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[vithagan]

Laptop maintenance tips, again!

I have 2 laptops One is AMD based HP Pavilion(2008) (DV6605US) and another is Celeron based Acer(2007)

There is not much problems with Acer, its survivng on Ubuntu, still now no great problems. Now I am typing this frm that laptop only. The HP one already got into a problem, 1 year before and I spent 12K changing the mother board. Now the same problem. Heard that its becos of the NVidia chip and generally these AMd laptops are getting this issue. Thing is, due to heat, the Nvidia GPU is spoilt and thus no display! Now I have to replace that chip.

I asked, is this heat due to using laptop in a Non A/C area. The service man said that this heat is due to the battery which has lost its backup and always running on AC Mains power. I was shocked! Most laptop users put the mains charger for almost all the time and thus the battery loses its backup by a years time. Then the backup will come only for few mins. He said, that's true but in reality, NO laptop is meant for continuous use. I said I have to run git servers and need to keep laptop ON. He said "Then use desktop. Laptop is NOT designed for 24 hrs use. Laptops shud run only on battery power and when the charge is gone, only charge it and DON'T use it while charging. give break! like mobile phone"

He said some remedies to prevent it. Simple things. Sit in an A/C room. if not possible, put a extra cooling pad at bottom. Give break for the laptop every 3/4 hours. Aleast 20 minits break. If shut down not possible, the hibernate. He said that the recent intel CPUs are far far better in this and we get lots of AMD laptops with this problem. And the corporate grade laptops too don't have this problem.

Ok, now that my laptop is gone, i asked for remedy. Replace the GPU for 3.5K, or replace the whole motherboard itself(yes!) to an equivalent dual-core intel motherboard, for 8.5K and laptop will live for atleast 5 years. Don't forget to replace original HP battery for 3.5K. The duplicate ebay ones for 1.8K will actually do further damage.

So this is for all laptop users, especially AMD users. If till now, you didn't sit in A/C, use ur laptop for all the day, and don't use any cooling pad, and almost 4/5 years you didn't get any problem, you are a lucky lot. But still don't forget to

1. Replace original batt
2. Add a cooling pad
3. Give break every 3/4 hours.

Thanks for the tips, I'm using my laptop 24*7 not for any useful purpose but for browsing and making it as TV ( connect thru HDMI to my TV). Its making noise like a big machine and its getting overheated. I'm planning to change the laptop(bought in November 2008) this Thanksgiving. I'm looking for a laptop as a desktop replacement. Most of the time it will be connected to TV, if i need to use then I'll connect to my monitor and use as desktop. DO you have any suggestions for my usage on laptops.

Off the topic, If I need to run multiple OS ( Windows / Mac OS / Linux ) if at all possible, whats my best bet, High end laptop or Desktop??