I have this problem with old my PC which is seldom use for linux work. My old PC configuration is Pentium 4 2.0GHZ, 1.2GB DDR1 RAM. It has xubuntu installed on it. It rarely hangs but when i do something graphical work the screen freezes or restarts or hangs the mahcine. I do noticed some bad sectors on disk and that makes it more problematic but still that is not the real issue.
If i remove the hard disk and run the pen drive linux (puppy linux) on 1gb drive and work on it, same stuff happens. CPU gets heated during graphical work and restarts. I know it is old computer and could have issues with modern graphic libs but even small low graphic version linux or windows xp experienced the same issue. Even running live linux cd and then using some graphical outputlike screensaver also freezes or hangs the system.
I think this could be because of the CPU fan speed reduction which increases heat but i am not sure about it. I also don't know if i can get fan for this brand of processor. I am searching in ebay so hoping to find it.
What do you think could be the issue?
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27 replies to this topic
#3
Posted 17 March 2012 - 06:59 PM
Yes. it is running on-board graphics. As this is old mahcine and graphic cards were expensive for me during that time so i never added anything to it and gone with the onboard setup.
The thing is that any graphical activity and window pausing for few seconds is likely to cause CPU heating.
What could be solution to this?
1. Replacement of fan?
2. Using some cooler?
3. Using additional fan near?
I really want to save this machine beyond 10 years because right now. I have just one more laptop and don't have plans or funds to invest into new machine. So looking for a way to reduce CPU heating.
The thing is that any graphical activity and window pausing for few seconds is likely to cause CPU heating.
What could be solution to this?
1. Replacement of fan?
2. Using some cooler?
3. Using additional fan near?
I really want to save this machine beyond 10 years because right now. I have just one more laptop and don't have plans or funds to invest into new machine. So looking for a way to reduce CPU heating.
#4
Ahsaniqbal111
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Posted 17 March 2012 - 10:06 PM
I had a similar issue with my old p4 system. The configuration of that system is 2.4ghz processor , 512mb ram and on board graphics card. I did suffer slot with my system but I thing was lucky to find the solution instead of burning the CPU. I will advise you to first of all confirm the issue. I did it by going into the bios of the cocomputer and checking the values of different temperature sensors there. It was possible for me to check the temperature in the bios because my CPU stAyed on only for a couple of minutes and then automatically turned off. So it was nit related to graphics or other intensive applications but the basic problem was the salsas yours. So first of all confirm the temperatures of your CPU by installing some utility that shoas sensor readings.
After confirmation, as I did in my case, you would need to disassemble your CPU casing and pull out the heat sink. In ny case, the thermal paste had dried up insight a way that it acted as a hurdle between the contact of heat sink and CPU. O I rubbed of the existing thermal paste and applied some fresh one on it. Then when I reassembled the system, it worked fine. The temperatures were still high but nevertheless it didn't automatically shut down on me.
After confirmation, as I did in my case, you would need to disassemble your CPU casing and pull out the heat sink. In ny case, the thermal paste had dried up insight a way that it acted as a hurdle between the contact of heat sink and CPU. O I rubbed of the existing thermal paste and applied some fresh one on it. Then when I reassembled the system, it worked fine. The temperatures were still high but nevertheless it didn't automatically shut down on me.
#5
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Posted 17 March 2012 - 10:25 PM
ensure enough (or a lot) airflow, and as mentioned above a quick whip of some fresh thermal paste definitely will have an impact... but if you can get hold of a bigger cooler... for example - Evercool Buffalo Cooler has been serving my P4 3.2 Ghz well for sometime now 
another cheap (Free if you hav fan) is to use a table fan. open one side panel of you're PC and sit a table fan facing the CPU so it blows straight into it
another cheap (Free if you hav fan) is to use a table fan. open one side panel of you're PC and sit a table fan facing the CPU so it blows straight into it
#6
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Posted 18 March 2012 - 01:19 AM
It might sound a little irrelevant here but @manuleka, I would like to ask one thing from you. What is better method of cooling: Air flowing towards the component or Air flowing away from it.
Actually I have witnessed many times on different computers where some fans blow air into the system and others blow out of it. About a couple of years back, when I didn't have my laptop and my only resource was my P4 system, I remember reversing the direction of the fan in the casing. That cpu didn't have any fan right above the heat sink. The only fan was the one at the back which by default blew air out of the system. I reversed the direction and made it blow air into the system.
