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#1 2013-11-10 22:29:09

chichakman
Member
Registered: 2013-11-06
Posts: 2

Laptop overheating

Before I get around to saying anything I want those reading this to understand that I am posting this because I have found no alternative to solve the issue myself. I have done research on what to do, but nothing useful has turned up. I am posting here NOT because I am too lazy to figure things out myself, but because I need more advanced an experienced users to help me troubleshoot the issue. That being said, I am an utter noob with relation to Arch and even Linux itself.

Onwards.

So...my laptop is overheating. It idles at about 60 -65C (Apparently that is an abnormal idle temperature as laptops are supposed to idle at around 50C?) and dramatically increases in temperature when the CPU load is approximately 25% or more. Overheating is most noticable when I game as the game freezes for a period of time (I assume a reaction from the PC to try and cool itself down). Other times that I notice problems are when watching Youtube (produces signifiant lag one high temperatures are reached...especially when in full screen, though strangely enough watching videos through VLC does not seem to have a significant effect on the temperature.

I have installed the following programs according to recommendations from the Arch wiki: acpid, laptop mode tools, and cpupower. I am currently running LXDE as a desktop environment, but have not done much with it as I would prefer to get this issue fixed first before doing anything else.

I have an Acer AS4830TG-6808 model:

Intel i5 2450M (2.5-3.1Ghz)
Nvidia 540M - uses optimus sad

I am not sure what other information to provide. As i said, I'm a fairly new user so you will have to bear with me. big_smile

I really appreciate any help you all provide!

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#2 2013-11-10 22:37:52

jasonwryan
Anarchist
From: .nz
Registered: 2009-05-09
Posts: 30,424
Website

Re: Laptop overheating

chichakman wrote:

It idles at about 60 -65C (Apparently that is an abnormal idle temperature as laptops are supposed to idle at around 50C?)

It depends on the machine. `acpi -V` will tell you what the "normal" range for your machine is.


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#3 2013-11-10 22:58:41

clfarron4
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From: London, UK
Registered: 2013-06-28
Posts: 2,163
Website

Re: Laptop overheating

chichakman wrote:

Nvidia 540M - uses optimus

Have you set-up BumbleBee or something to provide the Optimus features? If you haven't, you'll be powering both cards, but only using the integrated Intel one.


Claire is fine.
Problems? I have dysgraphia, so clear and concise please.
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#4 2013-11-11 01:03:27

WonderWoofy
Member
From: Los Gatos, CA
Registered: 2012-05-19
Posts: 8,414

Re: Laptop overheating

You might want to also open the machine and blow out the dust from the cooling system.

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#5 2013-11-11 01:31:50

chichakman
Member
Registered: 2013-11-06
Posts: 2

Re: Laptop overheating

Hey all, thanks for the replies

First and foremost.

WonderWoofy wrote:

You might want to also open the machine and blow out the dust from the cooling system.

I have considered the prospect, but considering the fact that I am not only an inexperienced Linux user (and there are overheating issues for arch on laptops if you dont install the proper software) I would consider opening up my laptop a last resort. I have no problem with doing so (I work in tech support so I have worked on laptops) I just don't feel like voiding the warranty on my laptop just yet.

jasonwyran wrote:

It depends on the machine. `acpi -V` will tell you what the "normal" range for your machine is.

For cooling output I get the following:

Cooling 0: pkg-temp-0 no state information available
Cooling 1: intel_powerclamp no state information available
Cooling 2: LCD 7 of 9
Cooling 3: Processor 0 of 10
Cooling 4: Processor 0 of 10
Cooling 5: Processor 0 of 10
Cooling 6: Processor 0 of 10

clfarron4 wrote:

Have you set-up BumbleBee or something to provide the Optimus features? If you haven't, you'll be powering both cards, but only using the integrated Intel one.

I did not know that. I have installed bumblebee, but hadn't taken the time to enable the daemon on startup yet. Just did that and will see how things go (really hope that it is just this...but at the same time I will feel really stupid if it is =P).

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#6 2013-11-11 01:51:16

WonderWoofy
Member
From: Los Gatos, CA
Registered: 2012-05-19
Posts: 8,414

Re: Laptop overheating

chichakman wrote:
WonderWoofy wrote:

You might want to also open the machine and blow out the dust from the cooling system.

