I purchased a Envy Sleekbook 4-1117nr a couple months ago and things had been working well to start, but in the last month or so the CPU fan has insisted on running at full speeds nearly all the time. Occasionally after a while it will turn off, but then almost any activity (even just opening Chrome) will turn it back to full speed, which is extremely disruptive. Why can the fan not start first at low speed? It only works in an ON-OFF scheme. And ON is VERY loud.
The fact that is used to run fine leads me to believe it is the result of an update that got pushed at some point, either from HP or Windows. I'm "up to date" on all Windows and HP updates, and that's not fixing anything. I've checked the fan and the vents and there is no dust or blockages built up. Open Hardware Monitor can report the CPU load at 3% and the CPU temp at 38 C, but the fan will insist on running at full speed. I live in midwest, and I've had plenty of experiences where it has been sitting on my desk sleeping for hours, and I can walk to campus where it is literally freezing (i.e. below 0 C) outside, walk inside, open laptop, and instant 100% fan for as long as I can bear it before putting it back to sleep so I don't disrupt the rest of my class with my rediculuously loud laptop fan.
What's the deal HP? Please don't link me to your blanket response pages about cleaning the vents or closing background applications, because it is clearly not that. No CPU load, low CPU temps, 100% fan. Can we get a BIOS update to fix this stuff? Or at least give users control over the fan, so I can tell it to not run the fan at 100% when the computer is idling (or ever, really)? But for the fan, you have a great product, but with this fan I can't use it anywhere meaningful without being disruptive to everyone around me.