Laptop Fan Not Working Well

I have a Dell Inspiron 6400 which is 1.25 years old. When I first got it,
the fan worked great, and you could feel the air being blown out the back.
Now you can't anymore, and the laptop's getting very hot. There was a lot of
dust on the intake vents, and I blew the dust off of those, but it didn't
help. I'm guessing either the fan is burnt out or damaged, or it's caked
with dust.

I guess my only option would be to open the case and blow dust off the fan,
but I was trying to avoid opening up the case. Any other ideas?

Thanks!

Neil

"Neil" wrote in message
. net...
I have a Dell Inspiron 6400 which is 1.25 years old. When I first got it,
the fan worked great, and you could feel the air being blown out the back.
Now you can't anymore, and the laptop's getting very hot. There was a lot
of dust on the intake vents, and I blew the dust off of those, but it
didn't help. I'm guessing either the fan is burnt out or damaged, or it's
caked with dust.

I guess my only option would be to open the case and blow dust off the
fan, but I was trying to avoid opening up the case. Any other ideas?

Thanks!

Neil


What/which warranty did you take up when you bought it. It could still be
covered.

You gotta take off the case to inspect/clean/replace the fan. There are
instructions on the Dell site for case removal. Punch in your TAG and look
through the options.

On Wed, 02 Apr 2008 05:11:00 GMT, "Neil"
wrote:

I have a Dell Inspiron 6400 which is 1.25 years old. When I first got it,
the fan worked great, and you could feel the air being blown out the back.
Now you can't anymore, and the laptop's getting very hot. There was a lot of
dust on the intake vents, and I blew the dust off of those, but it didn't
help. I'm guessing either the fan is burnt out or damaged, or it's caked
with dust.

I guess my only option would be to open the case and blow dust off the fan,
but I was trying to avoid opening up the case. Any other ideas?

Thanks!

Neil


Well if you could shrink yourself down to a small enough
size to crawl in through the vent slits with a dust wand...

On a more serious note I could be wrong but suspect it has a
separate panel right under that (exhaust?) port on the side
which is expressly there so you can access the fan and clean
the dust out. Just make sure you have a high
quality/precision screwdriver with the right sized tip so
it's not as likely to strip the screw head. It can take a
lot of downward pressure and torque to break notebook screws
loose the first time, especially if they have threadlock on
them.

"Neil" wrote in message
. net...
I have a Dell Inspiron 6400 which is 1.25 years old. When I first got it,
the fan worked great, and you could feel the air being blown out the back.
Now you can't anymore, and the laptop's getting very hot. There was a lot
of dust on the intake vents, and I blew the dust off of those, but it
didn't help. I'm guessing either the fan is burnt out or damaged, or it's
caked with dust.

I guess my only option would be to open the case and blow dust off the
fan, but I was trying to avoid opening up the case. Any other ideas?

I poured a cup of tea over my 6400 a few months back and had to take it all
apart - getting it open is easy - 1 small tipped cross-headed screw driver
to undo the screws and a small normal screw driver to prize bits off. I can
have my 6400 openned up in about 2 minutes now! You remove most of the
screws on the bottom of the case, then work with the computer the 'normal'
way up - the base stays where it is and you remove parts from the top -
first the strip under the screen, then the keyboard, then the grey main
'lid' - that is enough to get you to the CPU cooling arrangement. -
instructions are on the Dell website - go to support, then use the 'tag
number' on the bottom of your PC. This PC can't get onto javascript sites,
so I can't find the page to link for you, but I can post instructions here
if you want - let me know.

GT wrote:
"Neil" wrote in message
. net...
I have a Dell Inspiron 6400 which is 1.25 years old. When I first got it,
the fan worked great, and you could feel the air being blown out the back.
Now you can't anymore, and the laptop's getting very hot. There was a lot
of dust on the intake vents, and I blew the dust off of those, but it
didn't help. I'm guessing either the fan is burnt out or damaged, or it's
caked with dust.

I guess my only option would be to open the case and blow dust off the
fan, but I was trying to avoid opening up the case. Any other ideas?

I poured a cup of tea over my 6400 a few months back and had to take it all
apart - getting it open is easy - 1 small tipped cross-headed screw driver
to undo the screws and a small normal screw driver to prize bits off. I can
have my 6400 openned up in about 2 minutes now! You remove most of the
screws on the bottom of the case, then work with the computer the 'normal'
way up - the base stays where it is and you remove parts from the top -
first the strip under the screen, then the keyboard, then the grey main
'lid' - that is enough to get you to the CPU cooling arrangement. -
instructions are on the Dell website - go to support, then use the 'tag
number' on the bottom of your PC. This PC can't get onto javascript sites,
so I can't find the page to link for you, but I can post instructions here
if you want - let me know.



http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...0/en/index.htm

Dell laptops are about the easiest to do a breakdown on.

Small Flat head screwdriver. Small Phillips screwdriver. And make sure
you have Thermal Compound for remounting the heatsink assembly.

