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Compaq Presario 700 laptop overheating (Problem Solved?)



 
 
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  #11  
Old July 17th 03, 08:52 AM
John Edward Scott
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"Dillon Family" wrote in message
...
I did a search on that amdk7.sys file, and I seem to have it in several
locations on my XP laptop, including in C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\DRIVERS and
C:\WINDOWS\ServicePackFiles\i386 as well as C:\I386 and some file folders
with long numerical strings. So, I guess I have the software (all the

files
in question have the Date Modified as 8/29/2002. It just doesn't show up

as
a separate function in the power section of Control Panel.

Thanks.

SNIP

Hi Dillon,

Hmmm, well from what I understand (and its been a *long slow* learning
process!) the Windows Update for XP should install that file for you,
although by the sounds of what you've described (i.e. nothing showing up in
Control Panel) it sounds like its downloaded it but not installed
it....although I may be wrong.

One think you could try....you could download the PowerNow Dashboard
application from the AMD website and see if it complains that PowerNow isn't
installed (I think when I first ran it something like "PowerNow is
available, but not installed" came up)....it's worth a try.

John.



  #12  
Old July 21st 03, 02:53 AM
Rob King
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"Rob King" wrote in message
...

"John Edward Scott" wrote in message
...

"John Edward Scott" wrote in message
...
Hi all,

Like many others I bought a compaq presario laptop 700 series (729EA)

and
after a while I discovered it was prone to overheating (an

understatement
if
ever I heard one!). I trawled through the newsgroups and google

applying
various patches etc, looking on the compaq website and applied the

Softpaqs
it mentioned and the keyboard and mousepad updates that were

suggested.

SNIP

Just as a follow-up to myself ....it's currently a hot summers day here

(for
England anyway!) and my fan is running far less and quieter than it did

in
mid-winter. The PowerNow software has DEFINITELY made a difference.

5 days without a crash now...and counting..


Well I wish the service people would hurry up and return mine so I can try
this....... apparently work has been authorised to fix it.

And I bet the dude never once looked at this newsgroup :-)


Actually I have finally got the notebook back and they did in fact do
something to it. They seem to have looked up the same support sites as me
(or got the info direct from Compaq) and done the old
new-heat-compound-paste on the cpu trick.

We got it home and fired it up. Things seemed to run quite happily until I
tried to do something really menial. Bam! Total lock up again.

So, I thought, bugger this, before I take it back AGAIN, I will nuke the
whole HDD and completely reinstall the OS from scratch. So, on wnet WinXP
Pro + SP1. I downloaded the PowerNow software and it showed the everything
running at maximum. I scrounged the MS site for that PowerNow CPU driver
and installed that (5.1.2600.1106 is the latest verion apparently).
PowerNow now shows everything at minimum with occasional spikes up to the
max when under load. I'm assuming this is how PowerNow works?

Anyway, haven't had a lockup since the reinstall. I've also avoided
installing any of the Compaq software as WinXP drives it all anyway and I
don't much care for the easy access stuff.


  #13  
Old July 22nd 03, 04:42 AM
Martian
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"John Edward Scott" wrote in message

...the PowerNow software seems to run the CPU at minimum speed/temp until
you do anything *demanding* and then it cranks up the CPU speed. Which means
if you run loads of stuff thats very CPU intensive you might still get the
lockup problems since the CPU will be running at max speed anyway, but for
the majority of people it should at least give the CPU a chance to cool down
when its sitting doing nothing.

I've made sure that I now only run the software I need to (stopped
unecessary services etc), I've also disabled my previous OpenGL screensaver
and gone for a simpler one just that the CPU isn't sitting burning away
while I'm not in the room.


What annoys me is that for almost 5 months, I had no problems, even
with additional RAM and running a CD with other applications
simultaneously. After the new main board was installed (because of a
power problem), it was running like molasses and seemed to worsen
after I burned some CDs using the Roxio that came with it.

The phone rep had me re-run the Softpaq that reflashes the BIOS and
handles heat, so I did that, but it kept crashing. I pulled out the
RAM upgrade, set all the performance settings to the defaults (it
never worked right before the RAM upgrade with the default settings,
but I decided to try it anyway).

Then I visited the Windows Download Center and manually downloaded all
the recommended upgrades and installed them except the Jet 7 (the
downloads had failed even when done one-by-one from the Windows Update
page). People had been warning me about DirectX 9.0a, the Windows
Messenger upgrade, and the Media Player 9, so I did set another
restore point before downloading them. After the downloads, I
installed each and rebooted even if it didn't say I had to.
Amazingly, the machine has now been up without a crash for 7 hours!!!
It does want the Messenger to run all the time now, but that's a small
price to pay for having the use of it!

Although the RAM never seemed to be an issue, I think I'll leave it
out to be safe. There is clearly something unexplainable going on.
It still has the msconfig set not to load services except for my virus
checker and personal firewall, and I don't think this should be
required, but I just want the thing to run at this point. I'll
continue my burn-in tomorrow by taking it with me and using it on the
road to see how it does.

