5

I have been having an issue with my Laptop fan constantly running @ high speed creating an unbearable noise that is making it hard to work.

My processor is almost at idle when this happens only between 1-5% when viewed on Task Manager. It will be silent for about 5-10 minutes. sometimes up to an hour, then it will start up again slow at first/being engaged then with 10 seconds is at full speed making a loud noise.

The only way I can stop the noise is to pound the area above the fan and it immediately will stop, that is if I let it run loud and noisy for a few minutes up to 10 minutes, otherwise pounding on it won't stop the fan from making noise.

I recently received an automatic update from Windows 10 about 2 weeks ago and that is when this problem really became bad, there was some issues with the fan before but would only happen once a week, now it happens throughout the day constantly.

What tools can I use to diagnois this issue and from the description would you say is happening.

Edit The battery in my Laptop is spent will no longer hold a charge and is dead.

2
  • 2
    The operating system doesn’t control the speed of the fan. The hardware does. So, the OS update had nothing to do with it. You can download CoreTemp to see what load and temperature the CPU is running at. If the laptop isn’t cooling properly it needs to be serviced. You can also try compressed air to clean the cooling fins out. This is not a software issue. You also left out what make and model Commented Jul 16, 2018 at 4:01
  • 1
    This happened to my laptop. Then a year later it got pulled apart by a tech for a different reason, and we found the internal CPU fan vent was blocked by fluff. Commented Jul 16, 2018 at 6:09

4 Answers 4

3

Firstly, pounding / banging on your laptop is a really bad idea. Don't do that. You might be physically damaging the fan. If the fan breaks, you will not be able to use your computer.

It's important that you understand the fan is there for a very good reason. If the laptop is unable to get sufficient cool airflow, it will overheat and stop working. You can't simply start banging on your laptop and expect it to continue working. It'd be like draining the antifreeze out of your air conditioner.

Next, you should be aware that the fan can spin for reasons other than CPU usage. Here are a few:

  • If you're in a very hot environment without air conditioning, the fan might spin even when the entire system is idle. There isn't a lot you can do about that except move to a cooler area.
  • Don't just look at CPU usage. Look at disk activity and GPU usage as well. In recent builds of Windows 10, you can easily see the disk and GPU usage in Task Manager in the Performance tab. Otherwise you'll need to use a monitoring tool like GPU-Z to monitor GPU activity. If any of them are consistently utilized beyond a few percentage points, even if the CPU is idle, this is likely your culprit. Your GPU will almost always make the machine very hot. The disk is less likely to consume lots of power, but it still could bump your machine over the edge to needing to use the fan.
  • If your laptop is frequently used in areas that are very dusty or have pets that shed hair or dandruff (cat, dog, birds, etc.) the fan's output or the air intake may be partially or completely blocked with debris. You should try to carefully open your laptop -- assuming it's not one of those that isn't designed to be opened -- and gently clean out any dust. Don't force spin the fan because you might break it. Only use a dry cloth or an airduster; never apply any liquid to your computer's internals.

In general, attempting to "tweak" your computer software / BIOS to force the fan to come on less often is a bad idea. Leaving your fan control settings at default will ensure that your system's temperature doesn't reach dangerous levels. If you go in software and try to manually fiddle with these things, you might reduce the life of your system, cause early component failure or over-temperature throttling (which will greatly reduce the performance of your CPU or GPU temporarily to prevent it from overheating).

Your goal should be to help the computer exhaust hot air and take in cool air. If it can do this efficiently, the fan will stay off more often until you're using heavier programs like image/video editing or games.

If you're still dissatisfied with the frequency that the fan turns on and/or the noise it makes, I recommend buying some noise-cancelling headphones, playing some music and tuning it out. Many laptops have poorly-designed fan acoustics that does produce a rather annoying whine; you would generally want to determine this before purchasing the system in the future, to avoid being unhappy with your purchase. In most cases, RMA'ing your laptop for repair will not result in any improvement in this noise, as the most they could do is to replace your fan, but the new one will perform just like the old one provided that your current one isn't damaged.

One thing I can tell you for sure is that if you continue to "pound on" your laptop, you're going to break it. Most laptops -- except those that are extremely rugged, like the Panasonic Toughbook -- are not designed to be treated like that, and can easily be broken by a determined human. And if it does break because you pounded on it, please don't send it to the manufacturer for warranty repair. It's your fault for pounding on it; you should pay for the repair.

3
  • 2
    The CPU, Memory and GPU are @ 0% the only program i have open is Chrome with 2 tabs and the fan is very loud . I have owned this computer for over 4 years and never had a problem like this with the fan until the last couple weeks. If I feel the laptop above the fan and CPU it doesn't feel excessively warm feels perfectly fine. I guess the best I can do is open it up and see if it could use a good cleaning. Commented Jul 16, 2018 at 17:21
  • 1
    Forgot to mention and will edit my question. The battery is dead and has been for a while now. Can non functioning battery cause some confusion for the system? Commented Jul 16, 2018 at 17:43
  • It should not. I will say that I run my laptops on batteries only a few times a year, otherwise they are 24/7/365 running on mains. I am here because a very new , high spec, laptop has the fan constantly running in Windows. It does not do so when I boot into command prompt. Next step is to try safe mode, with no apps, including background apps, running, to try to see whether it is the GPU causing it, or apps.
    – Mawg
    Commented Nov 15, 2018 at 8:22
0

It sounds like you have the right idea as far as verifying whether or not the their was an issue with your CPU. The next step would be to verify that the temperature is not constantly running warm. This could be for a number of reasons such as the computer getting dusty overtime, leading to poor ventilation.

The other factor's I'd consider are more so things like, how does it impact performance? Is there a particular process/application that is reading/writing to the HDD without your permission? Do you even have a HDD or an SSD installed?

Hopefully this helps a little.

0

I had a similar issue under Windows 10 with a brand new laptop. The fan would be almost constantly be on, despite only a few % CPU usage. It stopped after I disabled indexing for all accounts (Default, Public and an admin account) except my own.

enter image description here

To change these settings:

  1. Type indexing options in the start menu
  2. Select Modify.
  3. Go to the Users folder and disable all accounts except your own.
0

Flip over laptop look for shiny metal circles thems da screws. Remove those suckers and open laptop.....and...this is.....critical.......CLEAN out the insides of the laptop paying attention to the fan. That won't fix your problem but it will help out your poor laptop. Lol

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .