Latitude E6400 - Very HOOTT on left palm rest!! :(

HI Guys,

Recently got a Latitude E6400 w/ 2.66Ghz, 4GB RAM, nvidia 160m, 250GB (7200rpm). The left Palm rest is often very hot to keep my hand on it. I even use Antec Laptop cooler pad.

Checking temperatures using speedfan, I have following temps when the left palm rest is hot:

GPU - 55-60C
HDD - 42C
Temp1: 37C
Core 0: 32C
Core 1: 38C

Anything wrong here? Every thing is damn good w/ the laptop, but this heat is causing way too much discomfort.

 

Hi and welcome to the forums.

The left palm rest is where your hard drive sits. I'd say 42C is still within the norm of a hard drive temp, but if you'd like to see cooler temps, you may want to invest in a cooler.

 

The hard drive is directly below that spot, and from what I can see the hard drive is fairly hot. I usually consider 45C to be hot for a drive, and 55C to be deadly to a drive. My HDD on my E6400 is currently running at 35C, and with somewhat frequent activity right now, and the palm rest is fine to me. But I purchased my 250GB drive after market from Seagate because I didn't feel like playing the Dell lottery.

Try going into the BIOS and setting the hard drive settings to 'quiet.' It might not make that much of a difference though, but it is worth a shot.

Also, are you seeing a lot of hard drive activity on the E6400 right now? Vista (if that is what you are using) might be indexing the drive thus keeping it actively working.

 

Thanks. Yah I don't understand why Dell Latitudes always have HD placed beneath the left palm rest. It shold be placed on the other end of the laptop.

What size/rpm drive is urs? May be 5400rpm? I think since I have 250G (7200rpm) it is probably higher temp than yours. Yah anything more than 40C is going to warm and in summer it will be even hotter

 

Well, Dell has to put something there, and generally, HDDs run cooler than something like a CPU. You wouldn't want a CPU at 70C under load there. Ouch.

I have a 7200rpm drive, and mine typically runs at about 38C while room temps are about 22C. Right now, I'm in a 28C room (yes, we don't really like air conditioning , and my drive is 41C. (both numbers at idle).

 

Also what's up w/ 54-60C for GPU? I have nvidia 160M... Anyone else w/ nvidia have same temperatures?

Normal usage (web browsing, folders etc), nvidia GPU temp is 60C+... seem very high? I wonder if there is way to underclock?

 

This is the exact drive I have, it is a 7200RPM drive.
http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Momentus-7200-3-ST9250421ASG-internal/dp/B001GPVGZ6

Some brands of hard drives do run hotter than others, that is a given fact.

Those temps are quite normal for a dedicated graphics card. If you want to downclock the graphics card, I would suggest you update your drivers using what is available at www.nvidia.com and then also download nTune. You should be able to downclock with that tool.

 

See Tom's Hardware for some useful power consumption charts. Maximum, minimum and one in between. I'm currently using the Hitachi 5K500.B which runs at about 12C above ambient temperature. It scores extremely well on that streaming video power consumption.

John

 

Thanks guys.. seems like 55-65C for nvidia GPU is normal.. thats hot!

 

Not really, well not for silicon that is. 'Silicon hot' is a blistering 95-105C. Yes, sometimes I can boil water with my desktop graphics card (it doesn't get that hot unless something is blocking the fan) .