But it didn't change anything significant. I also made an arrangement where I placed two fans into the casing. One of them (the slower one) sucked air into the system and then the other one (the faster one) blew air out of it. But this configuration too hadn't have a significant effect.
I guess my experiments on that system had non-significant results because the cpu and the cooling mechanism was not so much dependant on air flow (as it had a huge heat sink with specific desing (different from those that have fans on top of them). But in theory the direction of air flow should have an effect on the cooling system. So my question is which is better for a fan placed right on top of the heat sink of the processor. Air blown into the heat sink or Air blown out of the heat sink.
Actually I have witnessed many times on different computers where some fans blow air into the system and others blow out of it. About a couple of years back, when I didn't have my laptop and my only resource was my P4 system, I remember reversing the direction of the fan in the casing. That cpu didn't have any fan right above the heat sink. The only fan was the one at the back which by default blew air out of the system. I reversed the direction and made it blow air into the system.
But it didn't change anything significant. I also made an arrangement where I placed two fans into the casing. One of them (the slower one) sucked air into the system and then the other one (the faster one) blew air out of it. But this configuration too hadn't have a significant effect.
I guess my experiments on that system had non-significant results because the cpu and the cooling mechanism was not so much dependant on air flow (as it had a huge heat sink with specific desing (different from those that have fans on top of them). But in theory the direction of air flow should have an effect on the cooling system. So my question is which is better for a fan placed right on top of the heat sink of the processor. Air blown into the heat sink or Air blown out of the heat sink.
#7
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Posted 18 March 2012 - 05:30 AM
It might sound a little irrelevant here but @manuleka, I would like to ask one thing from you. What is better method of cooling: Air flowing towards the component or Air flowing away from it.
flip the CPU cooler over if it's blowing down the heat-sink hehe...
blowing on to it shouldn't be much of a difference (talking about table fan) because that means air hits the board and disperses sideways cooling the rest of the components inside the case
#8
Posted 18 March 2012 - 01:50 PM
Thanks for the thermal paste suggestion. I think i am going to go with that option for now. I don't know If i can get the fan for the CPU but surely i have to find atleast one over ebay. I tried and didn't find any fan for P4.
By the way isn't blowing the fan directly onto the CPU with going to create pressure issue for the heatsink fan? i mean two fan with wind in opposite direction could create pressure over board. I do think there should be some distance and could be used to throw the air on entire motherboard instead and that way it could help.
By the way isn't blowing the fan directly onto the CPU with going to create pressure issue for the heatsink fan? i mean two fan with wind in opposite direction could create pressure over board. I do think there should be some distance and could be used to throw the air on entire motherboard instead and that way it could help.
#10
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Posted 18 March 2012 - 09:05 PM
By the way isn't blowing the fan directly onto the CPU with going to create pressure issue for the heatsink fan? i mean two fan with wind in opposite direction could create pressure over board. I do think there should be some distance and could be used to throw the air on entire motherboard instead and that way it could help.
depends on which direction the CPU fan blows... on my PC the cooler fan blows straight on to the heatsink...
#12
Posted 30 March 2012 - 04:27 AM
I just applied the thermal paste to the processor sink and now it is so far under control. Only thing is that the behavior of the freezing is not at all stopped. It takes some time to freeze but does get freeze after say 15 or so minutes. But atleast it is letting me restart and start over. And I guess unless i get some decent backup of another laptop or pc, this thing is staying this way.
Another thing is that after checking the disk with gparted i have noticed some bad sectors. Actually errors related to some diagnostic test. But most of the time memtest and the startup tests are going okay. But i am sure this constant restarting after some time is going to develop the bad sectors one or the other way inside the disk. Not sure what to do with it as of now.
I am currentyly in process to look for bad sector repair utlity in linux. No success so far. Also my puppy linux setup is not done yet so that is one more odd thing yet to work out. So if this is not the heat and CPU issue by the end, it could be hard disk issue along with minor heat issue. So have to fix the HD with bad sector repairs. Maybe i can use puppylinux on usb and then remove those bad sectors. Might work who knows.
