Got an E530 with 3612QM & discrete graphics a few days ago. All in all a lovely machine, top notch features and power considering the price. However, not everything is rosy.

After removing/starting from scratch with a clean Windows 7 Pro (since the preloaded Windows installation was so bloated, >120 processes running, seriously?), having cut the number of processes in half, I continued to install all the drivers. When I was done, I installed some small software like MSE and a browser. But I noticed something, that even if the computer was barely doing anything, there was a pulsing noise from the fan. Every 3-4 seconds or so, it would spin/rev up a bit, then relax, then repeat this - forever...

Tried the normal remedy for Thinkpads, TPFanControl, but the E530 is not supported (as of yet). Tried to check the fan rpm, buth they are unreadable by SIW or HWinfo or any other tool I tried. I am - however - able to get the temp readings, and they are really low and cool, so I don't understand why the fan is accelerating/pulsing. Have also tried changing cooling option, passive/active made no difference. Tried without power management software/driver, didn't make a difference. Tried deactivating CPU features such as HT, or even running singel core, nope - didn't help. Doing nothing the computer has no core temp above 48-49 C, and all other available readings are even lower.

Lenovo, please adjust/fix (as in relax) the fan response curve, it is so annoying in a quiet environment I am considering just returning an otherwise excellent computer.

Update: removed both Lenovo PM-software, driver and disabled Lenovo PM-device. The laptop is no longer as eager to throttle as before. Although this is not a good way of solving it, it might be - sort of - a solution for me with regards to the fan-thing.

2nd update: Might have spoken too soon. Issue is still unresolved.  So now I'm giving up on this E530. Feels like I've purchased a project that I'm going to have to spend a lot of time tweaking and fixing, and I don't have time for more failed attempts with TPfancontrol or fiddling around with what drivers/devices to uninstall/disable. There should have been a larger fan/cooling system, or two at lower and more stable rpm. What I suspect is that the fan rpm/response curve is identical on the E530 with quad core and discrete graphics as on those with mere dual cores and no discrete option installed. The latter probably barely - if ever - touch the upper rpm options, and obviously would hum along nicely at the lowest options without switching around.

Either way, the fan noise profile/spectrum combined with this pulsing whine or whatever is not to my liking. Sure, it is not noisy (as in high dB) at all, even at full load the cooling is apparently well capable of handling this quad core cpu + discrete graphics card. Frankly, at full load I wouldn't even have minded a noisier computer. But at no/low load, this incessant switching between (what I assume) are the two of the lowest rpm choices available never gives my brain enough time to "cancel" it out. At no/low-load - another computer I have here (a quite old, but still capable hot-running C2D @ 2,4 GHz) is - with a/one fan at 2-3k rpm - less noisy (as in less annoying) than the brand new E530 (which runs cooler at no/low load)...

Checked with an RTA-app using the mic on my phone and also compared the sound/noise with my older laptop. Measured really close to the fan corner. It seems like the E530 outputs a higher level of noise around 1-2k Hz, plus a substantial peak somewhere above 16k (probably inaudible to me, so I'm not sure). Of course, the accuracy of my phone's mic is debatable, but I have compared it with/done measurements of generated/perfect noise/frequencies, and it seems pretty good. Either way, my own conclusion is thus: while the noise itself is low dB, the noise's profile - combined with the unstable nature of it - makes the computer too much of an annoyance for me in low noise environments. Which is a shame, as it was excellent in many other aspects.

ivand,

800 messages, but many of these were about the original issue which was the pulsing fan, which had been addressed by  BIOS update version 2.52. 

Here is the link to BIOS 2.52

Here were the updates from the BIOS change log:

Version 2.52

• (Fix) Fixed an issue thet is related to Fan speed unstable.
• (Fix) Fixed an issue that is related to leakage power when only setting WOL in windows.

I understand that after the update the complaint changed to that the fan is running all the time for some (perhaps many) customers.

I need to follow up with our engineering team on this subsequnet concern, but last I checked we had not replicated these new symptoms, so we may need a sample customer system.

Hopefully someone in US?  If only customers in Europe, then we can work with you there, but still need a volunteer..

Mark