We seem to have the odd scare story of laptops overheating and setting on fire and I do remember seeing a photo of a laptop doing just that, but other than this one incident I have not heard of a DJ first hand who has had this happen. So is it a myth, a one in a million, or an every day occurence?

Were not talking warm or mildly hot but dangerously hot, plastic melting, causing it to malfunction or on fire.

Please vote honestly if you! not a friend, or you heard about it on the grape vine have had a laptop over heat while DJing.


And feel free to post your own experiences, Its time we found out how big a problem this is or is not...

Nik

Laptops...Urrgggg horrible things.I use one as backup cos it fits under the seat.My son says theres an aluminium cooling board with two usb fans in the bottom that you can buy for overheating laptops.(he has 1 for sale).


http://www.amazon.co.uk/Roline-Notebook-Co...b/dp/B000FFJKRY Similar to this one


I personally havent had a problem with this.

I use conventional pcs.


Paul

I have used three laptops for DJing none have ever overheated.

I use external hard drives in icy box enclosures. that do get warm and sometimes hot

I always have a laptop that easily exceeds the minimum spec of the program i am using..I strip all none essential software rubbish off the laptop so it never runs too hot ever.

My theory is that its like Kelly Holmes and me both running at 5mph i will soon over heat and collapse when she is just cruising along with very little stress and wont even work up a sweat. I always over spec the laptop in terms of processor dedicated graphics and memory..never had a problem yet touch wood.

The laptops that have been seen on the net as overheating, are probably ones that had dodgy batteries in them. Theres pics of a dell laptop that caught fire, due to the battery in it.

A friend has a Mac book pro, where the battery bulged, a pic of it ended up on the pages of BBC news..

David

To be honest, the "burning batteries/laptop" was a manufacturing fault which could happen to Mobile Phones/Camcorder/Handheld devices or anything with a similar battery in it. Most of these batteries use similar cells, just repackaged to the application.

Most laptops have cooling vents at the base, with slim rubber feet. In a normal office/desktop environment, this should be adequate.
However, if your DJ set-up is to place the laptop on a carpeted surface, you'll see problems.
I've seen some laptop stands for DJ's - these should be ideal - lifting the laptop up, leaving any bottom vents open.

Running a laptop cooler will also help *lots* with forced air cooling on the underside of the laptop.
You'll hear the laptop fan coming on far less (providing the cooler isn't too noisy!)

I've used laptops for working on industrial robots and other machines - one job was in a very humid area (used to set bathroom sinks) - temp was about 35degC all day, and very humid though the water evaporating. The laptop wasn't mission critical - I was using it as a notepad and calculator.
In the 4 months I was there, the "cheapo" Dell I was using held up very well - far better than me :-(

I opted to use a PC over a laptop, as I use my Laptop for many different things, and didn't want all the other apps on the same PC I use as for DJing. Overheating was never a consideration.

Jason

Its not just laptops that get hot and fail mid gig..

Only a few weeks ago the PC running light jocky in the club I was working in stoped responding due to heat..

But interestingly no one has any first hand experience of a laptop going into melt down on this forum... Why do some people tend to put it out that using a laptop is dangerous as it might or will overheat.

Myself and another poster on this thread have reported using more than one laptop over a period of time with no problems.

Does this mean we can now put this MYTH to bed that using a laptop is bad as it will burn up on you.

Nik

Three years ago I had a laptop shutdown. No real problem as the back up was on. It took what seemed like hours to play the next track but in reality it took about 10 secs, but is a LOONGGGGG time with no music.

Cause.. somehow a ladies black silk scarf had covered the back cooling ports of the laptop. Rebooted and after 20mins or so went back to playing as the main player.

decided to add this....

5 yrs with laptops and this has been the only overheat issue. There have been two others

1. forgot to plug in the mains and the track stuttered as the battery warning came up as the laptops processer went into pre shutdown mode. plugged in all ok.

2. Lost the sceen as the laptop went into screen saver mode.

Both numpty propblems caused by breaking from procedure, checking all before the gig. The screen saver mode was caused by a major windows update.

Crikey, that's over 8% higher than previous figures I've seen. AND the above figure is more upto date than those other figures.



I empathise with those 35%+ of DJU members who may have had to revert to their back-up music solutions for all, or some of, the remainder of the affected gig(s).

You need to go back to school Gary ;-)

35% of people who voted, not 35% of all DJU so to flip that on its head;
There are over 5000 registered users here, so less than 0.12% if you look at those numbers...
In any case, many use CD's and are not digital DJ's.

Its worth mentioning that thermal problems effect all pieces of kit.
Amps have thermal shutdown, and I assume most HDC and their internal HDD's will have too.

Jason

So do I, it can not be good to be let down by any equipment when working...

Nik

In any vote, whether it's on a forum, a high street clipboard survey or any other sampling, we have to assume that however many people gave their answers, are a proportional representation of "all" - especially as there was a "no problems" poll option, which was presented to the same number of people who chose to vote that they had experienced serious problems. Any member who would have seen the one option, would have seen the other, so the polls percentages are accurate within the poll itself..

There was a Yes or a No, so the no could be construde as the no problems, then in question two you could check the not relevant due to answer one so I think you might be wrong on this point Gary.

Also todate no one has said first hand that they have had a problem and given an example. As polls are anonimus it is my worrie that some people who might have a dislike of laptop using DJs or have a vested interest in DJs using other play in formats might have massaged the results slightly... I think this might happen if a poll was started about HDC or CD players etc... Its a shame but I guess human nature.

Again I can only speak for myself and collegues I know personaly who use laptops and non have ever had a heat problem with there laptop.....

Nik

are you on robbert mugabe's election commity too ?


how about you just accept that laptop DJs never will be as good as a real DJ who plays Vinyl

No problems with laptop overheating, the one occasion where I had set the wrong audio input on the mixer and couldn't work out why there was no sound for about 10 seconds... felt like a bit of a numpty!

Well as a vinyl to cd to pc to laptop DJ I must be the best... Mind you I think Jim started on Wax cylinders so he might be even more experienced than me

Nik