What would you do
 

My main computer was/is a HP DV-7 I did all my web pages and image/video work on it, did everything I wanted to do with power to spare. The last 2 months it's spent more then 5 separate weeks at the repair depot, It was overheating etc, this past week I sent it back in when it got warm enough to transfer plastic from a cooler to the base of the computer (laptop cooler with fans) I got a shipment notice from them without the case manager calling like she said she would to inform me of what the issue is. I was told by the person they replaced the fan....again.....

This is what they've done and what I've done

Replaced Fan (first time)

Replaced heatsinks and systemboard

Replaced fan again

(other unrelated work they did (I hope unrelated) )
Screen, other one was loosing color

Keyboard (multiple Key loss and failure)

What I've done
I've reset the computer's OS back to Factory default, backed up all my data and did that. computer still ran hot

Replaced the HDD with a brand new one and a fresh copy of Vista. Again, still ran hot

Freecycled a laptop cooling tray thing (has fans in it)

Computer Transferred plastic from the top of the cooler to the bottom of the computer (yes, that warm)

Of late I hadbeen using the computer 30 minutes at a time and shutting it down for an hour and a half between use (pain in the butt to do)

So, basically they are returning it without doing much of anything.... what would you do?

find an open window.....

Very very Tempting.

Try a different circuit in the house...
Have you replaced the power supply ?
Are you sure the route of incoming air is not blocked by dust filter ?

Happens on several different Circuits of the house, power supply was replaced by them the last go around, forgot to place it on the list, and the heatsink/fan etc is new, barely 8 hours of total use and the air flow passageways are clear, It's confused me...

It has an AMD processor? These run hotter than the Intel CPUs. I have a loud, hot-running Gateway with AMD and two cooler, quieter HP's with Intel. [Disclaimers - one HP just had the motherboard replaced under warranty due to no-boot. The other HP repair was due to a teenager ripping out the DC jack. The loud/hot Gateway has been solid with no HW issues.]

Having also recently replaced the motherboard on an HP-HDX and seen the poor condition of the overcooked and crumbly thermal pad you may consider trying to help the situation by opening it up and replacing HP's pads on the video processor and the CPU heat sinks with a high-quality thermal paste. Some discussion here: http://forums.cnet.com/7723-7591_102-64247.html

My understanding is that pads are used in mass-produced assemblies since it's a stick-and-proceed solution with low probability of error vice the paste/grease solutions that require bit more skill to apply properly.

Find the online manual for disassembly and try to isolate specifically which component is overheating. I'd guess it's the video portion, but that's a guess. You may be able to set hardware acceleration to a minimum which could reduce that temp.

If it was doing it before they replaced the motherboard/systemboard and it's doing it again, then it's probably a poor design coupled with the settings.

yeah, thermal paste my next suggestion too...

It's factory settings, I've done nothing to speed it up. but it's worth looking into If I cant get satisfaction out of them. Still waiting on a call from the so called case manager...

Continuing the heat thing:-

This is a laptop right? My Dell gets really hot so I prop it up on my Haynes manual to give it a bit of air circulation. Also quite handy when you need to write in "well my Haynes manual says"...

Put the old computer down range and see if a steel cored 7.62x54R round might heal it.

If that fails I'd buy a new one.

If that were an option I would consider it... but I cant buy another computer right now..

Check your Power Manager or whatever that is and see if you can set it to "max conserve". They may have the on-AC power settings for "Max Performance".

You might also try running it on AC, but with no battery installed. You could have a bad/old battery that's drawing current through the motherboard circuits. There was a battery recall, but I don't know the cause or symptoms.

Does Vista on the laptop include diagnostics to query temps and fan speeds? If not, check CNET for utilities, maybe something like this: http://www.snapfiles.com/get/siw.html

I haven't used it, can't vouch for no malware, viruses, etc. Just an idea.

Sounds like there's an obvious heat transfer issue in there...You said they replaced the heat sink - did they use good thermal paste? "Arctic Silver" is pretty much the standard paste, I've got a few tubes myself from (way too many) computer repairs and tinkering. Also, you said that the screen colors would get funky when it gets hot - this is extremely indicative of the video processor overheating. I would check with the repair guys to see if they also repaired/replaced the graphics processor heatsink. There's a program that I use called Speccy http://download.cnet.com/Speccy/3000-2094_4-11906231.html
If you click on the graphics tab it'll tell you the temperature of the GPU, or track down what else is heating up and/or not right.

