SURFACE LAPTOP 3 - Overheating when charging and excessive Fan Noise

Anonymous
2020-01-07T23:58:07+00:00

Edit: 16 Jun 2021

Laptop is going OK - not much fan noise or heating as I haven't been using it much. mostly my work laptop

Got a better data USB C to USB C cable to plug into the dock and using a Lenovo Dock Gen 2 for the additional screen, think they are helping in better handling and keeps fans not to rev so much

Being my 3rd laptop (replaced 2 before) battery is performing better than the other two. Haven't run the full tests yet - still in progress to test real word batt life (office work, no games, no memory or cpu intensive apps)

Edit: 17 Feb 2021

Well, this 3rd laptop replacement is not as bad as the other two, however, the rocket engine fan noise is not completely gone. 

this laptop is for light use only, any slightest workload "WHEN hooked up to an additional monitor" + Microsoft teams video call, 3-word documents, 2 webpages, this laptop cannot handle. It runs however fans rev up and won't stop until we close a few applications or disconnect additional monitor. 

I think its the quick charging or charging which using additional display via display USB-C. Not much was done during the testing phase. 

I hear dell XPS's and some other laptops rev fans too, however only when there is significant load, not just basic office work.

Example: I had sticky notes, 1 webpage, and a TEMAS interview video call: Laptop fans did not stop revving at max speed until the end of the interview and I closed all applications. 

For this time there is nothing more I want to do - there is no fix for this, so i will have to s*C* it up and make a better decision next time. 

Edit:28 Oct 2020

Nothing changed its still overheats when plugged to an external display. Fans still rev high when on Microsot teams meeting or charging. Laptop battery looks like it gave up (3 to 5 hour max) on light use. What a shame this issue is not getting enough attention. 

Edit: 28 Aug 2020 

No change - Laptop still goes crazy when plugged to an additional screen

All Microsoft Stores are temporarily closed until further notice. So I have to escalate this again to Microsoft


Edit: 17 Apr 2020

The issue still continues, Couldn't attend MS Store because of COVID lockdowns.

At this stage im hoping they can fix this via software patch. However, after research, this has been a problem for a few MS products (charging, especially fast charging) 


Edit: 21 Jan 2020

Still did not go to Microsoft store. With this COVID 19 going on, working from home most of the time.

I will give away my laptop to the store soon to test. 

Biggest change I noticed.  Battery is being effected. When ever the laptop is hot during couple of hours of work connected to dock.... remove from the dock....u get 3 hours or so max on full battery... guessing due to excessive heat I guess. 

I tried multiple times charging with power adapter. Works fine without issues, no heat, battery lasts longer a little. Daily heating issue is causing battery to deterioate quickly 


Surface Laptop 3 - 13inch, i5, 8GB, 256GB SSD.

Surface laptop overheating on every charge - even with no applications running. Brand new laptop, room temperature is under 21 C. After plugging in the charger, if you listen closely near the exhaust vents - there is a faint static electric noise, not to mention is scary as i don't want to use this anywhere close to me. 

Laptop has already been replaced with a new one, still same issue. With some research a lot of people are experiencing the same issue. Any solution for this ?????

Surface | Surface Laptop | Power and battery

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  1. Anonymous
    2020-09-29T14:44:12+00:00

    Hi, 

    I've recently been experiencing the same problem (SL3, i5). However I installed the latest update which is supposed to improve 'battery reliability' or some such and that seems to have improved things, for the moment at least. Has anyone else had the same experience? If this latest update has actually fixed the problem then that would be great news. 

    Ben.

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  2. Anonymous
    2020-09-29T17:30:06+00:00

    Make sure you go to microsoft store and update all the apps as well. The Edge browser app has a big change from my perspective.

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  3. Anonymous
    2020-09-29T22:37:18+00:00

    Hi, 

    I updated my laptop last night and updated all the apps in the Microsoft Store as well, however, the laptop still heats up and the fan makes a whirring sound when plugged in :((

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  4. Anonymous
    2020-09-30T04:42:48+00:00

    My surface laptop 3 also overheats when charging (ever since I first purchased the device in February '20).  In particular, the device's temperature rises 30 to 40 degrees Celsius as soon as the charger is connected, and the temperature immediately drops when the charger is disconnected.  Given the heat, the laptop fan also runs very fast & becomes very loud.

    The graph below show how the CPU temperate increases by 30+ degrees as soon as I plug the charger in, and reduces by 30 degrees when the charger is unplugged.

    Unfortunately, the September 2020 firmware updates have not improved the situation (as shown in the graph below).

    Needless to say, I'm extremely disappointed that a premium device suffers this flaw, and that Microsoft seems to be ignoring the issue.

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  5. Anonymous
    2020-09-30T04:50:49+00:00

    My surface laptop 3 also overheats when charging (ever since I first purchased the device in February '20).  In particular, the device's temperature rises 30 to 40 degrees Celsius as soon as the charger is connected, and the temperature immediately drops when the charger is disconnected.  Given the heat, the laptop fan also runs very fast & becomes very loud.

    The graph below show how the CPU temperate increases by 30+ degrees as soon as I plug the charger in, and reduces by 30 degrees when the charger is unplugged.

    Unfortunately, the September 2020 firmware updates have not improved the situation (as shown in the graph below).

    Needless to say, I'm extremely disappointed that a premium device suffers this flaw, and that Microsoft seems to be ignoring the issue.

    I would suggest looking at your browser add-ins and updating all apps via the MS Store as a previous reply has suggesed. Good luck!

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