G.G.Willikers wrote:


snip

Dell laptops are about the easiest to do a breakdown on.

snip

Your wording is interesting ...

Regards

--
John Doue

On Wed, 02 Apr 2008 16:31:19 GMT, "G.G.Willikers"
wrote:

http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...0/en/index.htm

Dell laptops are about the easiest to do a breakdown on.

Small Flat head screwdriver. Small Phillips screwdriver. And make sure
you have Thermal Compound for remounting the heatsink assembly.


Why would you need to take the heatsink assembly off at all
unless replacing the CPU?

kony wrote:
On Wed, 02 Apr 2008 16:31:19 GMT, "G.G.Willikers"
wrote:

http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...0/en/index.htm

Dell laptops are about the easiest to do a breakdown on.

Small Flat head screwdriver. Small Phillips screwdriver. And make sure
you have Thermal Compound for remounting the heatsink assembly.


Why would you need to take the heatsink assembly off at all
unless replacing the CPU?

How about doing a thorough job, rather than something half-assed?

The original factory thermal paste is generally crap and dries out over
time. If the machine is already having heat issues, why would you not
cover all your bases?

Not to mention that a good dose of Arctic Silver is always an improvement.

If the machine is gunked up, your going to want to get the hair/ dust/
filth out of every crevice. inside the fan housing, in the vents and grill.

IF you're going to open it up, you might as well do a good job.

G.G.Willikers wrote:
kony wrote:
On Wed, 02 Apr 2008 16:31:19 GMT, "G.G.Willikers"
wrote:

http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...0/en/index.htm

Dell laptops are about the easiest to do a breakdown on.

Small Flat head screwdriver. Small Phillips screwdriver. And make
sure you have Thermal Compound for remounting the heatsink assembly.


Why would you need to take the heatsink assembly off at all
unless replacing the CPU?

How about doing a thorough job, rather than something half-assed?

The original factory thermal paste is generally crap and dries out over
time. If the machine is already having heat issues, why would you not
cover all your bases?

Not to mention that a good dose of Arctic Silver is always an improvement.

If the machine is gunked up, your going to want to get the hair/ dust/
filth out of every crevice. inside the fan housing, in the vents and grill.

IF you're going to open it up, you might as well do a good job.

Complete nonsense!! The OP's problem is a fouled heat pipe heat
exchanger. When that is cleaned out, his problem is solved.

In addition, many notebook CPUs have a heat transfer polymer strip
between the CPU and heat sink. Those that do cannot use anything other
than a polymer strip since there is no way to compensate for the excess
clearance with Arctic Silver and the like.

A good dose of Arctic Silver is a very thin film. A "good dose" is a
recipe for disaster.

Q

On Wed, 02 Apr 2008 23:23:51 GMT, "G.G.Willikers"
wrote:

kony wrote:
On Wed, 02 Apr 2008 16:31:19 GMT, "G.G.Willikers"
wrote:

http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...0/en/index.htm

Dell laptops are about the easiest to do a breakdown on.

Small Flat head screwdriver. Small Phillips screwdriver. And make sure
you have Thermal Compound for remounting the heatsink assembly.


Why would you need to take the heatsink assembly off at all
unless replacing the CPU?

How about doing a thorough job, rather than something half-assed?

Pretty nonsensical notion since the majority of notebooks
never have their heatsink taken off and run fine for the
life of the system.

There's nothing half-assed about solving the problem without
tearing apart unnecessary subsystems. Do you put a new head
gasket on your car when the steering pump is shot too?


The original factory thermal paste

Do you have any evidence of this in a notebook?
Mostly the limit in notebook cooling is not a small
difference in grease or thermal pad efficiency, it's the
airflow (or for other regions of the notebook that the fan
doesn't pull air through, the lack thereof).



is generally crap and dries out over
time. If the machine is already having heat issues, why would you not
cover all your bases?

1) If machine was overheating when new, it should have been
returned. No mention was made that this was the case.

2) If machine wasn't overheating new, it will not have had
the thermal material just vanish or self destruct in this
period of time. The solution is to focus on what is
different and amazingly enough we already heard what the
intention was, dust removal.

Do you also pull your video card heatsink off every time
there's dust in it? Maybe so, but likewise I can assure you
it's unnecessary.


Not to mention that a good dose of Arctic Silver is always an improvement.

Not worth the bother. The vast majority of systems don't
use it and work fine. A theoretical advantage has to pan
out as a real benefit - which merely dropping a couple
degrees in a system that isn't close to overheating is not.



If the machine is gunked up, your going to want to get the hair/ dust/
filth out of every crevice. inside the fan housing, in the vents and grill.

Duh? Has nothing to do with pulling heatsink off.
Hair/dust/etc isn't going to get into the CPU-sink mating
area, unless of course you pull that 'sink off in a
now-dusty environment like the inside of a used notebook.



IF you're going to open it up, you might as well do a good job.

If it makes you feel better go right ahead... meanwhile
everyone else who doesn't has gotten along fine too,
evidence you are stretching a point beyond reason.