Nitro 5 AN515-52; low drilling/whirring/buzzing sound from fans. What should I do?

Tushar25
Tushar25 Member Posts: 4 New User
in Nitro Gaming
So I have an ~2 years old Acer Nitro 5 AN515-52 (i7-8750h, GTX 1050Ti, 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, 1TB HDD), and recently the fans have been making this weird noise. I don't know which fan it is, but I'm sure it's one/both of them. And it is definitely a recent development.

The noise is most apparent at about 2800 RPM. Anything well below 2400 sounds totally normal (can't hear anything unusual at 2100, for example), and anything above 4000 sounds pretty much normal (I guess the normal fan noise just masks the buzzing at those speeds). Close to the 2400 and 4000 numbers, you can still hear it if you sit in a very quiet room and concentrate though.

I haven't really been cleaning the thing regularly - I've only cleaned the dust twice (without opening the back-cover). I did that second cleaning today, and the noise has significantly reduced since. FYI I have also been working on it in a pretty dusty place for most of time I've had it - pollution levels are among the highest in the world, and there's quite a lot of dust in the air. 
The fan speeds without too much load hadn't been too bad when I did the second cleaning though - 2400 tops while browsing/attending meetings. My estimate is that it would've been closer to 2000-2100 when it was brand new. The worst I've seen was touching 2600 while attending meetings. And it's back down to 2000-2100 now that I've done the second cleaning. The fan speeds have never been "unusual" under load either - never varied too much from back when it was brand new.

Thermals and performance have also always been great (I do run an under-volt of -140 mV on the cache, and -150 mV on the core). For the CPU, ~39 degrees on idle consistently ever since the UV, and almost always below 80 degrees while gaming, goes up to 85 under long-drawn heavy CPU load like long rendering cycles. Thermals have been REALLY good on the GPU as well.
Ambient room temperature: 25-28 degrees.

Sorry, I'm probably mentioning a lot of unnecessary details - just wanna put everything related out there, just in case it may be worth mentioning.

Can anyone take a shot at what the problem may be? Is it an obstruction problem? Should I open it up and take a look in that case? Or is it just a worn out bearing?

Answers

  • DarkSouls
    DarkSouls Member Posts: 16 Troubleshooter
    If the fans are making noise, it's never normal. 
    I would recommend you open up the case carefully and try to check if there is anything damaged within the fan blades and check for dust. You have mentioned that you have been cleaning from outside which helps with the noise but maybe you have not been cleaning it enough to completely remove the dust and clean the fans which made them make noises due to the dust being stuck inside/between them.


  • Tushar25
    Tushar25 Member Posts: 4 New User
    Yeah, I think you're right.
    I had this brilliant idea of using a flashlight to see if I could get a better look at the fans without opening it up. And I found lots of thick bits of dust and whatnot in between the blades.

    So I guess that's the problem right there. Hopefully there's nothing else wrong with it like the bearings and stuff. 

    Thanks for your reply, mate! I guess I'll be opening it up and cleaning the fans out. 
  • Tushar25
    Tushar25 Member Posts: 4 New User
    DarkSouls said:
    If the fans are making noise, it's never normal. 
    I would recommend you open up the case carefully and try to check if there is anything damaged within the fan blades and check for dust. You have mentioned that you have been cleaning from outside which helps with the noise but maybe you have not been cleaning it enough to completely remove the dust and clean the fans which made them make noises due to the dust being stuck inside/between them.


    So after like a million years of procrastinating, I opened my laptop and cleaned the fans out. Found two big wards of dust that were probably contacting the fans. 

    My laptop is absolutely fine now. The noise is gone and the fans sound good as new now. 

    Thank-you so much for your response! 
  • Christ3n
    Christ3n Member Posts: 1 New User
    I've cleaned my fan but still have the whirring noise. 

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