[AW14] Do you prefer quieter or cooler machine?

I've noticed that the AW14 has a interesting way to manage system temp and noise.
When the cpu is not in heavy load(like normal browsing or watching video), the fan stops completely.
Unlike the other laptops I've seen, which keep the fan spinning in low rev all the time, that makes our machines very quiet and even silent if you run your os on a ssd at idle.
The trade off is the cpu keeps it's temp around 50 C even with minimal load, and the chassis remains pretty warm
I would not say it is burning hot but it's annoying. With the same ambient temperature, my old laptop with a sandybridge i5 runs at around 35-40 C and the whole machine remains completely cool. The temp management of that laptop is poor, but it still achieve completely cool body when not gaming. The trick is keeping the fan spinning in low rev all the time even when idle. Is it loud? barely noticible. The WD in our systems definitely runs louder.
Then why not keep the fan spinning? (at very low rpm) The fan is loud I know, but quietness is something I am willing to sacrifice to have a cooler lap and laptop.
Alienware is doing a good job of listening from users and giving updates accordingly (like fixing the temp cap of gpu) and I appreciate it a lot. I really hope they will bring fan control to our systems. So people desire quietness can keep the current setting and people who don't mind noise can have the option to keep the fan spinning.

 

I personally don't care about noise. As long as the fan isn't full blast all the time. I completely understand it kicking into high when playing an intense game. Id rather the machine stay cool even f that means having the fans running at a low rpm all the time.

I am sure this is done to try ti increase battery life. I don't care about battery life on these machines either. if I am surfing the web sitting on the couch i might want an hour or two. If battery life is a concern i wouldnt buy this kind of machine anyway.

I say keep it cool no matte the noise!

 

I couldn't care a less about noise, I prefer lower tempertures overall than a dead silent fan.

I actually use HWiNFO even if I'm not using my M14X as I personally believe 50C is too high for idle temperatures. On my m14x the fans don't even seem to kick in until 50 degrees on the table.

 

Finally I've decided to risk my rig (very conservatively) and fiddle with HWiNFO
I've set the fan table as following

And the idle temperature dropped by 10 whole degrees
When the fan spins slower that 2000rpm, it is actually quieter than the WD hdd, so it's barely audible
Now I'll do a "laptop" test to see how much better it is now on my lap

Still tweaking for the sweet spot, so please share your fan table with us!!

 

It's a pretty amazing program. A little bit of future advice; you might need to consider is changing the table to one constant RPM across the board whilst gaming, i only use the lookuptable changes for idle and browsing.

I swear to god, there is nothing more annoying than the fan changing RPMS during gaming on such a table like that at default, the noise is so irritating when it happens frequently; and on a table like that, trust me! It will

 

well, keeping a constant rpm while gaming, i suppose it's a pretty high rpm? Will it stress the fan too much?

 

Either way when you're gaming it's going to keep going up and down. the difference between 2000-3000 RPM in terms of volume is pretty large. You'll see what I mean later.

 

ok I'm now trying out different rpm with manual setting
yeah it's annoying if the rpm keeps changing
May I ask what is the max rpm in stock setting?
I've tried 4500rpm and it's pretty crazy
I don't want the fan to die as I love my rig too much, on the other hand if the fan speed is not high enough,
the chips will die when I'm pushing it during gaming
So I just want to tweak the fan speed in low load while keep the stock setting in high temperature

 

Re-paste the GPU and CPU and it will be even better! I think you can re-paste the 765M, but not the 750M - it's soldered in.

Maybe I'm wrong...

 

The 750 and 765 are both soldered in.

 

I thought you can always repaste the machine no matter the chips are soldered in or not?
As the only thing needed to be removed is the heatsink...

 

Brand new performance gaming laptop in 2013, and we still have to re-paste?

Are Alienware not even bothering to paste the CPU and GPU correctly?

 

I think using a higher-end thermal compound, plus applying it more carefully will result in 3-4 C difference?
assuming the stock thermal compound is ...eh....not that high class.
Anyway I don't think repasting is necessary, as the cause of the problem is the fan control.

edit:
I've tested gaming with the tweaked fan table(differ from the one I posted above), the result was quite amazing. Both cpu and gpu remained below 70 C.

 

A re-paste can help up to 15C while gaming. I've seen GPU's that used to reach the mid 80's never get passed 70C after a re-paste. Maybe at idle 3-5C is about right, but not during intense gaming.

All I'm trying to say: your idea of fan control + re-paste = optimum cooling.

 

I prefer a good mix of cool & quiet.

I find that the fan stays off until around 58 degrees and then turns up to about 2000 rpm just above that. Which is noticeable.

Even using a SSD with the 7200 rpm drive removed, just doing my regular work, I find the CPU occasionally hits around 60 so the fan turns on and off every few minutes, which is very annoying.

Using HWInfo, running at 1600 rpm, the fan is almost inaudible and the temp hovers around 50 degrees (the GPU drops into the 40's which is nice).

I would love to know what values people are using. It would be great if I could just load up the default system values and tweak them to my preference rather than make them up from scratch.

 

Wouldn't it still have a heatsink and fan assembly whether it's soldered or not? I've never done a re-paste but I'm guessing a repaste might improve things regardless?

Cheers,

 

Just about every laptop that isn't installed in a boutique is usually badly pasted. So repasting is usually a big plus for temps. Especially for Haswell, which is infamous for it's murdering of many laptop cooling systems.