I have considered the prospect, but considering the fact that I am not only an inexperienced Linux user (and there are overheating issues for arch on laptops if you dont install the proper software) I would consider opening up my laptop a last resort. I have no problem with doing so (I work in tech support so I have worked on laptops) I just don't feel like voiding the warranty on my laptop just yet.

I'm not sure about your machine, and every machine is indeed different, and every manufacturer has different policies on what is and is not acceptable.  But many machines have a large panel on the underside that can be removed for things like RAM and HDD replacement.  Sometimes, but not always, this also gives you some access to the cooling system as well.  If this is not possible, I don't encourage you to do it if it is going to void your warranty (might as well keep that shit in tact as best as possible).  But you might want to just take a quick look at the way the screws and panels are laid out on your machine and see if that might be an option.

Also, if it is the case where you are allowed basically no access into the machine, you can always get a can of compressed air, and then blow it through the vent.  This can open have some pretty decent cleaning abilities.  But basically, if it is dist and grime built up on your cooling system, no amount of software changes is going to fix the problem.

That said, I think that thing to first look into is the suggestion by claffron4.  Machines with the optimus setup can certainly cause much heat and power consumption if not configured.  I remember when these machines first started hitting the market and there really was no OSS solution to handle such things.  People were complaining left and right about how f*cked up it was that their machines were getting unbearably hot and battery life was abysmal. 

Since you have a Sandy Bridge Gen Intel processor, it is therefore using the new intel_ptate driver for cpu frequency handling.  Intel has also developed a userspace daemon that is meant to work with the various kernel features available for their processors in keeping the machine cool.  It uses the p-states, t-states, powerclamp, and rapl to more effectively control the thermal output of the processor.  You might want to give that a go.  It is called the Intel Thermal Daemon, and is available in the AUR as the thermald package.

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#7 2013-11-14 22:39:32

marcoscan
Member
Registered: 2009-04-07
Posts: 36

Re: Laptop overheating

Hello chichakman,
I suggest to setup bumblebee and install bbswitch-dkms to disable the nvidia card. This should solve the overheating problem. 

It's easy, just follow the archwiki page.

Cheers :-)

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#8 2013-11-15 01:50:20

brebs
Member
Registered: 2007-04-03
Posts: 3,742

Re: Laptop overheating

chichakman wrote:

overheating

Undervolt the CPU (e.g. PHC). This really should be standard practice, especially with laptops - such a common problem. Can be done in combination with slight underclocking, too, to keep the CPU under the thermal throttling limit.

Here's my hints.

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#9 2013-11-15 14:27:46

clfarron4
Member
From: London, UK
Registered: 2013-06-28
Posts: 2,163
Website

Re: Laptop overheating

brebs wrote:

Undervolt the CPU (e.g. PHC). This really should be standard practice, especially with laptops - such a common problem. Can be done in combination with slight underclocking, too, to keep the CPU under the thermal throttling limit.

Here's my hints.

My APU has been undervolted deliberately at 1.9Ghz per core by AMD, even though it can go all the way up to 2.3Ghz.


Claire is fine.
Problems? I have dysgraphia, so clear and concise please.
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My x86_64 package repository

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#10 2013-11-15 14:36:02

brebs
Member
Registered: 2007-04-03
Posts: 3,742

Re: Laptop overheating

clfarron4 wrote:

undervolted deliberately

Good. So *push* further down. Less voltage is better (as long as it's still stable), it means less troublesome heat - it's that simple.

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#11 2013-11-15 15:08:04

clfarron4
Member
From: London, UK
Registered: 2013-06-28
Posts: 2,163
Website

Re: Laptop overheating

brebs wrote:
clfarron4 wrote:

undervolted deliberately

Good. So *push* further down. Less voltage is better (as long as it's still stable), it means less troublesome heat - it's that simple.

Indeed. OP has this:

Intel i5 2450M (2.5-3.1Ghz)

And could probably do with manually undervolting it.


Claire is fine.
Problems? I have dysgraphia, so clear and concise please.
My public GPG key for package signing
My x86_64 package repository

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