toshiba laptop shutting down for no reason, overheating?

junglewarfare · #1 05-06-2006, 10:43 PM

My 1 year old toshiba qosmio laptop (which has been great up until today) is randomly shutting down. I will be running something processor intensive like importing to PT, running a game and *click* it turns off. It generally does this when the program i am running is fairly demanding, so I guess this is some kind of overheating problem. The bizarre thing is, these are all things that have NEVER happened until today. For the first 9 months of my laptops life it never ever did this, and it isn't like what I am doing today is more demanding. Sometimes I literally can't load up windows without it powering down. I have put my bedroom fan next to the fan (the part of the laptop which gets hottest and has holes to blow heat out) and that makes it usable. Obviously this is not a real solution, so wtf has happened? I am feeling the comp and it is not like it is especially hot. It seems like the processor or whatever has changed the level at which it powers itself off, it is really weird.

please help me.

Nash_Clown · #2 05-07-2006, 10:15 AM

My girlfriend's Toshiba laptop (~8 months old)did the same thing. It would actually just shut down seemingly at random, even if you were just surfing the net. Eventually, it wouldn't start up and she had to have a new hard drive installed. I'm not exactly sure what the problem was, but the fan used to run really loud and her wireless internet would constantly lose connection. Since she had it worked on it's been fine, but the fact that your Toshiba does the same thing makes me wonder... wtf?

ajml · #3 05-07-2006, 11:39 AM

My Toshiba does this as well, if you search the internet it seems to a pretty common problem. Of course if you call them they deny it. The best solution I have found is one of the Targus Chill Mats for ~$20 at Best Buy. I attached some velcro to that and to the bottom of my computer, this helps a little because of the fans but also because it creates a bit of a space underneath for air to go through.

Biesterfield · #4 05-07-2006, 04:30 PM

I have the exact same problem with my Toshiba laptop. It overheats (I think) and then will randomnly shut off- sometimes shutting down, sometimes freezing.

About one month ago I bought a cooling mat from BestBuy and this pretty much solves the problem. It has still randomly shut down a couple times, but this was when I was running like 18 different programs and after it had been on the whold day so far. Most of the time my computer can stay on for the whole day now, though.

junglewarfare · #5 05-07-2006, 06:03 PM

problem solved. i googled toshiba overheat shutdown and got a bunch of useful stuff, this is a pretty rampant problem for toshiba. what was weird with mine was one day it was perfectly fine than the next day i could hardly start windows up without it powering down, so i knew something has majorly wrong. one of the links i came across showed diagrams of toshiba cooling fans where the vents had gotten covered with lint and dust, blocking it. you can either diassemble the computer and brush it off, or if the problem isn't too bad you can get compressed air and shoot it at the fan. I did that and it worked great, problem solved.

MSH · #6 05-07-2006, 08:14 PM

I have the same problem with my toshiba. Using a vacuum to suck out some of the dust under the fans was a decent temporary solution. But still, even with using a cooling pad, my laptop still occasionally shuts down while multitabling and running pokertracker. I recommend taking it somewhere to get it disassembled and cleaned.

Biesterfield · #7 05-08-2006, 12:08 AM

[ QUOTE ]
problem solved. i googled toshiba overheat shutdown and got a bunch of useful stuff, this is a pretty rampant problem for toshiba. what was weird with mine was one day it was perfectly fine than the next day i could hardly start windows up without it powering down, so i knew something has majorly wrong. one of the links i came across showed diagrams of toshiba cooling fans where the vents had gotten covered with lint and dust, blocking it. you can either diassemble the computer and brush it off, or if the problem isn't too bad you can get compressed air and shoot it at the fan. I did that and it worked great, problem solved.

[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah, I saw this too. I just didnt want to go through the hassle of doing this and I didn't have compressed air on hand, so I just bought a cooling mat. So far it is working pretty good as I said.