What will happen if we don’t take a shower for a week? We will feel sick and stink and unable to do our daily jobs. Similarly, we use our electronic gadgets regularly so they also need cleaning & maintenance regularly. If you own a laptop cooling pad that helps the laptop to stay cool during heavy gaming, it may become slow because dust and other small particles enter the laptop cooling pad, which can harm or slow down the cooling pad speed.
In this article, you will explore all the necessary points and tips to Clean and maintain your laptop cooling pad and how you can clean your laptop in easy steps so it can give passage to air to move freely.
Why should you clean and maintain your laptop cooling pad?
- They are made for heat dissipation from our laptop. However, without proper care and maintenance, they will degrade their performance with time, so it’s better to clean them every 2-3 weeks.
- When dust and other particles enter, they can make the cooling fans noisy and slow, so it’s better to clean them regularly if you want a quieter environment. A few types of cooling pads don’t make much noise, so you can consider them.
- Regularly cleaning laptop cooling pads may extend their life spans and protect them from any other interior damage caused by wires or materials.
Signs your laptop cooling pad needs cleaning
1. Heating problem
If you are facing a heating problem with cooling pads in regular work and your laptop feels like a hot pan when touching, you should immediately clean your laptop cooling fan.
2. Unusual Noise
If you hear random music and louder fan noise than usual, it’s a huge sign to clean the cooling pad. You can check out this article for the best quiet laptop cooling pads.
3. Cooling Efficiency
If your laptop does not provide high performance in light tasks, even if you are using a cooling pad, it means the dust and debris are blocking hot air passage, so it’s the third most major sign to clean the cooling pad.
Tools for Cleaning cooling pads
- Soft Brush
- Screwdriver ( If Needed )
- Microfiber Cloth
- Cleaning Solution or normal water or water mixed with soap
- Compressed Air ( Your Choice )
How to Clean Laptop Cooling Pad?
Safety First:
Unplug your cooling pad from your laptop, and if there is an external power source or another USB or accessory attached to it, remove it first to reduce the risk of electric shock.
Cleaning the Exterior:
Use a microfiber cloth with a cleaning solution or plain water to carefully clean all exterior parts. Do not use a damp microfiber cloth near the USB ports, and if you have removed any stickers, wipe that sticky section.
Opening the Cooling pad:
If your laptop cooling has degraded performance and becomes hotter in light tasks, you should open it and clean its internal parts. If you are not facing any of these problems, you can clean the outer parts of the cooling pad. However, check every 2-3 weeks, and if you struggle with the same problem, clean it from the interior.
Gather the necessary tools like a screwdriver to open the cooling pad and identify the screws, and if you are not founding screws with your naked eye, look below your cooling pad is a rubber strip or pads which removes that to find screws.
Check the screw sizes, and if there are more than 2 types of screws, organize them properly to remember. When you open the housing, gently remove the body part and check if any wire is connected.
Cleaning the Fans:
Use a Soft brush to remove dust and other particles from the fan blades. After cleaning & removing dust from the cooling fans with a brush, dampen a microfiber cloth with cleaning liquid to clean the blades and let them dry.
Cleaning the Interior:
Firstly, clean all fan wires and other connectors afterward, clean the remaining body part and see if there is any internal damage in the wires or at any other part, and repeat the process to clean the cooling fans using a soft brush with a microfiber cloth to clean dust and other particles from the interior.
Identify where the dust is gathered and first clean that part with a soft brush and after with a damped microfiber cloth swab. Use earbuds to clean the dust from USB ports if needed.
Reassemble:
As you open every part, assemble it in its proper position and carefully check that the wires do not stick while screwing. Reassemble all screws in their locations, and if your laptop cooling pad has a rubber strip beneath it, attach it from where you grabbed it before plugging it in and check out if it works.
Now note down the date of cleaning the cooling pad, and do a routine check every 2-3 weeks. Suppose performance is degraded after 2-3 weeks, so clean the cooling pad. If it’s performing well, leave it now, and whenever you face any heating problem, you can clean it.
Easy and Fastest way to clean laptop cooling fans:
Frequently Asked Questions ( FAQs )
How do I clean laptop cooling pad without opening it?
You can clean your laptop cooling pad without opening it only with a soft brush, a microfiber cloth with cleaning solution, cotton, and earbuds for USB ports. “However, if your cooling pads become slow and create too much noise and create random genres of music, you have to open it and clean it.
Can I wash my laptop cleaning pad?
Not all cooling pads are washable, and washing an electronic product is not recommended. However, if the manual guide allows it, you can go ahead. Only a few laptop cooling pads are washable because they contain different materials and fabrics that should not be washed.
How long do laptop cooling pads last?
Usually, 1-2 years is the life span of budget cooling pads ”However, if you purchase any gaming cooling pad, it may last 2-3 years, but they require regular maintenance and proper care from liquids and hot substances, and the main reason is also the quality and durability of the laptop cooling pad, which helps it last longer.