Another thing is that after checking the disk with gparted i have noticed some bad sectors. Actually errors related to some diagnostic test. But most of the time memtest and the startup tests are going okay. But i am sure this constant restarting after some time is going to develop the bad sectors one or the other way inside the disk. Not sure what to do with it as of now.
I am currentyly in process to look for bad sector repair utlity in linux. No success so far. Also my puppy linux setup is not done yet so that is one more odd thing yet to work out. So if this is not the heat and CPU issue by the end, it could be hard disk issue along with minor heat issue. So have to fix the HD with bad sector repairs. Maybe i can use puppylinux on usb and then remove those bad sectors. Might work who knows.
#14
Posted 30 March 2012 - 05:47 PM
I agree but the thing about the restart and shutdown is that it is mostly unpredictable. I also noticed that if the HD is removed and only livecd or usb linux is run result is the same. So this must be mix of HD and the CPU heat issue. Not sure why it freezes with black screen and refuses to show anything. Is it related to something like say, motherboard issue? Like capacitors issue?
I found that some of the Tom's hardware forum members had similar issue for their old P4 machines. So it is quite obvious that this is going to be common for many those who have such old machines. But still I have managed to hold the machine in condition for quite sometime and I wish to keep it that way for next year or atleast December this year.
Puppy linux trick is that I want to keep OS on usb and want to use it for some emergency work like connecting to the internet, pay bills, contact urgently and few other tasks. I don't know if there are any disk utils in the puppy linux distro which can solve the bad sectors issue. If there are any such then I am going to use it for finding and fixing the bugs. Hope that will solve this issue.
I found that some of the Tom's hardware forum members had similar issue for their old P4 machines. So it is quite obvious that this is going to be common for many those who have such old machines. But still I have managed to hold the machine in condition for quite sometime and I wish to keep it that way for next year or atleast December this year.
Puppy linux trick is that I want to keep OS on usb and want to use it for some emergency work like connecting to the internet, pay bills, contact urgently and few other tasks. I don't know if there are any disk utils in the puppy linux distro which can solve the bad sectors issue. If there are any such then I am going to use it for finding and fixing the bugs. Hope that will solve this issue.
#15
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Posted 18 April 2012 - 03:03 AM
It might be a bit irrelevant here but I think it would help many laptop users who read this post.
My laptop was running quite hot from sometime. One day, it even shut down because of over heating, when I was playing dirt 2 on it. So it made me think seriously about the overheating issue. I searched for some information from here and there and the most probable thing that came to my mind was that there is something wrong with the heat sink. So I decided to open my laptop's back and see what is happening inside. Though I failed to open my laptop, but the solution I applied did work. The solution was blowing high speed air through the vents of the laptop. I used a normal blower for this purpose and I visually saw dust coming out of my laptop. So most probably, there was dirt and dust clogged in the heat sink and it made it nearly impossible for the sink to stay cool. After blowing high speed air through the vents, my laptop is running significantly cooler and the fan noise is reduced to the extent that I don't even notice it now. The performance has also increased to some extent.
So all those laptop users who are dealing with over heating and fan noise, should consider this solution as it might easily solve their problems.
My laptop was running quite hot from sometime. One day, it even shut down because of over heating, when I was playing dirt 2 on it. So it made me think seriously about the overheating issue. I searched for some information from here and there and the most probable thing that came to my mind was that there is something wrong with the heat sink. So I decided to open my laptop's back and see what is happening inside. Though I failed to open my laptop, but the solution I applied did work. The solution was blowing high speed air through the vents of the laptop. I used a normal blower for this purpose and I visually saw dust coming out of my laptop. So most probably, there was dirt and dust clogged in the heat sink and it made it nearly impossible for the sink to stay cool. After blowing high speed air through the vents, my laptop is running significantly cooler and the fan noise is reduced to the extent that I don't even notice it now. The performance has also increased to some extent.
So all those laptop users who are dealing with over heating and fan noise, should consider this solution as it might easily solve their problems.
#16
Posted 18 April 2012 - 06:25 AM
Just to update this thread, the computer reported in the OP is died. After 10 years of service, this guy finally failed on me. I changed the fan and turned on the machine and since then it fails to bootup. Connections are fine so most likely the CPU or the motherboard is died on me. As the machine is quite old and the components are hardly in demand, i am going to keep the trash at home anyway.
