• Laptop fans do not work
    5 replies, posted
I have an alienware M17xR4 when I turn on my laptop my fans start spinning normally.. for 3-4 seconds, and then turn off This means that while gaming my CPU temp goes up to the 100°C in a matter of minutes. Never really had emergency shut downs, the laptop just slows down to a crawl periodically trying to maintain the temperature stable. I doubt it's healthy though. I've been using a cooling pad since but it doesn't quite cut it. Unable to actually fix the problem (setting bios back to default, formatting the HD, various troubleshooting) I have tried many programs to manually change fan speeds and the result is always the same: the fans do indeed start to spin, but after a few minutes, the laptop shuts down with no warning
[QUOTE=Ryo Ohki;40995187]I have an alienware M17xR4 when I turn on my laptop my fans start spinning normally.. for 3-4 seconds, and then turn off This means that while gaming my CPU temp goes up to the 100°C in a matter of minutes. Never really had emergency shut downs, the laptop just slows down to a crawl periodically trying to maintain the temperature stable. I doubt it's healthy though. I've been using a cooling pad since but it doesn't quite cut it. Unable to actually fix the problem (setting bios back to default, formatting the HD, various troubleshooting) I have tried many programs to manually change fan speeds and the result is always the same: the fans do indeed start to spin, but after a few minutes, the laptop shuts down with no warning[/QUOTE] What exactly happens when it shuts down? Do you just get a black screen and it's off?
Shutting down with no warning is obvious that the temperature sensors have detected the maximal temperature (on most systems it's 110c) and cuts off power immediately to prevent the components burning out from too high temperatures. But it's extremely weird your fan doesn't kick in at all. When have you actually cleaned the laptop? Usually all laptops have only one fan which is behind a heatsink and blows dust against it overtime.
[QUOTE=Squerl101;40996402]What exactly happens when it shuts down? Do you just get a black screen and it's off?[/QUOTE] Yeah, the power cuts immediately [QUOTE=Merijnwitje;41004726]Shutting down with no warning is obvious that the temperature sensors have detected the maximal temperature (on most systems it's 110c) and cuts off power immediately to prevent the components burning out from too high temperatures. But it's extremely weird your fan doesn't kick in at all. When have you actually cleaned the laptop? Usually all laptops have only one fan which is behind a heatsink and blows dust against it overtime.[/QUOTE] It shuts off when I'm forcing the fans to spin, nothing to do with temperature However I've taken a closer look yesterday (and decided to clean it aswell- apparently alienware laptops are a hundred times easier to clean than normal laptops) and discovered that the fans do indeed spin, but extremely slow, regardless of the temperature. I can still monitor temperature so the sensors aren't completely busted
Shuts off as soon as you force the fans to spin up? Sounds like a overloaded power supply. Did your laptop show warnings about a overloaded power supply or something similar? [editline]12th June 2013[/editline] Try to find a Dell power adapter and compare the power plug with your Alienware's plug. Alienware is a sister company of Dell. Both companies should have the same power plug. If you happen to find a Dell power adapter, connect it to the Alienware and cross your fingers the wattage matches. Make sure though if voltage rating is correct too, but usually Dell uses 19.5v
[QUOTE=Merijnwitje;41006166]Shuts off as soon as you force the fans to spin up? Sounds like a overloaded power supply.[/QUOTE] It is not immidiate, usually it happens after a couple of minutes I would exclude a problem with the power adapter itself, as the thought did cross my mind that that could be the problem I've tried to test if it worked while running on battery power and it still turned off
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