Good gravy, I just initiated a download of a steam game and my system went into full takeoff power fan mode.
Is it expected, or something wrong?
Sorry, but the existing topics are either from people speculating about purchasing a framework with GPU, or about laptop fan noise in general relative to other activities like music production and how some laptops make more or less noise. They are also tending to be older threads.
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Because of the way Steam packages games - it is extremely CPU intensive when they install shaders. The ramped up fan speeds are expected as your CPU is also likely hitting 95-100 degrees.
I just ran a compilation of Emacs from source too, and it was also full speed, and loud.
It seems this is just something I’ll have to get used to.
Some tasks will do that.
Best bet is to check your temps - and if using linux, capture some output from btop (or your favorite “top” flavor).
Do you have the gpu expansion?
On mine, with the GPU, it ramps up… but its not much louder than any other “gaming” laptop I have owned.
If you are using Windows that expected as windows has poor CPU clock speed management. The CPU will go full boost with even 8% of utilization like downloading steam games regardless of computer model
Any chance you could check the CPU load when you do your tasks?
for compiling emacs, you can limit the compile in using 2 CPU cores only.
If all cores go to 100%, then yes, this will produce some heat that needs dissipation.
Regarding Steam, if you want Steam to not power your fans, reduce the download speed.
On my 1Gbps FTTH, Cyberpunk was installed in about ~17 minutes. Lots of data coming in, dumped to disk and processed. I kind of expected it.
When using 2 CPU cores only, the laptop runs much cooler when on Linux compared to on Windows. The only instances that my CPU reaches 90C on Linux are gaming and installing software that requires compiling locally(uses up all cores). On Windows, the OS turbo boost the CPU to 4+GHz on as low as 8% usage is not Steam exclusive and not Framework Laptop exclusive. I witnessed the same on other computers doing other activities that use 8% to 12% CPU, all turbo boost regardless. I also tried artificially underclock the CPU using software like throttlestop and my previous gaming laptop’s ECO mode cappes the clock speed to 1.3GHz. Steam game downloading speed is completely unaffected and the computer runs much cooler.
The way I see it, the louder the fans get the more work is being done, the more work being done the more value I get out of the money I spent, so it doesn’t bother me. If you want less fan noise, you could probably just put it into power saver mode.
If I recall, Steam is actually decompressing it and writing to the SSD as it downloads, which is why it is CPU intensive. The faster your internet speed, the more your CPU has to keep up with decompression. Eventually one of the 3 will become a bottleneck (internet speed, CPU, or SSD write performance). For most people, it’s usually the internet speed that’s the limitation.
But yeah…Steam downloads will kick up the fan if your CPU is being utilized. Did you watch the CPU utilization and temps during a Steam download/install?
I’ll confirm that if you have good internet, steam can be brutal on a cpu.
In my short experience, it appears PPD (Power Profiles Daemon) does not limit the CPU/heat as I would have expected.
When I toggle between power save, balanced, and performance… I do see my “base idle clock” lower or increase as expected… but it doesn’t stay there. The moment something wants to load all the cores, up the clocks, heat, and fans go.
Whereas full load (processing steam shader cache) would push a sustained 99C in Balanced, power save appears to allow a spike upwards of 95C, but after that spike seems to level off into the high 80’s or low 90’s. A step in the right/cooler direction, but PPD does not appear to have the user options for granularity/control like TLP seems to.
yes, enjoy having a very powerful laptop in a relatively small package. It gets loud, you will get used to it.
After a while, I notice fine dust collecting on the black area above the keyboard because of all the air-sucking it is doing 
Just as well it is removable then … 
I opened the fans and there was some stuff it was hitting off
Same thing, new 16, downloaded logitech hub and was changing settings around. Sounded loud asf, like crazy loud. So got rid of those things, i think it id better now. Fans still turn on when integrated gpu is like 60 degrees but doesn’t sound like an engine anymore.
Been at least two other reports of this on the forum, with owners managing to do a self discover and repair.
@nrp - perhaps a check with the factory may be in order over QC.
Update: By the way I was on Pop_OS!.
So, I actually hacked myself into a broken Kernel trying to compile pytorch for ROCm 6.0 and gfx1103 (I do have the graphics module) so I started over, this time installing Ubuntu 22.04 LTS and following the framework guide.
To my surprise everything functions FAR more smoothly, from desktop behavior to fan noise. I had installed the patched ppd on Pop_OS! but it seems that it doesn’t work so well with that OS version, whereas with Ubuntu, I do not have insane fan noise installing Warhammer: Vermintide 2 on steam.
So much for the theory that the noise was due to some extreme download-computation on the steam install. CPU peaks about 25% across all 16 cores during install, with only minimal fan spin-up.
So, lesson to others, if you’re a Linux user of a new Framework 16… try the recommended install path before setting out on any adventurous distro installs.
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