something prevents the cooler fan from spinning as fast as needed

[teo1978]

Something in Ubuntu keeps my laptop's cooler fan from going at the speed that would be needed to keep the temperature within its safe range.

The proof that something is wrong is that the computer overheats to the point that, first, the CPU starts to slow down to protect itself (you can tell the CPU has less power because trivial processes that barely do any work suddenly are consuming great percentages of CPU) and eventually even the computer shuts down (abruptly) to prevent itself from burning **AND** the fan speed doesn't get even close to its maximum speed while all this is happening.

Note: I keep thermald turned off because of issue 1600599. I also disabled intel_powerclamp and intel_rapl to rule out that they were just kicking in before it's actually necessary.
This has mitigated the issue, I'm pretty sure, but it has not solved it completely.

Yes, my fan is full of dust and doesn't do its job very well, but if that alone was the issue, the fan should reach its top speed well before the CPU reaches critical temperature.

The definitive proof that the fan *can* go faster is that, when the computer is overheating, if I restart it, at the grub screen, the fan spins a lot faster. Then, as the OS boots, its speed drops. Then you can also hear as the speed slowly diminishes, as if it was gradually slowing down because it's managing to keep the temperature under control. Except that the temperature keeps going up.

Even by just suspending and resuming, the fan speed gets a noticeable boost (not as huge as by rebooting, for some reason), which is utter nonsense, and then soon slows down again.

The huge increase in fan speed at restart just before boot (note: only when the computer is hot) proves that not only the fan can spin faster than the OS lets it, but also that the hardware "KNOWS" how fast it should spin. Either the hardware, assuming that no driver has been loaded yet when presented the grub screen, or some kind of more primitive driver that is loaded together with grub, I don't know. SOMETHING does know how to control the fan speed properly, and something that is started during boot imposes a wrong, lower speed.

I assume that the fan speed is not regulated by a simple fixed map from temperature values to fan speed values. That would completely explain the behaviour (the fan is not as efficient as it is supposed to be, hence the predetermined speed values function of temperature are not enough), but it would be incredibly stupid. Please tell me that's not the case.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.04
Package: linux-image-4.4.0-79-generic 4.4.0-79.100
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.4.0-79.100-generic 4.4.67
Uname: Linux 4.4.0-79-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia_uvm nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.20.1-0ubuntu2.6
Architecture: amd64
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: teo 2826 F.... pulseaudio
CurrentDesktop: Unity
Date: Tue Jun 13 01:49:34 2017
HibernationDevice: RESUME=UUID=ff7e702a-a05a-47fd-8c14-551e81f9e9e3
InstallationDate: Installed on 2013-10-11 (1340 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 13.04 "Raring Ringtail" - Release amd64 (20130424)
MachineType: Acer Aspire V3-571G
ProcFB: 0 inteldrmfb
ProcKernelCmdLine: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-4.4.0-79-generic.efi.signed root=UUID=5830b30e-69e8-4bb4-8a2b-bc2b43c7414a ro quiet splash vt.handoff=7
RelatedPackageVersions:
 linux-restricted-modules-4.4.0-79-generic N/A
 linux-backports-modules-4.4.0-79-generic N/A
 linux-firmware 1.157.10
SourcePackage: linux
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to xenial on 2016-12-11 (183 days ago)
dmi.bios.date: 10/15/2012
dmi.bios.vendor: Acer
dmi.bios.version: V2.07
dmi.board.asset.tag: Type2 - Board Asset Tag
dmi.board.name: VA50_HC_CR
dmi.board.vendor: Acer
dmi.board.version: Type2 - Board Version
dmi.chassis.type: 10
dmi.chassis.vendor: Acer
dmi.chassis.version: V2.07
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnAcer:bvrV2.07:bd10/15/2012:svnAcer:pnAspireV3-571G:pvrV2.07:rvnAcer:rnVA50_HC_CR:rvrType2-BoardVersion:cvnAcer:ct10:cvrV2.07:
dmi.product.name: Aspire V3-571G
dmi.product.version: V2.07
dmi.sys.vendor: Acer

[Joseph Salisbury (jsalisbury)]

This change was made by a bot.

[Joseph Salisbury (jsalisbury)]

Did this issue start happening after an update/upgrade? Was there a prior kernel version where you were not having this particular problem?

Would it be possible for you to test the latest upstream kernel? Refer to https://wiki.ubuntu.com/KernelMainlineBuilds . Please test the latest v4.12 kernel[0].

If this bug is fixed in the mainline kernel, please add the following tag 'kernel-fixed-upstream'.

If the mainline kernel does not fix this bug, please add the tag: 'kernel-bug-exists-upstream'.

Once testing of the upstream kernel is complete, please mark this bug as "Confirmed".

Thanks in advance.

[0] http://kernel.ubuntu.com/~kernel-ppa/mainline/v4.12-rc5

[teo1978 (teo8976)]

I dubt this has anything to do with the kernel.

I'm not testing the upstream kernel. Please don't leave this bug in the "incomplete" status or it will starve without anybody doing anything to fix it.

> Did this issue start happening after an update/upgrade?
> Was there a prior kernel version where you were not having this particular problem?

I don't know. I have been observing this for years. Ages ago, however, on another computer with Ubuntu 12.something I didn't experience the issue, and I can tell because the fan was also old and would not do its job very well (much worse than my current one), and it was spinning very fast all the time as one would expect in that situation.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for linux (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]

[teo1978 (teo8976)]

The importance of this bug should obviously be critical, not medium.
It meets all the criteria, plus it may even cause hardware damage.

[Kris969 (cby469-free)]

Same issue on my side with an Ubuntu 20.04 upgraded from 19.10 in the middle of march. At the beginning all was working fine.
Since yesterday I have exactly the same issue.

Laptop is an HP 820 G1 with Intel core I7 cPro.

Regards

[teo1978 (teo8976)]

How the fuck can this still be unfixed?

This is a critical bug that causes a computer to suddenly switch off, loosing data, and it potentially DAMAGES HARDWARE.

This has been known for at least 3 years, nothing has been done and... OMG I now see the importance is set to medium, who is the IDIOT that set the importance to medium??

Is there at least a workaround? I need to force my fan to spin at the maximum speed, since the OS is not controlling it properly and my CPU is BURNING.

Also, this recently got worse.
As I mentioned in an earlier comment, when I boot and the boot menu shows up, the fan used to spin much faster when the computer was hot.
That proved that either the OS, which loads afterwards, would start controlling the speed and keeping it too low, while during the boot menu screen the hardware was left uncontrolled and knew better, OR that grub used to load some sort of driver that did a better job than ubuntu does at controlling the fan speed.

Well, that doesn't happen anymore, since a recent update. Now, when my computer gets too hot and switches itself off, or when I see it is getting too hot and I restart it, during the boot screen the fan does not spin faster, it goes at the same insufficient speed as it does during normal OS operation, or even slower. I guess grub has been updated to control the fan in the same broken way that used to only kick in later in the boot process.