[Debian-eeepc-devel] Running Eee with lid closed considered harmful?

[Ben Armstrong]

On Tue, 21 Apr 2009 12:28:55 +0200
Santi Béjar <santi at agolina.net> wrote:
> It has been discussed in the past. The main issue is that the Eee uses
> the keyboard to cool the machine, so the only sane/safe thing to do is
> to suspend.
> 
> You can always, at your own risk, modify the action in /etc/acpi/actions/lid.sh.

I think the risks may be somewhat overstated, so we need to be clearer
on this point.  Please supply evidence that this is harmful.  My
experience with the model 4G is that it is safe to leave the lid closed
along as you apply some common sense.

My Eee is now nearly a year and a half old.  In that time, I have more
than once accidentally left the lid closed with the system running
*and* left it in that state in my not-well-ventilated bag.  Upon
discovering this hours later, the temperature was reported to be around
68C.  There is no evidence that the system sustained any damage from
these events.  Granted, this is only one data point, so you can't draw
any general conclusions from it.  However, it suggests that if you
exercise some prudence (i.e. don't leave it running with the lid
closed and run something CPU-intensive and/or block the vent) there
should be no problem running it with the lid closed, even for extended
periods of time.

Ben