HP/Compaq :: Dv5 And Overheating

The problem:

as many dv5 owners know, this HP series has a little problem with overheating.

The laptop has a small aperture for air circulation just below the exhaust vent: the fan takes fresh air from the aperture and then push out warm air.

Many people noted that the aperture is too small but its position is also problematic because when you put the laptop on a desk, the air stream is reduced so much that the heat cannot be dissipated correctly. This leads to very high temperatures under high loads that sometimes causes the laptop to shutdown itself to prevent damage.

Now one solution is to raise the laptop a bit, to allow better cooling.

My findings:

Dissecting my laptop I found a very interesting thing.

In the upper left corner of the laptop there's the fan that cools down the whole thing.

The fan is very near to the upper left corner of the keyboard too, and the notebook chassis has a hole to let the fan aspire more air from the upside.

You may say that's good, the fan is getting fresh air from the keyboard too, right?

Wrong. The keyboard on its back has a thin plastic coverage that prevents the air flow!

The solution:

So, armed wih a cutter, I delicately made a cut on this plastic coverage film near the upper left angle and then I removed the cutted piece from the back of the keyboard (there are some glue strips that fix it for better adherence).

To be precise, when I say "upper left angle" I suppose you have your keyboard in front of you (near the ESC key to be pratical). Since you need to cut the *rear* coverage plastic, it becomes the upper right angle. Just always take the ESC key as a placeholder!