[GTALUG] Power Mode: reducing fan noise on a notebook

[Giles Orr]

I don't recommend taking a laptop apart for this.  Generally the air
path for cooling the processor is very short, so the in and out air
vents are both close together and fairly obvious.  The easiest way to
clean this is to blow compressed air into one vent and watch the puff
of dust that comes out the other vent.  Should it not be obvious: do
this with the machine turned OFF.  I can imagine possible problems
with this method, but I've been doing it for years with reasonable
results and no problems - and it's a lot easier and faster than
attempting to disassemble your laptop.  Particularly as laptops get
harder to repair / disassemble.  For a desktop - disassembly is much
easier, and also more needed for this task.

It's also interesting that one could argue that an ad blocker in your
browser is for the good of your computer - it saves your processor and
fan from overheating.

On Fri, 31 May 2024 at 09:45, Don Tai via talk <talk at gtalug.org> wrote:
>
> Many web sites are doing a lot of javascript behind the scenes, to get as much info from you as possible. They may also be pulling in huge amounts of code from other web sites. Install the NoScript plugin and you'll see them all. Try an ad blocker. I find that Youtube and a couple of web sites, SCMP.com for example, run a ton of JS, which makes my laptop run hot.
>
> Also maybe you should open up your laptop and clean the inside, including the fan.
>
> On Fri, 31 May 2024 at 09:38, D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk <talk at gtalug.org> wrote:
>>
>> Most modern notebooks throw off a lot of heat when computing hard.
>> Too much heat can force the cooling fans to go faster and
>> therefore make more noise.
>> The notebook that I keep by our couch for casual use while watching TV
>> sometimes gets noisy.
>> What's the heavy computing doing?  Mostly running ads in Firefox.
>> Since I don't really care how quickly ads run, I've switched the "power
>> mode" to "power saver" and there seems to be less noise.
>>
>> Power Mode can be set several ways.  The way I used on Fedora 40's Gnome
>> Desktop:
>>         Settings: Power: Power Mode: Power Saver
>>
>> There is a slightly faster way that is harder to describe
>>
>> - click on top right of the screen (the little icons for networking, sound
>>   and power on are really one button)
>>
>> - that pops up a window showing a lot of things.  One is "Power Mode"
>>
>> - click on "Power Mode" and it will toggle between "Balanced" and "Power
>>   Saver" (at least on my desktop).
>>
>> - Alternatively click on the ">" symbol on the "Power Mode" oval to get
>>   all the choices displayed (including "Performance")
>>
>> Note: just how the fans behave under different Power Modes is specific to
>> the hardware.  YMMV.
>>
>> My suspicion is that vendors like their computers to have good benchmark
>> performance so the "balanced" mode is more likely to run fans than I'd
>> like.  I'm going to try "Power Saver" on more of my computers.
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-- 
Giles
https://www.gilesorr.com/
gilesorr at gmail.com