Thursday, October 9, 2008

How to Avoid Excessive heat build-up in Laptops

Hearing the news about a man experiencing blisters on his upper thigh region as a result of prolonged usage of his laptop may be considered as something to laugh about. But, this is no laughing matter. Many medical experts have been known to report hundreds of instances wherein computer laptops have caused First Degree Burns on its users as a result of it resting on the user’s lap while being used for long periods of time. Try putting your laptop on your lap and use it for just about 15 minutes and you would begin to experience your lap warming up. In fact, if you use your laptop for more than 2 hours, you would even start feeling the keypad slightly become warmer.

Using your laptop until it heats up would not only prove to be a health hazard but can also damage your laptop in general. The various wirings and connections on the boards within your laptop are sensitive to changes in temperature. Using your laptop even though it is already heating up can cause these wirings and connections to melt and the computer boards to malfunction leading to your laptop to eventually crash.

Here are a few ways for you to prevent your laptop from building up excessive heat.

Give Your Laptop a Break
Just as we would need to stop and rest for periods at a time, so do computer laptops. Once you start feeling that the keyboard is getting slightly warmer, it is an indication to stop what you are doing and close your laptop. Shut down your laptop on regular intervals especially if you intend on using this for long periods of time.

Proper Ventilation is Important
When you are using your laptop, it is a good idea to make sure that it is used in a cool place. Although computer laptops are equipped with a cooling fan, the compact design of laptops today has compromised the cooling fan size. It is for this reason that computer laptops have been designed with grills that would allow air to pass in and out. When using your laptop, make sure that nothing is blocking these grills. Otherwise, the warm air being pushed out through these grills would build up inside your laptop causing it to overheat.

Invest on Cooling Pads
If you do plan to use your laptop for long periods of time, it is a good idea to invest on a cooling pad. Laptop Cooling pads are actually trays that contain extra blowers to allow more cool air to enter and push warm air out. These cooling fans are extremely cheap and while it may cause your laptop to look a bit bulky, these would greatly minimize the chances for your laptop to overheat.

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