Toshiba Satellite P850-12Z CPU fan has stopped moving, no idea how to disassemble

Alcoholic Llama

Estimable
Mar 30, 2014
3
0
4,510
I'm sorry if this is in the wrong place.

I've had this laptop for around 2 years now. It's always been noisy, it's always got warm. That's how it goes for playing games on this laptop. It can get to around 85-90 degrees on games, for general use it's 50-60.

But recently I've been trying to clean the CPU fan with a small duster I have which can barely get in, but it still helps. I've been blowing through the side vent too, and a ton of dust came out of the CPU from there. Probably because I haven't done that before.

I started doing that last week because my performance playing games started getting low. If it matters at all, I have been playing League of Legends for the entire time I've had this laptop on the highest settings other than in game shadows off. I don't know how long my CPU fan hasn't been working, I can't believe I haven't noticed it. It's probably because I have a loud USB fan to stop my laptop overheating during games.

The first few times I cleaned the dust, a lot game out from the CPU after blowing the side vent. It ended up quieter than last time. I did blow the side vent as hard as possible, which the CPU is connected to. I might have overdone it and messed it up inside. But after the first time, my performance issues were fixed, the temperature started dropping around 10 degrees, 80-90 on my GPU in games but 75 on my CPU. My GPU always gets hot, not really anything I can do about it.

Each time I done this, I got the cooling system warning
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About 3-4 times after booting up. I never got them again after restarting my laptop or using it in general. However this time, I'm getting it every 10 seconds. Even as I type this. My CPU fan is trying to move, I can occasionally hear it. My laptop is extremely quiet without my USB fan plugged in. Right now with only Chrome open writing this, my CPU and GPU are at 70 degrees when it's usually 50 with my fan on.

I have never been able to open this laptop, I've tried to a couple times to clean the CPU, but I never got past removing the keyboard, which is apparently required to open it up. All I done was remove the screws from the base, and it would move a tiny bit after pulling it up slightly from the sides. I can get to the RAM and HDD fine, that doesn't require it to be completely opened. It has one screw than a plastic base in the centre of the base of my laptop. The GPU and GPU are on the right side.

I've looked everywhere for a guide on how to open this laptop, but nothing. It's a weird model from what I believe, everytime I search it results in showing other guides.

I can't do much on this laptop with this warning displaying every 10 seconds. I don't know what to do. I won't be able to play games because it might put too much strain on the CPU.

I have no money, I'm only 17 and in college for computing, I don't even know much about computers compared to people in my class, I've never even had a PC. That's why I'm stuck and posting here. I want this laptop to be able to last until I might be able to get a PC later on this year.

I want to try opening it myself just to see and not do anything drastic, but I'm not sure how to get past the keyboard.

One other thing I can do is take my laptop into college and see if a technician or someone can try and see what the problem is. I'm sure the teachers there have experience and proper tools to be able to do it. They've helped other students with laptop problems before I think.

So I'm sorry for being vague and posting a wall of text, but what should I do?
 

Dburnsx

Estimable
Mar 10, 2014
5
0
4,520
Could be a few things...fan could be dead, or too much dust?
I would try cleaning the fan first...

In order to do so you hafta take the keyboard off first. Here's a helpful link:
http://www.laptopkeyboard.com/Guides.php/Toshiba/Satellite/P850/KBT850

After that there's button/press fixing to lift it away, and just a few more screws to get to the fan after that.
If you don't feel comfortable doing this yourself, I would ask one of the professors like you suggested for help.
Best of Luck
 

Alcoholic Llama

Estimable
Mar 30, 2014
3
0
4,510


I don't think it's dead, I think I just blew on the sides too hard that it messed it up or something.

There are a lot of screws on this model, around 7-8 on the corners, but there's also small screws in the central cover where my RAM and HDD is. There's tiny screws in the corners where my HDD is over, and that could be for my keyboard. I don't know what those screws are for.

I don't want to pry the keyboard and snap it, it feels thin and easy to break. I don't even have thing for that, so I might have to check at my college.

Is there any way to tell what the actual status of my fan is? Like if it's detected or not?

Oh and this warning message is very annoying, no way to remove this? I can't do anything with it popping up so often.


 

Alcoholic Llama

Estimable
Mar 30, 2014
3
0
4,510


I kind of understand the way the keyboard works, I can imagine the snap points being there. This looks way too complicated to me, he did say you need to remove the motherboard to get to the CPU and that looks very unsafe for someone like me.

I bookmarked the thread and I'll see if I can get someone from my college to help me with it tomorrow. Going to be hard because it's a heavy laptop and a long way there. I wouldn't have the tools to do it safely anyway.

Thanks a lot.