Laptop oveheats after W7 upgrade

Hi,
I'm hoping somebody can help with a problem I'm getting since upgrading my laptop from Vista to 7.
Laptop has allways been faultless before the OS upgrade (clean install). After the upgrade yes it runs quicker but it overheats and shuts down. -The laptop is getting hotter than usual and depending on CPU demand will just shut down, the only warning being the fan speed increasing just before it dies. I have tried the following;

1. Cleaned out the fan and air dusted all under the cover. -even tried freezer spray to the bottom cover!!!
2. restored all the drivers I had backed up before the instal.
3. checked the latency on the system (the computer is mainly used for Music) APCI.sys sits high on the demand list and its latency increases as CPU heats. -Not sure if this is the problem, can find no reliable info as to if I can stop it running (not listed in the services
4. removed battery and ran the laptop. -still shuts down and runs red hot!
5. checked the Acer website for driver. It only has drivers listed for Vista and XP (not tried these as yet).

Was thinking of updating all drivers to latest using a driver update program, had allready done the CPU update but to be honest I have had problems before with the updated drivers causing more problems than they solve on other PC's.

Seems to be a lot about Win 7 causing overheat problems but have not seen any solutions, Can anybody help me before my processor goes into melt down?

Many thanks,

Matt

How long have you had the laptop? The CPU itself could be going bad. To verifiy this, and I know this is a pain in the butt, reinstall Vista and check CPU for overheating. If it's ok do as OldMX suggested re-install 7, go to each hardware's website from laptop and get latest driver from them, not from the make of laptop...ie HP, Dell (those are just the drivers they used when making the laptop and not the latest). Then check for over heating.

Hi,

Thanks for you advice.

I took the advice from OLDmx above, found the latest BIOS and installed that. -bit hairy as the computer seemed to overheat and shut of near the end of the instal! -when it did come back up (had to remove power and battery for a short time to get it to come back up) I reloaded W7.
This seemed to sort the problem out. left it for a week and all was well (or so I thought).
I then reloaded McAfee and a few other programs that I use, -no where near restored to what I used to have installed and guess what?
After prolonged use or even just a short spell of downloads the overheat problem has returned! -It can get red hot within half hour!
-It is not related to running Traktor (a DJ audio program that will use a large amount of memory as it plays two or more MP3's simultaniously) as it has even crashed just running the bundled windows media player and internet explorer.
I have emailed Microsoft and sent the MSDT results to them but does anybody have any other ideas I can try???

Thanks,

Matt

Something in the system, Win 7, other program or BIOS setting is stopping either the fan/s to turn on at a lower temperature or setting the CPU into FULL power mode all the time instead of using Speed Step to throttle the CPU speed.

Along with this the CPU heat sink could be failing which would stop the movement of heat away from the CPU to whatever radiator the fans blow across to cool down the CPU.

Cheers guys.

I have re installed Win 7 64 bit as my Acer is 64 bit ready (don't know why but though it might help. Had nothing to lose).. also have changed the power settings as per fafrhd's email above. That really has helped to keep the temperature more managable. Now it does not trip and it seems the fan will cut in earlier. -though still seems to get hotter, quicker, than usual. -I have not tried the sys internals suite yet. Will try running tomorrow but have tried running a latency monitor program earlier. ACPI.sys sits head and shoulders above any other driver in its processor drain. It runs every 15mS for a duration of 2000uS. Well above all the other driver or processes that run on the computer. I can even see the core temperature peak a bit when it runs too! -could this be part of the problem???? can it be updated or removed?

Will try the sys internals suite and see if that sheds any light. Also will renew the thermal compound this week, if the computer survives the cider my good lady just knocked over it! (so far it has only claimed the glide pad.......)
mind you that extra heat could be usefull in drying it out in this instance! ;-).

Matt

I will check back with the results. Again thanks for the support.
MUCH better than the Acer\Windows support I have had thus far!!!!

fafhrd

"Download the sysinternals suite of utilities - we are interested in Process Explorer - but the other utilities are pretty useful too, and worth having:"


......In Sys internals, process explorer system idle process always remains in the top 5. between 40 -80% CPU process power. Private bytes =0. working set = 24 Guess thats telling me the period that nothing is happening? or else its a massive black hole of nothingness! what should I be looking for?