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Michael asked: “I recently bought a gaming laptop. If I were going to hookup a monitor and keyboard to it and leave the laptop closed, will that be more work for the laptop than just using the laptop display? Will it cause the laptop to heat up more, or will it actually help keep the heat down because it’s a separate screen and the laptop will be closed?”
Michael, the screen doesn’t really generate a lot of heat (don’t take our word for it, you can test that by touching it…), so you won’t be keeping the heat down by using an external monitor.
If you were just doing office work, or general web browsing, running your laptop with the screen down would probably be just fine, modern laptops don’t heat up too much, but you’re talking about gaming.
Gaming, in particular, will heat up your laptop like few other tasks can
Gaming, in particular, will heat up your laptop like few other tasks can, and you may need the best heat dissipation you can get.
Some laptops models do just fine with the lid closed, they don’t have vents around the keyboard, and they have fans strong enough to cool the computer whether it’s closed or open, but that’s not the case of all of them.
If you can keep the laptop open and off to the side, but the screen being on bothers you, a compromise may be to plug in the external monitor, press the Windows key and P, and just ask it to use the external monitor only. That should turn off the built-in monitor, without compromising any air flow.
For other tasks, we’d tell you not to worry about it, but for gaming, opening the lid may be a better choice.
Audio archived for at least 6 months
Even more. My Asus N550j was doing emergency power off when layed CS:Go just about 40min having lid closed.
Another case, my father used his macbook pro almost olvays closed and after couple of years it burn out and he went to service center.
So my experience: do not use closed lid at all. Just switch off internal monitor if you dont like to have both.
The main issue is: check how your laptop cooling is designed, specifically: where it blows hot air out. Many designs blow air under the screen, above the keyboard, and closing the lid severely restricts hot air out path. If a cooling system takes colder air from underneath the case, and blows the hot air on sides or back of the case the cooling is going to be practically identical with the top lid closed or opened.