I do see that DDR RAM is useful for other people so I may send it to someone who needs it. I also think that some other components are useful as well and most likely i will donate that to the hardware needy organizations like debian or some other NGO. That aside, rest of the stuff will be used for some other purpose. I don;t know what to do with the case lol.
As for ahsan's last post, yes i agree that vaccum cleaner or blower usually helps to clean the dust from the laptop. In fact one doesn't need cooler in most situations if there is vaccum cleaner to clean the dust. I have so far managed fine with vaccum cleaner on slow speed to clean the dust. Blower can be good but should be used in caution not to damage by opening laptop and blowing it on temperature sensors.
I do see that DDR RAM is useful for other people so I may send it to someone who needs it. I also think that some other components are useful as well and most likely i will donate that to the hardware needy organizations like debian or some other NGO. That aside, rest of the stuff will be used for some other purpose. I don;t know what to do with the case lol.
As for ahsan's last post, yes i agree that vaccum cleaner or blower usually helps to clean the dust from the laptop. In fact one doesn't need cooler in most situations if there is vaccum cleaner to clean the dust. I have so far managed fine with vaccum cleaner on slow speed to clean the dust. Blower can be good but should be used in caution not to damage by opening laptop and blowing it on temperature sensors.
#17
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Posted 18 April 2012 - 10:08 PM
@yordan, it is sorry to hear that your old friend died on you after serving you for 10 years. And it is also nice of you to think of donating the remaining stuff so that they can be used for good.
However, if I were you, and I really had the need for another system, I would have bought another motherboard and put all the remaining components in that. But this is a need based scenario and a better option is always to go for newer technology even if you have to pay extra money.
And for the last part, I should say that use of blower should be done with great care as it has the potential to damage laptop components which are relatively fragile.
However, if I were you, and I really had the need for another system, I would have bought another motherboard and put all the remaining components in that. But this is a need based scenario and a better option is always to go for newer technology even if you have to pay extra money.
And for the last part, I should say that use of blower should be done with great care as it has the potential to damage laptop components which are relatively fragile.
#18
Posted 19 April 2012 - 06:18 AM
Thing about borrowing or buying alternate hardware to keep the current going is quite hard for me. I mean processor and motherboard are gone but it seems to me that RAM is working fine and so is HDD and display. So getting older yet functional hardware for say processor and motherboard is not quite easy for me here in my city.
I do want to see if there is any option but most likely i have to hold down on that puchase because older hardware here is less likely to be reliable so donating is much better as these are separate items and could be useful for someone else.
I finally figured out the reason of the CPU heat which is current environment temperature here. We have 44 degrees here and i this is quite hot for any type of computer regardless of the fan or the other cooling solutions. I am sure laptops can be managed here but even they do need some cool air or else they are going to have issues with temperature here as well.
I am planning to get one laptop cooler which will help me keep the current laptop cool and in turn i can also experiment with old setup to see if it performs under the hot temperature which is highly unlikely anyway.
I do want to see if there is any option but most likely i have to hold down on that puchase because older hardware here is less likely to be reliable so donating is much better as these are separate items and could be useful for someone else.
I finally figured out the reason of the CPU heat which is current environment temperature here. We have 44 degrees here and i this is quite hot for any type of computer regardless of the fan or the other cooling solutions. I am sure laptops can be managed here but even they do need some cool air or else they are going to have issues with temperature here as well.
I am planning to get one laptop cooler which will help me keep the current laptop cool and in turn i can also experiment with old setup to see if it performs under the hot temperature which is highly unlikely anyway.
#19
Posted 19 April 2012 - 07:58 AM
The other problem is a funny feature. Device aging tests are usually made by overheating the devices. So, remember that the temperature inside the box is twice the room temperature.
Then, using computers in a room where the temperature is about 44 degrees instead of 20 degrees will make an artificial aging test, and the cpu will last twice less than in standard conditions.
That means that a standard system board and peripherals will last one or two years instead of two to tens years.
This is not a problem if you knew this and nevertheless decided to buy this thing. If not, you will be surprised how fast your device stops working.
Then, using computers in a room where the temperature is about 44 degrees instead of 20 degrees will make an artificial aging test, and the cpu will last twice less than in standard conditions.
That means that a standard system board and peripherals will last one or two years instead of two to tens years.
This is not a problem if you knew this and nevertheless decided to buy this thing. If not, you will be surprised how fast your device stops working.
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