Laptop fan on full at startup for 5 minutes

richc72 · 31 Jan 2014

I have recently upgraded my HP Pavilion dv6799ea laptop from Vista to Windows 7 (32-bit). Everything works fine except one thing. On startup, when entering Windows, the fan comes on at full power. It remains on full power for 5 minutes, regardless of what the computer is doing during this time. The CPU and hard disk may be idle, it makes no difference. After exactly 5 minutes, the fan suddenly stops blowing at full power and reduces to its normal low level for the remainder of the time the computer is on.

When resuming from sleep or hibernation, the fan does exactly the same thing, again staying at full power for exactly 5 minutes before reducing. Needless to say, it did not do this in Vista, only since upgrading to Windows 7.

Any suggestions about this would be welcome.

bawldiggle · 31 Jan 2014

Hi richc72 welcome to the forum :)

My Toshiba laptop (15 months old) has been doing the same thing for about 4 to 6 months, without any OS changes.
I know it needs a clean, my keyboard is always dusty. I am led to believe some air intakes are through the keyboard spaces (?)

Recently cleaned my Acer-Vista laptop which had a fan-on-a-lot problem. Its back to acceptable operation levels.

How long since you cleaned the internals of your originally Vista lappy?

Not suggesting it is not the upgrade, but dust is an enemy of CPUs ... the fan.
Be warned don't use a household vacuum on your lappy, blowing or sucking. It can cause damage.

There are some excellent step by step YouTubes on how to clean lappies, even brand specific.
It takes a bit of trawling through the weak videos to find good tutes.

Hope this helps :)

MattPanton · 31 Jan 2014

It may be a BIOS setting? Fans can generally be configured in the BIOS, whether it be enabling/disabling them to setting the RPM of each one. Hope this helps!

joeycedric · 01 Feb 2014

I always clean my cpu fan with a little brush (not too large, not too small an about 5 cm length brush) you can either use a humide cotton cloth (NOT WET). Use your brush to clean the metal heat conductor of your Fan and the humide cloth for the palms of the fan itself.

But I believe that dust might not be the only problem. Some process at the boot up stage may require more cpu power hence affecting the cpu fan speed. If that's the case you don't need to worry that's usually normal procedure.

Furthermore, don't touch the BIOS fan configuration! If the BIOS detects an increase cpu heat it will automatically adjust the speed of the fan else your cpu may overheat.

madcratebuilder · 01 Feb 2014

I would look at the BIOS, most LT's control the fan with BIOS. Some new LT's may have a program for cleaning the fan. It runs the fan at full rpm for several minutes, then slows it down to normal speeds.

Slartybart · 01 Feb 2014

The only time my HP dv6 blows at full speed is when I apply a BIOS update.
Your machine might think there's a pending BIOS update and it tries to apply it every time.

The 'current' BIOS v F.58 A for your machine is for Vista, what version is the BIOS on your machine?

richc72 · 02 Feb 2014

Thanks for your suggestions.

I keep the laptop very clean and have cleaned the fan vents recently. There doesn't seem to be any build up of dust which would be causing this. After the initial 5 minutes, the fan calms down do a very low level and stays there, even when the CPU is working quite hard.

The BIOS is quite basic, it just allows the running of a few system checks, changing the boot order etc. There are no fan settings.

The BIOS I have installed is F.59, which was an HP authorised update a few years ago. I am wondering whether to try going back to the F.58 BIOS to see if that makes any difference.

Slartybart · 02 Feb 2014

Make sure that I found your machine: Software & driver downloads HP Pavilion dv6799ea Special Edition Entertainment Notebook PC | HP® Support

I don't see an F.59 under BIOS.

The other thing about my machine that is cooling related is CoolSense. I removed that HP utility and my laptop actually ran cooler - go figure.

If CoolSense is on you machine, you might consider uninstalling it. I had some strange things occur when I tried to put it back on using an updated version - I don't recall the specifics.. but it wouldn't install, it would install, after fiddling, it wouldn't start.... just a flakey experience. So needless to say, it's not on my machine and I'm running a consistent 10 degrees cooler with no spikes in temps.

I'd try them one at a time and see. BIOS first - yep I'd roll it back.

both of these are suggestions - it's always your call.

your mileage might vary....

Bill
.

richc72 · 05 Feb 2014

Yes, that is my computer.

I have rolled the BIOS back to F.58 A but unfortunately that hasn't made any difference. I don't have CoolSense on this machine so that's not a problem. Thanks for the suggestions though.

Slartybart · 09 Feb 2014

You might try setting BIOS to defaults, if you haven't already.

Check your power plan advanced options
Processor power management -> Cooling policy

Is it active or Passive? -> mine is active for both AC and DC