Laptop overheating, any cheap fixes?

AndreiArgeanu · October 5, 2019

So, I have a laptop with an i7 7700HQ and a gtx 1050 which overheats underload. It also turns out that the Tjunction on intels website is BS as mine start clocking down after 81 celsius and on intel's website it says 100 celsius. Now I've tried under volting and I did see some sizeable changes but I only hit -0.120v stable. Any other suggestions that could improve temps? The laptop is quite clean already and doesn't have much dust, also the thermal paste has been replaced when I RMA'd like a year go as it had an issue and was still under warranty. I'm not really into changing the thermal paste, at least not now as not only is it quite a tedious process but also I rather fear doing so because I might break it and it's not as easy as changing part like on PC. Now I will most likely make a build soon and I'm just asking if someone knows a cheap reasonable way to reduce temps for the time I'll continue using this laptop to make gaming on this more bearable.

Nord · October 5, 2019

Unless your CPU is clocking below 2.8GHZ, it is not downclocking or throttling, it is reducing it's turbo boost, which is normal and you will find this behavior on any CPU, in any laptop.
Turboboost can be seen the same way as GPU boost on Nvdia cards, if temperature* and power allows it, it is used, if not it's not.

*Temperature not as in TjMax from intel but rather a cool chip. For newer nvidia cards, they don't lower the boost clock up until they hit 60°C~ , after that you lose some MHZ, no matter the usage or if it's 61° or 75°C.
For laptop CPU’s it's rather variable as to when similar behavior does happen. It depends on what the laptop manufacturer sets in the BIOS, but generally around 70 - 85°C.

Now to the cooling problem:

Depending on how your laptop is built on the bottom - like if heatpipes are visible through intake vents or not and how “open” it is in general, you might get some additional cooling with a cooling pad like one from the “cooler master notepal” series. Should cost you around 20 - 30€.

For the undervolt - in case you didn't do it yet - you can also undervolt the iGPU as well as CPU cache for the same amount you did on the CPU core.

Other than that cleaning is never a bad idea, even if you just spray the device out with compressed air.

A quick and free way would be to simply lift it up a bit, like for example placing a screwdriver or similar at the bottom back, so the fans have more room to breath in fresh air.
Or putting 1-2 old CD-Rom cases under each foot to lift it… you get the idea.