat path for the CPU, but also the exhaust for the air warmed by all the other air-cooled parts. Hot-cha-cha.... The radiator cannot be cleaned by only blowing it out (i.e. with canned air) from the outside. This just blows the dust throughout the interior of of the case where it will end up plugging up the radiator again. Some laptops have a door over the CPU. Remove the door and apply some <low suction> while blowing the dust back out with canned air.

2. "Heat pads/laptop coolers" are great - in theory. All of the ones that I've seen, and the 3 I own, are all designed the same way: fans draw ambient air through the 1/8 - 1/4" space under the laptop, then exhaust it to the side. This is supposed to help cool the bottom of the laptop. A great idea - except that it creates a low pressure zone under the bottom, right where the inlet vents on most laptops are trying to pull air in. The cooler fans are usually more powerful than the little fan in the PC and the result is that the laptop can actually run hotter. As the cooler fans are centrifugal, they are better adapted for exhausting air than pressurizing the bottom of the case, which is what is really needed. I have two Antec coolers which I use to keep my legs cool. Go figure.

3. Anyone actually use a laptop on their lap? I do, when I'm watching tv. The catch is, you don't want to be plugging those vents. In my case, I get a lot of hot air out of the exhaust, which tells me that I'm getting some degree cooling, but is it enough?

4. When I recently had a heating problem, I used Task Manager to correlate the CPU activity to the temperatures reported by Speedfan. Somehow, indexing had been turned on and Cidaemon was eating my lunch. The CPU was being saturated and the exhaust temperature was very high. The CPU was running at around 73C. Killing indexing cut back on the CPU loading and reduced the heat.

Hope this gives you some ideas.

the Fock