HP has the computer at the moment. I had the power settings on Max battery and performance set to max the life of the battery. Not sure if it's the GPU or not. it heats up where the processor is and the middle back so maybe a combo of the two. I dont know what Paste was used between the processor and sink, I've not opened up the computer to work on it, as it's covered under their warranty somewhat still.

Have the vents been cleaned?

How hot does the CPU get, and does it crash? If the computer is stable it is probably within operating temps. Does it get too hot regardless of what you're doing or only when you are putting it under heavy load?

if I let it go it does shut down. Gets hot no matter what. takes more time when the computer is idle,

I wonder if there's a problem with the thermal paste on the CPU/heatsink

Anything is possible at this point. I dont think they ever Changed the processor so it could be a problem with it too.

AquaticEdge,

I have a HP dv3 laptop that had the following problem:
After about 15 minutes of use from a fresh start with the A/C cord plugged in, the laptop screen would go dark in the Windows 7 OS and then shut itself down. I could immediately start it back up and it would take me to a screen that said that Windows 7 was improperly shut down, yadah yadah yadah...

This HP dv3 is powered by an AMD processor. (Turion 64 maybe?)

Here is what I did and it helped expand the shutdown time from 15 minutes to about 45 minutes. (Doing all of the below allowed 45 minutes of run time.)

-Used canned air to blow out the vents, but only a small amount of dust came out... could not be the sole reason for overheating...

-Removed the battery, this gave me a large chunk of the 30 minute time upgrade.

-Removed the keyboard and cleaned under it. There was a surprising amount of dust/dirt, but nothing covering vital heat sinks and such so I am not sure this actually helped at all.

I was nervous about taking apart this HP. It is simply not built very well and the parts are thin plastic prone to cracking and stripping. I had an IBM ThinkPad T43 before this laptop and boy did I take on a huge downgrade when going from the ThinkPad to this pile of garbage HP.

What I ended up doing short of applying new thermal paste between the CPU, GPU and heat sink was to take an Exacto knife and cut out all of the small vertical plastic bars covering the copper/aluminum air intake and exhaust ports.

After this modification, I could run the laptop in High Performance mode with the battery installed, and the A/C plugged in all day long. The laptop gets hot and the fan is almost always at top RPMs, but it never shuts down on its own anymore.

My advice to any one reading this: Never buy an HP laptop powered by an AMD processor. You will most likely regret it. My next laptop is going to either be a Macbook or a ThinkPad.

I'd never used the canned air on my computer, moisture and electronics dont mix... but I may investigate the CPU thermal Gel and see what if anything is on there, I'm supposed to get the computer back tomorrow...

Canned air is dry air made for blowing the dust off things like motherboards....
Heat and electronics don't mix either.... and an insulation layer of dust can make a difference...

If they took it apart and replaced all these parts, i am betting dust is not the problem... unless they are total dummies and didn't clean the vents and heatsink.

I was amazed at the amount of dust wedged into the fins on my daughter's computer. But she would use it flat on the carpet or on her bed, so that added lint. It would not have come clean with just air from the outside.

Remember that spraying air from out to in only pushes the dust around.

The disassembly manual on HP's site was surprisingly thorough. You can remove most components without full disassembly of the laptop.

But...assuming HP's done this twice already under warranty the chances are good that it's been cleaned, particularly if they already replaced the fan.

They were supposed to call me tonight. she did not.... Irked. I called them 3 times today to find out what they did "she's on the other line but as soon as she's done she'll call you riiiiiiight back" I called back "She's gone home for the day...." Not happy..... not happy at all......

Computer came back. case manager called. they are replacing the computer. now I need to move 800GB worth of data.... weeeeee

I "Would" buy a Macintosh. :D

I enjoy right clicking oh so much though....

I'm not too fond of mac computers, I know they are better then the ones I used but I would have to relearn some different programs and the price tag is prohibitive, I wouldnt say no to a free one though just to play with, get to use. I know they have some nice Video editing software etc

Just having to move that data sounds like a pretty good end to this story....

the Joke is now I need to find my backup Drive. I forgot where I put it.... too bad you cant have dual HDD's in laptops....

Look, we can't help with BAD ORGANIC MEMORY....
you just have to go find that backup HD...
at least you were smart enough to make a backup....

lol too bad there isnt a backup to organic memory, would save me a lot of hassle lol.

There IS !!!! Paper and Pen...