Dell laptop blowing hot air

how.gareth

Hi folks I have a dell latitude e6320 and it’s blowing hot air out of the vent, I’m pretty sure it’s been getting hotter lately and I’ve read the vents can get blocked with fluff but I’m a bit afraid of opening it up in case I wreck the thing, any other options or advice would be most welcome

ED E

Buy a can of compressed air, use it when the laptop is off. Should dislodge some of the accumulated dust and grime.

how.gareth

ED E wrote: »

Buy a can of compressed air, use it when the laptop is off. Should dislodge some of the accumulated dust and grime.

Would that not just blow the dust in further?

Alanstrainor

how.gareth wrote: »

Would that not just blow the dust in further?

There isn't a lot of space inside these machines, the air is enough to free the dust and for the most part the compressed air blows straight back out the vent. It is better to do this with the machine open, but there's no harm doing it from the outside.

Keep in mind though, that I wouldn't expect this to be a miracle cure, that machine is 7 or so years old, maybe more. The thermal paste on the CPU is likely not doing it's job half as well as it did when new, add to this the dust and grime inside, and potential for the fans not working to their full extent and you end up where you are now.

how.gareth

Cheers yeah I’ve just opened it up as much as I dared and tried to hoover up any dust I could but the fan looked clear to be honest so I think your right on the thermal paste, will that heat cause the machine serious trouble? Worth my while trying to replace the paste or leaving it into somewhere to get it done?

bonzodog2

The bits of the fan you can see may look OK but there's prob a little carpet of fluff between the fan and a part of the cooler that acts like a car radiator

edit. like this

incentsitive

Remember having a similar issue, I just put the end of the hoover near it (just enough to create a bit of suction out of it) and it did the trick. Didn't put it right up against the fan mind.

Don't know for sure it was the right thing to do but it worked!

how.gareth

bonzodog2 wrote: »

The bits of the fan you can see may look OK but there's prob a little carpet of fluff between the fan and a part of the cooler that acts like a car radiator

edit. like this

Yeah I had an old inspiron which was easy to access the fan to remove the lump of fluff but I removed the back panel today and every screw I could find but couldn’t access the fan, I’ll do a bit of googling tomorrow and see if I can find a guide on accessing it properly

how.gareth

incentsitive wrote: »

Remember having a similar issue, I just put the end of the hoover near it (just enough to create a bit of suction out of it) and it did the trick. Didn't put it right up against the fan mind.

Don't know for sure it was the right thing to do but it worked!

Tried the hoover but didn’t seem to get anything of note out and it’s still blowing hot air, could be some hidden fluff or the paste might need replacing as suggested earlier

bonzodog2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StXPfq8nDVk

how.gareth

bonzodog2 wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StXPfq8nDVk

Cheers I’m hoping there’s a quicker way than that to access the fan or I’ll be leaving it to the experts! I’ll do some research tomorrow

Alun

I have a Dell E6320. Just taking the back off (after removing the battery and disk drive) will give you at least some access to the fan so that you can blast it with compressed air. That bit isn't too difficult, undoing lots of screws, just the first step of that video. I do seem to remember that one or two of the screws are different lengths to the rest, although not certain, so best to keep track of where each screw came out.

If you put something in between the blades of the fan, like a small screwdriver or cocktail stick, when you do it to stop the fan from rotating it'll be more effective, plus apparently it can sometimes be bad for the motherboard electronics of you run the fan in reverse, effectively as a generator, so that avoids that potential problem too.

Alanstrainor

I just thought I'd chime in... I wouldn't be using a hoover for anything here. Just buy some compressed air, it's cheap and you should be able to find it easy enough. It's much better suited to the job at hand.

ED E

how.gareth wrote: »

Tried the hoover but didn’t seem to get anything of note out and it’s still blowing hot air, could be some hidden fluff or the paste might need replacing as suggested earlier

Its meant to blow hot air. Thats its job.


Might be worth checking that its not your CPU producing more heat than the cooler failing to extract it. Check its not pinned to 100% usage all the time.

how.gareth

ED E wrote: »

Its meant to blow hot air. Thats its job.


Might be worth checking that its not your CPU producing more heat than the cooler failing to extract it. Check its not pinned to 100% usage all the time.

this is fairly hot, I presume hotter than should be expected but obviously I could be wrong! I have it set to “performance” but i wouldn’t have a clue how to access the cpu settings

ED E

Ctrl + shift + ESC

When you first boot 100% usage is normal. After 20 minutes it should be idling much lower unless you're gaming or video editing etc.