Tuesday, January 25, 2011

HTPC Cooling

I finally got my hands on one Scythe 100x100x12mm slim fan. It turns at roughly 1000rpm and practically cannot be heard. It only moves 15 CFM which means that the PC now gets hotter than before - approximately 60C . This is quite alright as far as I'm concerned so I'll leave it as is (for now).

Friday, January 14, 2011

HTC Touch Diamond 2 problem

This phone has been nothing but trouble since I got it. The joy of owning a sparkling new phone lasted just about 2 days. My first problem was that from time the time the phone just couldn't be woken up without removing and reinserting the battery. This turned out to be a software problem which I fixed after a while.

My second problem is that the "SMS received" sound sometimes doens't play until I turn on the screen. What's that all about? Probably firmware related...

The third and biggest problem is that the receiver speaker is acting up and I sometimes can't hear a thing. This cold be due to a cold solder joint or it could be a bad speaker. Definitely something I can't solve myself so I'll have the phone repaired. Hope it doesn't last long.

Saturday, January 1, 2011

AT5IONT-I fanless? Forget it!

Last night we watched a full HD movie and were in for an unpleasant surprise. Just when the movie was about to end, the computer turned itself right off. I suspected overheating so I checked the temperature readings in BIOS and they were extremely high (79C)! To solve the problem I temporarily mounted a slim 60mm AMD stock fan above the heatsink. Since it doesn't cover the whole heatsink, a real solution would be getting a slim 100mm fan which I'm going to have to order from the UK.



Conclusion: The board obviously cannot rely solely on passive cooling, at least not in a slim desktop case. You will have to provide for adequate ventilation or face potential problems with overheating.