Fan Control for Geforce Go 7900 GS

[C.G.]

Hello all. I hope you can help me with this issue.

First of all, I'll start by giving you the current specs:

Laptop: Toshiba Satellite P100-400 (PSPA6E)
BIOS version: 4.80
CPU: Intel Mobile Core 2 Duo T7400 @ 2.16GHz
Motherboard chipset model: i945PM (Intel)
Current RAM: 4GBs

Graphic Card: Geforce Go 7900 GS
Forceware version: 186.91
BIOS version: 5.71.22.08.a8
Memory: 512MBs

OS: Windows 7 Professional 32-bit

Background:

Last year, my laptop began displaying artifacts in the screen: red lines over black colors, blue lines over white. Took it to a PC repair shop. At first they told me this was the LCD screen failing, but after replacing it they found out the lines were still there. They ruled it as a motherboard problem and replaced it. I got it back in November of the last year.

The Problem:

Last week, the same exact artifacts that showed up one year ago returned while I was gaming. Only this time their behavior was different: they would come and go for no particular reason.

Now, the motherboard is still under warranty (or so I hope, technically it's less than an year old), but since I had not cleaned my laptop's fans in a good while, I got a can of pressurized air and used it. Also placed my laptop over a cooling pad, but this one is not being very effective so far.

The lines now only show up once per session (every time I turn on the laptop) and last between 5 to 20 minutes. I have had this laptop turned on the entire day and they have not showed up again. The artifacts show up shortly after I fully load W7, then they disappear.

Ok, I could live with that. But then I noticed something odd about how my GPU was behaving - every time I turn my laptop on, the GPU's fan won't start working until its temperature has reached 105 degrees Celsius. For a laptop, that is ridiculous high. Oddly enough, after that, the fan keeps running without interruption, keeping the temperature at 50ºC during idleness, around 70ºC when gaming. But the fan won't work at all unless it hits 105ºC, meaning when I start my laptop, it can idle for a long period with the temperature increasing constantly until it reaches 105, then drops significantly when the fans receive the kick. It's also during this period (when the fan is not working and the temperature keeps rising) that the artifacts show up, then vanish. I have yet to detect the presence of artifacts with the fan working and with the temperatures stable.

In summary:

- Artifacts (red and blue lines) show in LCD display when laptop has Windows fully loaded, last between 5 to 20 minutes, then never appear again during the rest of the session.

- The GPU fan won't work unless it reaches 105ºC. It then remains stable. Rebooting or closing the lid won't interfer with the fan activity. Upon turning the laptop off and turning it on again in the following day, the fan will only start rolling when the GPU temperature hits 105ºC again. This is a problem for me because waiting for the GPU to reach 105 so it can have the fan spinning is a recipe for potential laptop meltdown.

What have I done so far, how's everything else:

- Fans have been cleaned with the fabulous canned air, but that's as far as I can go. I would open the laptop to check and clean the remaining components, but the P100-400 is a b*tch to tear apart. One small mistake can tear apart a couple of wires. I'll have to trust the professionals on this one.

- I don't know if the motherboard is again related with the artifacts in the display or not. I tested with Memtest-86, and it returned no errors at all.

- I have tested all softwares, from RivaTuner to Powerstrip and Coolbits, and none can detect the fan speed. They cannot detect there's a GPU fan at all. Most programs detect the temperature just fine, like GPU-Z. Apparently this is "normal" with laptop GPUs, they can't be controlled like desktop ones.

- I have tried a couple of drivers for the GPU. 179.48 was my previous one. I installed the one in Toshiba's website (179.76), but did not notice any particular changes. This current one, 186.91, does not show any significant changes either (as in, did not notice any performance improvement over games or other applications)

- I also updated the laptop's BIOS from 4.40 to 4.80. Again, no significant changes.

- Installed a bunch of Toshiba's official tweaking tools, but none of them seem to affect the GPU directly.

It's possible that I'll take the laptop back to the same repair shop this week. They can give me a free diagnosis as to what is wrong with the computer, especially the artifacts. I suspect it's the Video RAM going bad this time and the graphic card is giving its last breaths. (Since it looks like there's nothing wrong with the motherboard this time.). But meanwhile...

- If I install the equivalent desktop driver of my GPU with the modified INF you guys provide, will that help me detect and control the GPU's fan? Because this whole issue with the "wait before meltdown before the fan kicks in" is irritating me and it poses as problematic. I would like this laptop to last at least one more year. Controlling the fan would also help me troubleshoot the red and blue lines problem source, since I suspect the GPU's temperature gets high enough to affect the motherboard and unleashes the artifacts, then the CPU's fan spins fast enough to control its temperature and they disappear.

- If so, any suggestions for a good driver? I downloaded the 275.33 driver, just haven't installed it yet.

- If a driver with a modified INF won't help me detect and control the GPU's fan, then are there any alternatives? I have tested numerous programs and tweaks, I have searched for registry hacks or instructions to no vail. All I want to do is control the fan and tell it to start running from the start, or when the temperature reaches 70ºC instead of 105ºC.

Thank you for any help provided.