--Jane
  #14  
Old July 22nd 03, 01:31 PM
John Edward Scott
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Posts: n/a
Default


"Martian" wrote in message
om...
"John Edward Scott" wrote in message

...the PowerNow software seems to run the CPU at minimum speed/temp

until
you do anything *demanding* and then it cranks up the CPU speed. Which

means
if you run loads of stuff thats very CPU intensive you might still get

the
lockup problems since the CPU will be running at max speed anyway, but

for
the majority of people it should at least give the CPU a chance to cool

down
when its sitting doing nothing.

I've made sure that I now only run the software I need to (stopped
unecessary services etc), I've also disabled my previous OpenGL

screensaver
and gone for a simpler one just that the CPU isn't sitting burning away
while I'm not in the room.


What annoys me is that for almost 5 months, I had no problems, even
with additional RAM and running a CD with other applications
simultaneously. After the new main board was installed (because of a
power problem), it was running like molasses and seemed to worsen
after I burned some CDs using the Roxio that came with it.

The phone rep had me re-run the Softpaq that reflashes the BIOS and
handles heat, so I did that, but it kept crashing. I pulled out the
RAM upgrade, set all the performance settings to the defaults (it
never worked right before the RAM upgrade with the default settings,
but I decided to try it anyway).

Then I visited the Windows Download Center and manually downloaded all
the recommended upgrades and installed them except the Jet 7 (the
downloads had failed even when done one-by-one from the Windows Update
page). People had been warning me about DirectX 9.0a, the Windows
Messenger upgrade, and the Media Player 9, so I did set another
restore point before downloading them. After the downloads, I
installed each and rebooted even if it didn't say I had to.
Amazingly, the machine has now been up without a crash for 7 hours!!!
It does want the Messenger to run all the time now, but that's a small
price to pay for having the use of it!

Although the RAM never seemed to be an issue, I think I'll leave it
out to be safe. There is clearly something unexplainable going on.
It still has the msconfig set not to load services except for my virus
checker and personal firewall, and I don't think this should be
required, but I just want the thing to run at this point. I'll
continue my burn-in tomorrow by taking it with me and using it on the
road to see how it does.

--Jane


I'm still not *convinced* that the problem is due to one thing on my machine
(Presario 729EA), the PowerNow software
has definitely cut the crashes and overheats down by a HUGE factor. I still
have my suspicions though that something is not quite right
with the graphics driver or the mousepad/touchpad. Since my lockups always
seemed to happen just as I suddenly moved the mouse.

I installed all the patches etc that Compaq advised, plus the Microsoft
ones. I'm currently running the latest driver for my graphics card
so if there's a problem with that then I'm stuck. But as I said, I'm just
happy that the machine isn't overheating every 30 minutes now like it
used to.....one step at a time!

John.


  #15  
Old July 23rd 03, 03:20 AM
Rob King
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I'm still not *convinced* that the problem is due to one thing on my
machine
(Presario 729EA), the PowerNow software
has definitely cut the crashes and overheats down by a HUGE factor. I

still
have my suspicions though that something is not quite right
with the graphics driver or the mousepad/touchpad. Since my lockups always
seemed to happen just as I suddenly moved the mouse.

I installed all the patches etc that Compaq advised, plus the Microsoft
ones. I'm currently running the latest driver for my graphics card
so if there's a problem with that then I'm stuck. But as I said, I'm just
happy that the machine isn't overheating every 30 minutes now like it
used to.....one step at a time!


Funny you should say that, as I noticed most lock ups occurred when doing a
trackpad movement. When I reinstalled the notebook from scratch I made the
point of not installing any extraneous drivers for the touchpad, sound and
access keys. Haven't had a lockup yet and it runs at a decent temp now.

Perhaps you want to reformat your HDD and install just the OS from scratch?


  #16  
Old July 23rd 03, 06:31 AM
Martian
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Posts: n/a
Default

"Rob King" wrote in message ...
I'm just
happy that the machine isn't overheating every 30 minutes now like it
used to.....one step at a time!


Funny you should say that, as I noticed most lock ups occurred when doing a
trackpad movement. When I reinstalled the notebook from scratch I made the
point of not installing any extraneous drivers for the touchpad, sound and
access keys. Haven't had a lockup yet and it runs at a decent temp now.

Perhaps you want to reformat your HDD and install just the OS from scratch?


I had put a clean load on, so I'm not sure that will help. Also, mine
has been crashing not only after mouse movement, but also when I'm
doing absolutely nothing, typing email, or just playing a music CD.

I've been very careful to keep the intake and blower vents clear and
I've tried to keep it as near the air conditioning as possible, since
it's hot weather here now (this never seemed to bother my old Compaq
laptops, though). I haven't put the RAM back in (although it was
problematic before the RAM, which was why I was so adamant about
reinstalling it). So far, so good. I am absolutely paranoid about
trying to put the RAM back in.

I asked Compaq about PowerNow, and it is supposedly operational. It
does slow down the processor depending on need when I don't set the
power setting to home/desktop.

I wouldn't feel safe playing a game on it, although after I get my
dissertation finalized, I plan to put it through its paces while it's
still under warranty!

--Jane
 




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